Why Don't We Use Our Own Names?

[DanielBrenton]

To all --

It's been a while since I've posted here, and I've gotten involved in a number of other forums. I have become very mindful of the fact that very few people actually use their real name (or something resembling a real name) as their "handle."

Being a former (*blush*) AOL user, I remember there being character limits at the time, and I had to get pretty creative to find something that suited. So to some extent I can see that.

I am mindful of this for a more personal reason. For quite a while I used the pen name of "L. George Daniels." When I really really got down to the reason for why I was doing it, the answer was because I was ashamed of my parents. After working with that for a while I finally copped to it -- my name (after all) is my name, and my parents (after all) are my parents, and that was the end of that.

Now that I'm attempting to make a presence for myself on the internet, to some extent I'm inviting personal scrutiny. I need to let people know I'm not showing a false face because there are times I want them to take seriously what I'm saying. So to that end I feel it's important to avoid any sense of duplicity.

My point here is that most of the people I see online at the forum at the moment are either using some clever handle or at most their first names. There were only about three people other than myself that were using something that looked like a full (first and last) name. This forum is no exception -- in fact, it's probably "worse" at the other ones I frequent.

So my question is: why are we doing this?

[mattsonn]

Because Mom always told us not to give our personal information on the internet. As you see by my name, I didn't really listen.

[Matt Willard]

Paranoia, I think. At least in my case. My normal online handle is inappropriate for this kind of forum in my opinion (nothing too horrible, just that it doesn't really fit this enviroment), but you know, people may just not trust people on the Internet. That is a valid concern in some ways, but in others, if you're offering only your real name, it's not gonna do much (unless the other person you're talking to is a very ambitious identify thief or something).

[DanielBrenton]

Matt(s) --

I appreciate the candor. This is one forum I know I can ask a question and get thoughtful answers (which is totally cool as far as I'm concerned).

[Markus74]

Because if you use your real name then people can google up everything you've ever wrote somewhere. Even if it's something intelligent, a little bit of privacy can't hurt ... can it?

[ReallyGoodIdeas]

Mine was purely because I messed up logging in the first time, so tried again using my business name and email. I'm Hazel Rogers and live in Melbourne - look me up! I reckon that if I have something to hide I'm hiding it from myself as well, and I'm into full disclosure.

On that topic, I put something onto freecycle, and got a lecture from a woman who reckoned I wasn't safe giving out my name and suburb on the internet. She was imploring me to use a pseudonym on the freecycle list to stop loonies finding me. She said people could look me up, find I'm single and steal my stuff. Or worse!!

Personally I reckon talking like that is just attracting violent behaviour, and I believe I am perfectly safe letting anyone know who and where I am.

Joy to you
Hazel

[Susie]

Originally Posted by Markus74

Because if you use your real name then people can google up everything you've ever wrote somewhere. Even if it's something intelligent, a little bit of provacy can't hurt ... can it?

This is exactly my reasoning. The things I write here can potentially stay online for the rest of my life, or at the least, for years. I don't need everything I write online to be searchable-- I intend what I write here to be read by the people who visit this forum, not everyone who knows me and happens to type my name into a search engine.

[Frans]

Originally Posted by Markus74

Because if you use your real name then people can google up everything you've ever wrote somewhere. Even if it's something intelligent, a little bit of provacy can't hurt ... can it?

It's difficult to hide your identity if people really want to find out who you are (especially if there are links in your signature ).
But even then: Was könnte im schlimmsten Fall passieren, J.?

[MartialDev]

Originally Posted by Frans

It's difficult to hide your identity if people really want to find out who you are (especially if there are links in your signature ).
But even then: Was könnte im schlimmsten Fall passieren, J.?

From govermnents, maybe, but not from individuals. I use my real name on some forums, but not this one; I don't want a potential employer finding this board, and mistakenly concluding that I support all the arguments on it.

[Brutha]

Everything you write online today under your real full name is part of you resume when you apply for a job.

I want to have the freedom to write thing in an internet forum that don't turn up when someone googles my name.

It's difficult to hide your identity if people really want to find out who you are (especially if there are links in your signature ).

You can hide your identity from the google spider that reads the forum.

Sure someone who know me personally and read this forum can see who I am. But someone who knows me but doesn't read this forum can't.

