Building an online identity

Kermi

Elite Member
Nov 7, 2007
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I was recently approached (via private message on LiveJournal of all things) by someone who had tracked me to there as the only alternate contact I had listed on my DevniantArt account. Their request was simple: they noticed I hadn't used deviantArt recently and wondered if they could have the account. Apparently they go by the nickname Kermi as well and hated to see the name going to waste.
My first impulse was to decline their friendly request. After all, I got there first, the account was mine to have.
But on reflection, just why the hell would I want a deviantArt account? The friends I had there stopped posting art long ago, and the journal posts are usually cross-posted to LiveJournal or of no interest to me. I am not an artist myself. I had not visited the site in some time.

In this case "some time" amounts to four years. I have held the account since 2003 and not logged in since 2006. Racking my brains for hazy green-grey memories I tried to recall how many times I distinctly remembered logging into dA between registration and the day I could no longer be bothered logging in.

Ten times? More? less? It certainly never made it into my bookmarks folder for regular visitation. I just registered there so if I felt the urge to visit, I could, without feeling like an outsider.

In any case, it felt like no loss to me to give up the username to this person. I posted a journal entry on Da (my first and only) letting my friends who still use the site that no, my account wasn't jacked - someone else would be using it now.

But I started to wonder at the wider implications here.

It's easy to forget just how long I've been using the internet. It has in fact been over 13 years since I started surfing the intertubes. I have probably at one time or another been registered at literally hundreds of message boards, community websites and social networks.
I regularly visit and maintain posting habits at perhaps a dozen (keep in mind I am of course referring the message boards and other online communities. Obviously I visit more than a dozen websites... hell, I read more webcomics than that).

Some of the sites no longer exist but most still do.

I reflected on this. Hundreds of websites across the dozens of email addressses I've had since my initial forays after I cunningly registered the email address [email protected], assuming the handle Iain-Paul Freeley. You may better know him by his first two initials.
In all of my online interactions I used some lame pseudonym, even to my real life friends on ICQ and IRC.
In 1998 that I joined my first internet message board and even then I hastily registered under the name WedgeAntilles, because it was the first Star Wars related name that came to mind and the message board was the Jedi Council at theforce.net

I digress. No one is reading this for my internet life story.

The point is, at some point I decided I if needed to be a part of something I felt this needed to be unified under one recognisable username. I became Kermi online, and pretty much any site I visited that offered the option, I registered on it.
Sometimes it's because you can't view content or comment unless you're registered. Sometimes just because the option is there.

In any case, I have developed an internet history, an electronic trail I suppose of my browsing habits as they've evolved over time.

Maybe I'm just more attached to my usual handle - it's uncommon enough that when I sign up at a website or message board I don't have to adorn it with extra letters, numbers or inappropriate punctuation in order to help it find its place in the community. There's a good chance that if you run into Kermi on the internet, that's me you're talking to. Obviously there are other Kermis out there, but still.
On the other hand other people have less of a connection to their online identities, considering them as disposable as the free email accounts they used to register them.

So what I'm wondering is, are any other Escapists this dedicated to securing their favoured username at any old website they stumble across? Do you diligently register for memberships on websites you may well never visit a second time? Does it help you feel like part of that community? How attached are you to who you are online?
Would you prefer to maintain your e-life compeltely independently of your meatworld?
 

x0ny

New member
Dec 6, 2009
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x0ny was a username I started using back in 2003, but there are many websites I just register to see some info someone posted in a forum because they don't allow non-members to read threads. I did that for various things when hunting for information. It's only this forum where I feel I have to behave the way I do in real life.
 

keybird

New member
Jun 1, 2009
810
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Online I am not that connected, but on XBL I am extremely notorious. My GT has been changesd a few times but nothing major, TheFlyingKey, Birds of Key, now finally Keybird.
 

ultrachicken

New member
Dec 22, 2009
4,303
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I don't make friends over the interweb, so no, I don't have an attachment to who I am online.
 

Pariah87

New member
Jul 9, 2009
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It depends on the site. Paypal or ebay are very different to Pariah87 as are other more "official" places. Pariah or variants thereof is relatively new, I've had maybe 4 Alias since I started my online journey 10ish years ago. One I was particularly happy with, it was a conversation starter and everyone who frequented the same myspace chatrooms as me would recognise it, even on other sites.

Since all that closed however I have used this or a variant of on virtually every site I sign up for, not because I expect anyone to recognise it from site to site, but simply because it is my internet name. It enables me, as you say, to keep the online world and the real world seperate to a degree, if anyone on a message board or chatroom learns my name or is given my email address, they jump the gap from semi-anonymous text to a real person.
 

delet

New member
Nov 2, 2008
5,090
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In general, I keep to the few online personas I create. The first one I created was 'Aby', thus why it's first in my name on here. Aby is just a shortening of the name I used in the MMO GuildWars that I just stuck to after joining an incredibly fun guild. I made some great friends in that game but sadly, most people have moved on from that game. I can still talk to some of 'em now and then but they're mostly gone.

