Regarding #6: I've found through experimentation that it's totally OK for me to just be opaque about my identity online. I'm not anonymous at all, just that if

Regarding #6: I've found through experimentation that it's totally OK for me to just be opaque about my identity online. I'm not anonymous at all, just that if a prospective employer were to Google me, they'd not find my meager internet presence. It's not that I'm hiding anything, but in the spirit of #6, not hiding something doesn't mean you have to advertise it either. I've never had an employer give enough of a shit to see my social media accounts. And while I admit this is probably a position of privilege in some ways, I feel like almost anyone in SWE or wanting to get into SWE is better off this way anyways. Again, it's not about deception. If I were asked, I'd say I don't have any professional internet presence (which is true, I don't. This is me as a person here, not me as an employee.) I of course will link my GitHub, but links from my internet presence only point in the direction of my GitHub, and not the other way around. So if you were really curious, you could dig. Nobody cares to do that, though. I think employers that search are mostly just looking for blatant red flags to try to simplify their lives, and thus it's mutually beneficial to keep a lower profile online even if you don't do anything wrong. Of course, in my case, it also helps to have a super common name :) But still. Being "just" a pseudonym most places is fine.