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I love this topic; I love knowing where people get their online names, and I've always sort of assumed that there's some sort of correlation between the name and the person behind it, an identification at the very least, a wish to assume some of the characteristics the person associates with the name, or even a new personality altogether.
I've never used my full real name on the internet. Only recently have I set my email address to reply with my last name, which is something even those who've met me don't necessarily know; I was sending resumes and such and forgot to reset it, which means that my last name is known by people who don't need to know it. On the one hand, I hate that; on the other, it's interesting to see what kind of trail one leaves on the internet with both names.
Since I don't like to use my real name and have been posting to all kinds of message boards for years, I've left a trail of psuedonyms. Betty Crocker, Sparky (Sparks, originally) Dawntreader, and Cordelia (years before the character on Buffy!) used to post a lot to usenet, especially alt. music groups and alt.tv.real-world. I was deluxe for years on IRC, and then elphaba - a nick that has since been stolen pretty much anywhere I might want to use it. Now I have to sulk about as sabriel or lirael on the rare times I try to sign on. Lirael gets used here and there on various message boards. Serroi on yahoo until I decided it didn't suit me anymore. On diaryland, which is probably where I have the "largest" web "presence", whatever that means or matters, I'm achren - who is an evil sorceress. I chose it on a whim because all my favored usernames - elphaba, mehitabel, eilonwy, and at least half a dozen more - were taken. I'm also straylight there, though it's locked, and there's a secret diary with a name from norse legend. My email address is from Arthurian legend. They're all, almost without exception, from books, from characters I admire in one way or another - except achren, which is a bit odd.
So I have a multiple personality issue when it comes to usernames/fictionsuits. This one is as close as anything but my never-used hotmail account gets to my real name, and only by association: I chose straylight because I liked the genderlessness of the word. I think it's a lovely word, also, and the images it calls to mind for me are tangled and immense, like the William Gibson creation I took the name from. I wanted to be vague, and unassociated with the rest of my web identities, but here I've gone and - because I couldn't resist - listed more of them than not.
My real name is Molly, which would be boring if not for the Gibson association. And I haven't posted here in a million years, by the way - I've been in Australia, paying for my internet access. Now that I am home (sigh) and back to unlimited, I will undoubtedly be a lot more chatty. |
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