Next I created the name 'Zehrizan' on Xbox Live. After only a few weeks playing online I discovered that noone could pronounce that correctly. While I'd normally be ok with that, the mispronunciations steadily became more and more unbelievable. For instance, someone once put in a 'T' somewhere in my name. I still don't get how they did it. Eventually, I had people simply call me 'Z' to avoid confusion, thus the second part of my name here.

Here on the Escapist, truly the only forum I frequent her on the intarwebs, I intended on my username to simply be 'Aby', but I found that taken. After some quick thinking I decided to add both of my Online Personas together to create what I've got now. It may not be the best of usernames, but I've grown quite attached to it.

Lately through Steam, I've attained one more online persona from an interesting inside joke. I go either by aZn or Artificially aZn. It stems from some guy (He went by Turtles) commenting that I sounded like 'An azn from california'. I just ran with the joke and stuck with that ever since.(To clarify, I am not asian. That's why it's a joke...)

I think I'd prefer to keep my Internet Persona from the 'meatworld' even though I'd quite like being known as 'Z' for some reason. On the internet I'm a completely different person so it just wouldn't feel right to take that name into the 'meatworld' where I can't live up to it.


... Did I perhaps right a little more than necessary?
 

LittleAmii

New member
Mar 10, 2010
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It was good of you to give up the account. :)

As for me, I tend to shed names every year or two, being horribly aware of that electronic trail I'm leaving in my wake and of people like Anon and bad ex's.

Passwords, however, are something I'll keep forever out of nostalgia, and are usually the usernames of friends I used to know. One of which is nine years old, and so horribly unusual, that no one has ever come close to guessing, even with clues.

As for being a member of this little internet society, not so much. I'm not so great at being an attention whore, so I don't really get points for being a girl, nor am I single-mindedly persistent in posting that I garner a reputation and recognition. Losing my internet identity would do nothing to me.

However, I am amused by people who are fiercely connected to their alias, especially when they flip out when someone happens to attack them and their holy views.
 

asdasdasdasda

New member
Oct 17, 2009
253
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While I don't go out of my way to register for sites or whatever, on pretty much everything I'm either Mihz00 or Mizh00 and I doubt you'll find someone else with that name.

Edit: However when I was playing WoW and Everquest I did go out of my way to make characters on as many servers as I could just for the purpose of reserving names.
 

drizztmainsword

New member
Apr 15, 2009
152
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Mine is rather? unique. I was trying to get something "Drizzt" based when making a user name for something (I have no idea what) and I just strung three words together that quite honestly have nothing to do with each other. In any case, they make for a unique username (that nobody can pronounce) that gives me an online persona, except in the rare cases where the system doesn't allow me to have a username that is fifteen characters long.
 

atalanta

New member
Dec 27, 2009
371
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I'm Atalanta some places, but it's not my primary username. I've never seen anyone use my usual username but me, and I'd be both really surprised and kind of upset if someone did -- there's a fair number of my friends who only know me by that name instead of my real name, and it would almost feel like someone was stealing my identity.
 

Acier

New member
Nov 5, 2009
1,300
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EClaris is mine.

Except on youtube


*****.

Anyways, Ive grown used to EClaris as my eName, but I suppose if I had to get another one it wouldn't tear me apart.
 

LiftYourSkinnyFists

New member
Aug 15, 2009
912
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My image is individual to every differnt place I travel across, may it be time space and other communities. I tend to make different impressions everywhere I go I find it more of a personal experimentation with peoples reactions to different attitudes and expression. At the moment I am not maintaining any particular "image" or personality, so at the moment I'm plain sailing and a little tired.
 

Umberphoenix

New member
Jun 17, 2009
234
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I used to use Shadow Phoenix King but some websites don't allow spaces or the name was too long. In those cases I used Shadow Phoenix or ShadowPhoenix. However, those were often taken. On Konregate I registered as Umberphoenix, and I decided that that was who I was going to be from now on. My stage name is even DJ Umber.

EDIT: I also use the same avatar for all my accounts.
 

Pimppeter2

New member
Dec 31, 2008
16,479
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Well I first used Pimppeter2 on oblivionsource.com, and from there carried it out to all other places on the intertubes. So I guess, to an extent.
 

Generator

New member
May 8, 2009
1,771
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I simply chose my favorite song at the time and it made for a fittingly awesome username. I don't really register for many websites unless I know I'm planning on visiting them often or at least enough to validate spending the time on making an account, but when I do, my username is generally whatever I'm into most at the time.

As for future use of this username, the only other site I tried using it on had it marked unavailable, so if I do decide to use it, I'll probably have to insert random characters here and there to make it work.
 

Berethond

New member
Nov 8, 2008
6,474
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Hi, I'm Berethond.
Except for when I'm not, but that isn't very often. It's even spilled over into real life -- some of my school assignments bear a Bere on the top-right, with my own name underneath.

I've only ever seen this name used in two other places, though I think I was before the one and after the other. Apparently, I'm a minor character in the Forgotten Realms.

But, chances are very, very high that if you see a "Berethond" out there, it's me.
 

Aesir23

New member
Jul 2, 2009
2,861
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I started using "shewolf51" back when I was 14 or 15. While I don't go out of my way to obtain my preferred username, it is the first one I'll type in if I'm registering for a website. If it's already taken then I'll just choose a variant of it.