I do this too!theultimateend said:I write stories and base my names of the names of characters in my stories.
As one might guess from my username here, I have a penchant for difficult names. My WoW main is Eirishkegal. I wanted Ereshkegal, Sumerian goddess of the underworld and thus the perfect name for an Undead female Shadow Priest, but it was taken, as were several variants. I finally hit on this one, seemingly a rulebreaker except for the fact that everyone has taken to calling me "Eirish" or "Eiri". Easy to type, easy to say, if you are going to pick a long complex name, make sure it clips down to a good nickname and you are fine.
In defense of picking an alternate spelling of a name that's already taken, keep in mind how many abandoned or dormant accounts there are in the system, all of them retaining their names. At signup, I was told my name was taken but wowarmory shows no one of that name on my server. Of course, wowarmory doesn't list toons under level 10, so Ereshkegal was probably started by someone on a trial account and then abandoned, or an alt someone rolled on a lark and then never deleted.