3 ms·

I .. have a hard time taking that serious. Let us stick with the site in question, G+. You can block persons very, very easily. It's just 2(?) clicks away. Som

I .. have a hard time taking that serious. Let us stick with the site in question, G+. You can block persons very, very easily. It's just 2(?) clicks away. Someone posts in your (extended) circles using a pseudonym and you don't like it? You can _easily_ make sure you'll never be disturbed in that perfect world of 'valid' names. I see no freedom issues here? The _real_ issue is, that you want your personal believe, which in this case might align with what Google arbitrary enforces or not, forced upon everyone. To save you those 2 clicks. And maybe (I'm not trying to make this a personal attack, but this is more or less the only reason I can actually imagine as being 'pro real names' among users) you just don't want to end up in the dilemma that your mum is listed as KnittingGoddess and your girlfriend as PinkUnicorn, because that would mean that you'd either have to block them or - cope with other people's choice of a name. Again, your argument is really, really backwards. I was suspended on G+ because of a name that didn't conform to the rule (intentionally, I set it to "short-version-of-firstname .", as a protest. It was my real name before) Now - did you see me somewhere? To help you out: I'd be "Ben .". Have you seen me in your circles? In your incoming stream? No? So... Why do you bother? YOU are in charge of your personal network. Here, like in any other social network. Over at FB you'd just not befriend me. Here you'd just not put me in a circle. If I'd do that though you'd notice that a creepy person with no real name is in your incoming stream and you'd block me easily. Done. You _have_ your environment. You still fail to understand the difference between rules about one's own profile ("I'd like to be darklajid") and some weird filtering that is going to happen anyway, names or not ("I'd like to see nothing but realnames"). Listen - you can choose what you see on the network. I want to choose what represents me. You have to use the controls I talked about (i.e. blocking users) _anyway_, because you'll encounter people that you don't care about/that annoy you. I cannot imagine a reason for not being able to use these same mechanisms to build yourself the illusion of a world without pseudonyms. What stops you? Where's the danger for your use case?

philwelch 15y ago
Well, suppose I want to find my friend Henry Jones on Google+, but I can't because his pseudonym is Jameson Soulblighter, and since I know him from real life rather than online, I had no idea. Now I'll never get back in touch with him. Now, it's possible that Henry Jones doesn't want to be found, but you can set your profile to be non-searchable.
- dagw 15y ago
  Well, suppose I want to find my friend Jameson Soulblighter on Google+, but I can't because his real name is Henry Jones, and since I know him from online rather than real life, I had no idea. Now I'll never get back in touch with him. I know enough people online that I'd consider friends and yet I don't know their full legal name.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    It's probably fair to say that if you are close friends with certain people and yet don't know their real names, you're already keeping in touch with them somewhere on the internet anyway, and how completely different people use completely different websites is frankly not your business.
    - darklajid 15y ago
      > how completely different people use completely different websites is frankly not your business. Likewise? This is not helpful. Some people want their pseudonym as 'main' handle, optionally adding their real name _if they please_. That would solve the usecase further above. Other people want to use their real name and _keep other people out unless they comply_. I really don't get it how you can try to put it different while keeping a straight face.
      - philwelch 15y ago
        optionally adding their real name _if they please_. That would solve the usecase further above. Um, one of the primary use cases of a social network is to search for people you know in real life by their real names. Making that entire thing "optional" hinders that. If your primary use case is to use a pseudonym, the entire rest of the web is more or less set up for you that way already.
        darklajid 15y ago
        How can you state that as an absolute truth? For you (and maybe a lot of people, granted) the primary use case seems to be "Hey, let's search for that guy I know". For me it's not. I _still_ like to use these networks. Along the whole thread you failed to provide a single decent argument why other people need to use their real name except for "_I_ want to find them like that". Great. But this attitude is not what I'd consider social in the first place. If I'm darklajid on G+ or not, you don't see it. If your own friends in real life _want_ to connect with you in a social network, they better make sure that you can find them or write 'Puffy1982' on a napkin in that bar you meet and tell you to look them up using that pseudonym. Do you only meet people that give you their full name? You go out, and everyone in a pub introduces himself as 'Hi, my name is John Smith' so that you're able to find them on Facebook? Or is it rather like 'Hey, I'm Ben. Nice to meet you'. And - y'know what? I'm Benjamin according to my passport and you still don't have my last name. No way to find me with only that bits of information. So your use case falls apart for casual encounters, unless you already exchange explicit details. "Hey, can you add me on Facebook? You find me as ..." works with pseudonyms just that well. Don't say real names are easier to remember, write or pronounce or I have a huge pile of counter examples. Countering the last open point: If you want to (for example) find your old class mates from primary school by their real name, there are sites for that. They specialize on this particular need of yours. That is not a primary function of a social network in my personal opinion. Bottom line: Your use case is not universal, you can do whatever you like. Consider returning the favor to others.