[Akashic_Librarian]

I have no worries about giving my Real Name, it is Philip Nelson, I am 16, I live in West Yorkshire, My Parents are both Normal, respectable people and I am not embarassed by myself in any way, shape or form.


However I choose my handle because it occured to me that if you put a face to a name, or previous writings (Which can be googled, I had a blog for a short time, I never got that interested) people tend to prejudge you. I like people to have an unbiased, free-from-judgement view of me. Plus I think that we can all safely say that none of us are anymore the skin we wear, or the flesh beneath it or the bone benath that, we are ideas, and minds, only. The body does not answer our posts, our mind does, and our mind is ever changing, I am sure that if I looked back on my previous thoughts and beliefs, I would consider myself to be foolish, as would anyone else, but that is not me, This is me. I am The Akashic Librarian.

That name has a meaning to me, I originally picked it from Divine Inspiration, I simply plucked it from the air.

But as time went by I noticed it had relevance, first in my efforts to reach the Akashic Library, then in my aspirations to learn and grow, and these days it means to me, that I am a keeper of knowledge, and it is my job, my duty, to guide others, to teach others this very special, this Akashic Knowledge, and guide them.

I hope this answers your question. I also get the distinct feeling that yoru question was not ALL that you anted to know.

[DanielBrenton]

Akashic, and All --

Not clear if there were any unconscious intentions on my part of wanting to know anything else, but consciously, no. If the question raised any hackles or crinkled any foreheads, or anyone felt browbeaten into offering more than they were comfortable with, I apologize.

Yes, there are risks standing on the world stage. Maybe I am a fool (or perhaps a foole?) to do it.

I tend to not try to get into other people's shoes because I have a hard enough time getting into my own. (A razor blade can't cut itself, as they say.)

Akashic -- the simple idea of the Akashic Records fascinates me. Is there a good on-line reference of reasonable depth on the subject you can recommend?

[Healthyfit]

Anonymity...I have googled a couple of people online just to be nosey. I don't want anyone doing that to me

[Cron]

Originally Posted by Frans

It's difficult to hide your identity if people really want to find out who you are (especially if there are links in your signature ).
But even then: Was könnte im schlimmsten Fall passieren, J.?

In my opinion using aliases and watching what you put in a profile is probably effective enough for most people.

Somebody has to be willing to do the work of tracking someone down and most people aren't.

[Frans]

Originally Posted by MartialDev

From govermnents, maybe, but not from individuals. I use my real name on some forums, but not this one;

C., though I'm only an average web user, it took me only a few minutes to find out where you live, what your personal interests are, the name of your wife and your children, even what you have purchased on eBay lately.

If your full name and one of your nicknames or email addresses is somewhere on web documents, and if it is possible to find a relation between these documents (through links, for example), it's a piece of cake to track you down.
If I can do that, everybody can.

[Michael Chui]

More and more, I've learned to stand by anything and everything that I say and do. I've never claimed perfection in my past: I've done some pretty bad stuff, some of which no one is aware I was the one who did it.

I've always been pretty careful about choosing a name to identify myself with, and I like to dig for the story behind others' names, until I realized that most people just pick something fairly random and run with it.

I don't mind if someone digs up something I wrote with my name on it. I said it. You want to judge me for it? I deserve it, good or bad.

[Akashic_Librarian]

Daniel I recommend Robert Bruce's book, Astral Dynamics. Also Astral Dynamics | Astral Projection, Energy Body, Healing, Kundalini, Auras, Self-Defense and Astral Dynamics :: Index have some very useful information.

The idea also fascinated me when I first heard it. Something about it just captivated me, it drew me in. I have not accessed the Records in the Astral as of yet, but I have accessed it from the Physical plane. I have come to believe that the Records are connected to the Body - Mind Temple and our intrevounsly linked to all people on Earth and in the Universe. However thats just a preliminary guess of mine, but I have a knack for understanding these things

[DanielBrenton]

Akashic --

Thank you. I'll take a look at those.

[MartialDev]

Originally Posted by Frans

C., though I'm only an average web user, it took me only a few minutes to find out where you live, what your personal interests are, the name of your wife and your children, even what you have purchased on eBay lately.

Because I have not taken any pains to hide myself; quite the opposite actually. Rest assured you won't be tracking me without my implicit permission.

P.S. Haven't purchased anything on eBay lately.

[Frans]

Originally Posted by MartialDev

P.S. Haven't purchased anything on eBay lately.

