I use my real name. My real name is distinct enough that when you search for it, you find results almost exclusively about the real me. When you search for my

I use my real name. My real name is distinct enough that when you search for it, you find results almost exclusively about the real me. When you search for my real name, you find almost exclusively accounts on sites like github, and a couple others, where I get to control entirely what is being shown. That's pretty good internet real estate and branding. At that point, it doesn't matter that my name is somewhat rare. If my name was Brad Pitt, by some sad coincidence, I could never own the internet for that name. But for mine, I can easily. Makes me appear like a way bigger deal than I am. And I don't want the first search result for my name to be my facebook. I don't want to be my facebook. I'd rather be my github. Not exclusively for professional reasons. When it comes to professionalism: We internet people don't get weird looks when we show someone something we've done under a "nickname", but we also don't get attribution for it. If your github name is "randominternetguy69", you might show it to your interviewer, but you won't get it attributed to you. Not because they don't believe its you - simply because you don't feel confident enough about it to own it. If you don't have confidence in your own work, why should they.