philwelch 15y ago

Well, suppose I want to find my friend Henry Jones on Google+, but I can't because his pseudonym is Jameson Soulblighter, and since I know him from real life rather than online, I had no idea. Now I'll never get back in touch with him. Now, it's possible that Henry Jones doesn't want to be found, but you can set your profile to be non-searchable.

dagw 15y ago
Well, suppose I want to find my friend Jameson Soulblighter on Google+, but I can't because his real name is Henry Jones, and since I know him from online rather than real life, I had no idea. Now I'll never get back in touch with him. I know enough people online that I'd consider friends and yet I don't know their full legal name.
- philwelch 15y ago
  It's probably fair to say that if you are close friends with certain people and yet don't know their real names, you're already keeping in touch with them somewhere on the internet anyway, and how completely different people use completely different websites is frankly not your business.
  - darklajid 15y ago
    > how completely different people use completely different websites is frankly not your business. Likewise? This is not helpful. Some people want their pseudonym as 'main' handle, optionally adding their real name _if they please_. That would solve the usecase further above. Other people want to use their real name and _keep other people out unless they comply_. I really don't get it how you can try to put it different while keeping a straight face.
    - philwelch 15y ago
      optionally adding their real name _if they please_. That would solve the usecase further above. Um, one of the primary use cases of a social network is to search for people you know in real life by their real names. Making that entire thing "optional" hinders that. If your primary use case is to use a pseudonym, the entire rest of the web is more or less set up for you that way already.
      - darklajid 15y ago
        How can you state that as an absolute truth? For you (and maybe a lot of people, granted) the primary use case seems to be "Hey, let's search for that guy I know". For me it's not. I _still_ like to use these networks. Along the whole thread you failed to provide a single decent argument why other people need to use their real name except for "_I_ want to find them like that". Great. But this attitude is not what I'd consider social in the first place. If I'm darklajid on G+ or not, you don't see it. If your own friends in real life _want_ to connect with you in a social network, they better make sure that you can find them or write 'Puffy1982' on a napkin in that bar you meet and tell you to look them up using that pseudonym. Do you only meet people that give you their full name? You go out, and everyone in a pub introduces himself as 'Hi, my name is John Smith' so that you're able to find them on Facebook? Or is it rather like 'Hey, I'm Ben. Nice to meet you'. And - y'know what? I'm Benjamin according to my passport and you still don't have my last name. No way to find me with only that bits of information. So your use case falls apart for casual encounters, unless you already exchange explicit details. "Hey, can you add me on Facebook? You find me as ..." works with pseudonyms just that well. Don't say real names are easier to remember, write or pronounce or I have a huge pile of counter examples. Countering the last open point: If you want to (for example) find your old class mates from primary school by their real name, there are sites for that. They specialize on this particular need of yours. That is not a primary function of a social network in my personal opinion. Bottom line: Your use case is not universal, you can do whatever you like. Consider returning the favor to others.