I've recently asked an artist how they want to be tagged, and it's not one of the three tags I got - specifically, their current tag is "name (artist)" but there's nothing for just "name", including no implication. How should one go through having the tag changed to just "name"?

How common a word/generic is their name? Even if it's not currently tagged for anything else, if it's something that could easily become a tag for something in the future, it'd probably be best to keep the _(artist). Otherwise you can submit a tag alias for it.

Would need to be bit more specific, because if name have possibility to be confused with any other artist, character name or other tag, then it should be kept name_(artist).

Also if there is small amount of posts, simply manually changing them or poking someone with access to tag script to do it, if there's massive amount and/or there's risk that someone in future will tag with old name, then request alias.

the artist in question is "nontoxo" so, no, no appreciable risk. I think at least one of the aliases should be realiased to the new one, especially since they're aliased to each other. Ah hell, I'll request one.

OK, seems like this is the regular case of someone not knowing how to change tag to be artist tag, so they simply do the _(artist) instead of tag type change.

There's only handful of posts under that tag, so changing them manually is the way to go and yeah, that name is in no risk of getting mixed up. With other possible artist tags though it might be required to alias.

You can change a tag's typing in the tag menu.

I am also wondering about how to tag the artist "php3":
https://e621.net/post/index/1/php3
https://e621.net/artist/show?name=php3
https://www.derpibooru.org/tags/artist-colon-php3

Why is the artist tagged as "php3" instead of LeBeeLeTrainandLeDick or lehoersdick? None of the web archive pages of the artist's now dead website say "php3" example:
http://web.archive.org/web/20130311223129/http://lehoersdick.tumblr.com/post/33851000051/edit-accidentally-uploaded-a-wip-now-its-fixed

54 URLs have been captured for this domain. --http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://lehoersdick.tumblr.com/

Other anonymized artists: https://www.derpibooru.org/tags?tq=php*&commit=Search (currently php1 through php39)

I asked about it here: https://www.derpibooru.org/tagging/request-artist-tag-aliases-here/post/3446579#post_3446579 (post #3446579 is now deleted) and received this email:

Derpy Whooves Not a Llama - Happy April Fools Day!
Site ModeratorJust a Pony
Any artist on the site with a tag of "artist:PHP[#]" have requested that they no longer be publicly associated with their work, so we have anonymized them, and removed all publicly viewable links between themselves and their art.

Internally, we still know who owns the copyright on the image, and they still control their own images, but we work to make sure that they remain anonymous.

Please do not change their tags, or post any links exposing who they really are. This is what the artist has asked for, and we are respecting their request.

*scratches head thoughtfully*

I'd argue that if they haven't asked us for anonymity, then it would go against our general principals to retag them just because another image board has done so. Technically, the entity known as "lehoersdick" doesn't seem to be around anymore and if they had a 'secret identity' (as in, another artist name where they do other work), it doesn't seem to be readily available... so... php3 is 'as good as' lehoersdick?

I dunno though. That's for the bosses to figure out :D