names

Posted Jul 3, 2010 2:52 UTC (Sat) by giraffedata (guest, #1954)
In reply to: names by jpnp
Parent article: Two GCC stories

I think it's more sane than that. First of all, I dispute that NightStrike isn't a real name. What it is is a name that appears likely not to be the name he uses in parts of his life he cares about. And that makes one believe he's hiding. He wants to be able to do and say things that he can't be made to pay for in those other areas of his life.

Maybe that's an unreasonable suspicion, but I think that's at the base of people's reaction to dealing with people who go by cute screen names.

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names

Posted Jul 7, 2010 14:59 UTC (Wed) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (3 responses)

There are other interpretations, though. I've used the name I use here as an on-net pseudonym for almost twenty years now, but not as an attempt to evade real-life consequences; more as an indication of a shift in personality. Me-in-real-life *does not act* like me-on-the-net, and the name change makes that more obvious than it might otherwise be.

Now perhaps this is uncommon, but it's not unheard of.

names

Posted Jul 12, 2010 21:55 UTC (Mon) by Tet (subscriber, #5433) [Link] (2 responses)

Then, of course, there are people like me. Some 20 years ago now, I legally changed my name to be my online pseudonym. It might not sound real, but it is now my real name...

names

Posted Jul 12, 2010 22:44 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (1 responses)

There are several people who've done the same thing. The man now known as MegaZone is one.

(btw, presumably you kept a surname, for convenience's sake if nothing else? So very many things fall over, from ecommerce to random form-filling and bank applications, if you don't have a surname...)

names

Posted Jul 13, 2010 8:05 UTC (Tue) by Tet (subscriber, #5433) [Link]

No, I didn't keep a surname. And yes, only having a single name does cause all manner of things to fall over. I've got used to it by now...