Then I must have confused you with somebody who uses one of your nicknames at eBay.
(last purchases on eBay were on Nov-03-06 - 7 items in total)

[Lucas]

Oddlly enough, I have never used me real name on a forum before...I dunno why I did it here either. I am going to have to think about this, heh.

[Blaine Moore]

I am slowly building a brand around my name, so I stopped using my nickname as a handle on places where I want to build up a reputation of expertise, knowledge, or experience (be it transfer from myself to others or others to myself).

[Brutha]

Then I must have confused you with somebody who uses one of your nicknames at eBay.
(last purchases on eBay were on Nov-03-06 - 7 items in total)

I guess that is the point. Different People share the same Nicknames.
If you google for example my real name I "own" half of the hits. If you google my nickname I "own" only a fraction.

[Mark Lapierre]

I was once on TV telling all of Australia that I take (took) drugs. I'm quite confident that anything I say on this or any other forum online couldn't be of any greater detrimental use than that.

I do my best to take responsibility for all my words and actions, good or bad.

I understand that some people will see something like past drug use as a reason to disregard me (or worse), but I'm quite certain that I also wouldn't want a person like that in my life.

I am who I am and I won't hide that because it might be used against me.

[DanielBrenton]

(This thread, like the Energizer Bunny, just keeps going and going ... )

I think most of us have done the "vanity search," going through the exercise of "Googling" ourselves to see what comes up. I went through this exercise a few months ago and came up with a few "ouches." Nothing outright hateful, fortunately.

In my own defense, I wrote a "Vanity, Thy Name is Blogger" piece, that gives my side of the "ouches." (It seems to me a lot of folks have written their own versions of this, in some cases under the same title.)

(Well, I thought it was original title at the time ... )

For better or worse, even if I had stayed out of anything on the internet there would still have been "hits" for me.

Like the Djinn of Nuclear Power, the Djinn of Information has escaped, and there is simply no one who will drive him back into his bottle.

I'm free! I'm FREE!! Ah hahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!

[belugagirl]

Interesting question. When I signed up on this forum, it never even occured to me to use my real name, mostly because I think coming up with a handle is fun, and is an opportunity to express myself in some small way. I like the handles on here. I think they reveal something about the poster that just a proper name wouldn't. I can tell something (albeit just a LITTLE something) about the person who would choose such a handle.

Incidentally, the "beluga" in my handle refers to the species of whale, not to the color white in Russian--although the whale is named that because of the Russian word. On a kayaking trip in Canada a few years ago, I had an encounter with a wild beluga whale. It came right up to the side of my boat three times, checking me out, letting me touch it. It was the biggest thrill of my life. I love animals, and since this one came to me, I like to think of it as a sort of totem animal for me.

[John Hill]

Daniel,

I think most people use a "handle" so they can basically remain anonymous yet say what they truly believe without anyone ever being able to judge them or judge what they have to say. It comes down to a basic human insecurity, we want to say what we really feel but we don't want to allow our peers to persecute us for what we believe.

It seems to me like many young people who are perhaps in school or college or only in their 20's are hitting many of the internet forums looking for help and wanting to share information with like minded people without having to make any form of intimate contact by sharing real names or personal details.

We live in a media dominated world that trys to instil in us a sense of fear. Be fearful of what you say or do because we are always watching you. We see good people persecuted by the media every day in an effort to make money at any cost. In a world like this why give your real name if you don't need to. Especially on a personal development site where sometimes the topics might be of a sensitive nature it just makes it easier to remain anonymous.

I have chosen to use my name as my website link comes at the end of each of my posts so for me it's no problem as if people want to check out my site they can learn a little bit more about me and the topics I like to write about.

Cheers,
John

[asrai]

My psuedonym is more likely to get you information about me than my real name.

(There is some cree leader with my real name that is everywhere in the news).

[Causalien]

My reason for using a handle is different from the reason others did. The sad truth about my real name is that it is too common and a quick search gave me a few tens of thousands of hits with other people that has similar names.

Since the conception of google, it's easy to pin down someone online anyway, so I choose a handle that no one else used and it has created a trail on the net that is easily traceable.

I stand behind everything I've left on the net so far and doesn't regret doing it, so there's nothing to hide.

[Michael Chui]

I think uniqueness is an excellent reason to have a handle.