diff --git a/CHANGESTODO b/CHANGESTODO
index 27a17a2..bcf1d43 100644
--- a/CHANGESTODO
+++ b/CHANGESTODO
@@ -13,6 +13,15 @@ ________________________________________________________________________
 ________________________________________________________________________
 == currently being inspected ===========================================
 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯
+- neither USE_THE_NICK or USE_AUTOALIAS work flawlessly. in the case of
+  the latter, _nick either displays without uniform for remote people,
+  or it occasionally shows a room's nick instead of the user's nick.
+  they way to solve this is to get rid of _nick in the protocol, it seems.
+  therefore we need to upgrade all servers to properly be able to display
+  _source, _target and _context in psyctext before we can start migrating
+  templates and removing _nick vars. during this tradition we keep the
+  USE_THE_NICK code running. several "invite issues" should be solved once
+  nicks are gone.
 ________________________________________________________________________
 == psyced 1.0 ==========================================================
 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯
diff --git a/world/net/include/net.h b/world/net/include/net.h
index 4ae2f6f..0903830 100644
--- a/world/net/include/net.h
+++ b/world/net/include/net.h
@@ -220,9 +220,6 @@
 # define NEW_UNLINK
 # define NEW_RENDER
 # define MUCSUC
-#else
-// the old nick code seems to introduce the remote-part bug
-# define USE_THE_NICK
 #endif
 #define GAMMA   // code that has left BETA and is in production use
 
@@ -241,6 +238,9 @@
 #  define HTFORWARD	    // let person entity buffer output for http usage
 # endif
 #else
+// the old nick code seems to introduce the remote-part bug
+// but if we don't use it, psyced will render [_nick] wrong in many places
+# define USE_THE_NICK
 //# define PRE_SPEC	    // things that changed during the spec process
 //# ifndef __PIKE__
 //#  define USE_LIVING
diff --git a/world/net/library/text.c b/world/net/library/text.c
index 55c4d37..e32a67f 100644
--- a/world/net/library/text.c
+++ b/world/net/library/text.c
@@ -73,7 +73,7 @@ varargs string psyctext(string s, mapping m, vastring data,
 		break;
 	case "_source":
 		// should this support _source_relay? var inheritance!
-#ifdef USE_THE_NICK
+#ifdef USE_THE_NICK_TOO_MUCH
 		r += p + (nick || m["_nick"] || m["_source"]
 			       || UNIFORM(source) || "?");
 #else
@@ -84,7 +84,7 @@ varargs string psyctext(string s, mapping m, vastring data,
 #endif
 		break;
 	case "_source_relay":
-#ifdef USE_THE_NICK
+#ifdef USE_THE_NICK_TOO_MUCH
 		r += p + (nick || m["_nick"] || m["_source_relay"] || "?");
 #else
 		q = m["_source_relay"] || "?";
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ varargs string psyctext(string s, mapping m, vastring data,
 #endif
 		break;
 	case "_target":
-#ifdef USE_THE_NICK
+#ifdef USE_THE_NICK_TOO_MUCH
 		r += p + (m["_nick_target"] || m["_target"] || "?");
 #else
 		q = m["_target"] || "?";
@@ -104,7 +104,7 @@ varargs string psyctext(string s, mapping m, vastring data,
 #endif
 		break;
 	case "_context":
-#ifdef USE_THE_NICK
+#ifdef USE_THE_NICK_TOO_MUCH
 		r += p + (m["_nick_place"] || m["_context"] || "?");
 #else
 		q = m["_context"] || "?";