: Very simple - of course anyone can fake their identity or invent virtually
: anything, that's not the issue here. The reason that the use of one's own
: name tends to be a mark of maturity is that those who do tend to feel no
: need to invent a new personna - they are comfortable with who they are.
I've always used my real name online, because as you say here, I never even though to invent a new online persona, it just never really occurred to me, and two, because with a name like Forrest I didn't really need a nick. I mean, my email address is just my first name at my ISP, even aside from my B.org address.
I have, however, used variants on my name depending on the context; in the Marathon community I was
"Pfhorrest" for the longest time. I still use Pfhorrest for a username on most large, popular places with overpopulated namespaces, just because "Pfhorrest" is never taken anywhere. When I moved into Myth I dropped the Pfh and went just by Forrest again (I rarely use Cameranesi just because it's such a cumbersome name, and there are never any other Forrest to confuse me with). When I began to run Myth@B.org, I found the prospect of appending "of B.org" to my name to be too tempting, and thus started showing my credentials and making a Star Trek reference at once by calling myself Forrest of B.org. (There was actually a "Locucious" [as in someone who can speak well] who worked with B.org for a while, who I loved to call Locucious of B.org :-] )
William Wallace (the Myther, not the famed Scotsman), who we all used to abbreviate WW, once decided to retaliate and call me FOBO (Forrest Of Bungie.Org). The name has since stuck, and "Fobo" is now my personal diminuitive version of my own name (as Mikey would be to Michael, for example). Close friends in person call me Fobo sometimes. I refer to myself in the third person as Fobo quite often. That's taken on a life of it's own, and I have a zillion different variants on the Fobo name - Superfobo, later Superfoborg, Fobokin Skyfscker, Fobo of the (n) Fingers, Fobos vs Demos, SUPA PHAT KUNG FOBO, FOBOT... virtually any name containing the "Fob" particle is pretty much guaranteed to be me.
But deep down inside, I'm still using my real name, just a nickname thereof in acronym form :-)
