Most people have a partitioned identity. There is a side you show to your friends, a side you show to your colleagues, a side for your parents, for your signifi

Most people have a partitioned identity. There is a side you show to your friends, a side you show to your colleagues, a side for your parents, for your significant other and even one for your kids. An online persona is just another partition that whilst you may don't want to hide, you probably want to keep the intersection with most of the rest of the partitions to a minimum. In real world there is a physical separation. All your contacts know you by your real name but only interact with a specific partition. On the other hand, in the virtual world, all your contacts will have to interact with your one online persona. A pseudonym is an easy and practical way to have more than one online personas or keep your one persona limited to a certain group of people in your life. The people you want to interact with a certain part of your identity, are easy to reach; online nicknames are part of everyone's life. For the rest, they will have to search a bit more to find you and even then, they will be less imposed to take into account that part of your identity due to the use of a pseudonym.