Add phone numbers, email addresses and human names to the list.

What do you mean we shouldn't have a first and last name input?

explains the naming conventions of every culture on the planet

Agreed! My team is constantly humbled by the mess of user data: names, birthdays, addresses, people dying or living abroad etc.

Honestly, sometimes I think about the linear algebra, AI, or robotics I learned in school and get this feeling of, "Is this what I'm doing? Stuff that feels like it should be simple?"

It's funny, even our product manager - who is a great guy - can fall into that "come on, this should be easy" mode, and I'll admit I sometimes get lulled into it too. But to his credit, every time I walk him through the actual edge cases, he totally gets it and admits it's easy to forget the on-the-ground complexity when you're in 'planning mode'.

So yeah, seeing your comment is incredibly validating.

Just validate the registration form? Surely this is a solved problem?

Uhhh...