Yup... the registration is there to help prevent people from pretending to be each other. If there were no registration then anyone could come login as "ArrowStar" and pretend to be you. Once you register a name, it is yours and no one else can use it.
If anyone is concerned about privacy... all that is required is a login name, password and email address. Also, no need to worry about me reading your password... it is encrypted so that not even I can read it. (If you loose your password, all I can do is kill the account and let you re-register)