
My Name Is Me - Supporting your freedom to choose the name you use online - ChrisArchitect
http://my.nameis.me/
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wccrawford
I think it's sad that we need a site like this. I thought Google understood
Privacy when they built Google Plus, but it's quickly becoming apparent that
they don't. That the whole 'real name' debacle has lasted this long is
honestly a surprise to me. I thought for sure they'd understand as soon as the
first person complained. Now that there are thousands, it's becoming
ridiculous.

~~~
derefr
I've found this whole argument strange from both sides, but I couldn't quite
put a finger on why until now. You reminded me:

> I thought Google understood Privacy when they built Google Plus

G+ has this thing called "circles." It was all very hyped-up when it came out.
It allows different groups of people to see different facets of you, and
basically treat you as the subset of "you" that you want each group to see.

Now, the argument we've all been having, is that different groups of people
call you by different names. Your family likely call you by your "real" (birth
certificate) name. Your friends might call you something else. Strangers—and
if you're an online celebrity, you know a lot of them—know you by yet a third
name. See what this is suggesting?

 _Your name should be a property of a circle, not of your identity_. In fact,
almost _all_ your attributes should be circle-attached, rather than profile-
attached. Remember the spat about people who wanted to not share their gender
online? What if you could be genderless to most folks, male to business
contacts, and a female-to-male transsexual to friends?

(Of course, it gets a bit more complicated for the people you've put in
multiple circles when you share something with both of those groups—I imagine
there should then be a "circle precedence order" where metadata from circle X
overrides metadata from circle Y when both are available. But sheesh, these
are problems Google engineers should be eating for breakfast.)

Your "public" persona, then, is just metadata attached to the lowest-
precedence, virtual "universe of discourse" circle that encircles everyone you
don't actually have any relationship with. Your personal settings for what G+
should refer to you as are just the metadata of a highest-precedence circle
that just contains you. And so on.

~~~
MartinCron
I love this idea, I can even see an interface where the circles can be
overlapping, making it obvious that only people in the "innermost" circle can
call me "Marty" or see pictures of my Hello Kitty coffee mug.

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jdost
And the freedom they have is choosing the services they use as well. If a
service wants you to use your real name and you don't want to, you don't use
the service. That's the beauty of freedom, you are not required to use a
service like Google Plus. Freedom is not that Google Plus is suddenly a
governed body that has to adhere to some unwritten law that they cannot
require real names.

~~~
troymc
You aren't required to use Facebook, you're free to use alternatives, but it's
become so ubiquitous that having a Facebook profile has become necessary to
participate fully in online life. (Think of the Facebook like buttons and
"login with Facebook" options you see scattered all over the web, or
TechCrunch comments, for that matter.)

To put it another way, why should people with legitimate reasons for using
pseudonyms be forced into a ghetto? What kind of freedom is that?

~~~
matwood
_but it's become so ubiquitous that having a Facebook profile has become
necessary to participate fully in online life._

I must not be participating fully in an 'online life' then. When I look at my
non-tech friends I do much more participating online than any of them do and
they all have FB accounts and I do not.

~~~
sp332
You can't even sign in to some websites without a FB or Twitter login.

~~~
adambyrtek
Blame those sites for that, there is no excuse for not offering alternative
login options.

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dreamdu5t
How about we stop supporting Google and Facebook? That's the best way to make
your point.

You can also MAKE UP A NAME. It's like nobody has the basic critical thinking
skills to just use a fake name.

~~~
unicornporn
> How about we stop supporting Google and Facebook? That's the best way to
> make your point.

I think it's a very good thing to articulate what is wrong with things. That
way they evolve, at least sometimes.

~~~
pessimizer
Especially here, where the only reason we discuss google and facebook is
because we might try to work on it, work with it, or compete against it.

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myffical
This is a good lesson for everyone who builds online communities: Some design
decisions that are acceptable to the majority, like the real-name policy, harm
groups of people who are already marginalized.

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PositveZero
No one is required to give their real name to Google Plus because no one is
required to use Google Plus. If you do not agree with Google's policy, don't
use Google's services. They are Google's services and Google is allowed to set
policy as they see fit. No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service.

~~~
dangero
So you're saying that the community has no place in attempting to guide and
shape the social networking sites that they use?

Social networks are becoming a must and you can't just choose to use whichever
fits your needs. You have to use the one that everyone else uses. Many people
are forced to use these sites for business reasons. Often it's even required
by a job, so suggesting that people have a choice is true to a point because
they could find a new job. For many people it's probably about as true as
saying that you don't have to have a bank account.

~~~
a3_nm
The community should probably spend less time complaining about how existing
centralized social networks are abusive, and spend more time developing, using
and promoting federated alternatives. The fact that you have to use the one
that everyone else uses is not a universal truth but a regrettable state of
affairs which should be fixed.

~~~
dangero
I agree. Unfortunately, I don't have any faith in the diaspora project. I'd be
curious to hear what other solutions are out there that people are working on.

~~~
michaelchisari
Here's my project, it was one of the first:

<http://opensource.appleseedproject.org>

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MrKurtHaeusler
I support this site as I also use a "pseudonym" (I call it a real name, but I
will use pseudonym in this post to avoid confusion) almost everywhere. The
only place my legal name is found these days is passport, birth certificate,
forms related to visas, and the bank. Even my payslips, and the insurance
company use my pseudonym. One degree has my legal name on it, but my current
degree will have my pseudonym on it. Drivers license has legal on it. Medical
insurance has pseudonym.

But I gotta say, facebook and google never asked for any proof of name, so I
use my pseudonym there. They are probably the two places I have had the least
trouble using my chosen name with.

Shrug. Maybe people should pick believable ones.

I would much rather see people fighting for the right to use their chosen
names when interacting with the government and banks etc, than bloody
facebook.

~~~
stinkytaco
I must admit that I'm confused here. Why (and how) use a pseudonym for medical
insurance, payslips and degrees but not for passports. I'm not even sure how
that would work. If your legal ID has your name on it, how could you use a
psuedonym effectively?

Why not just change your name?

~~~
MrKurtHaeusler
Well I use my pseudonym wherever I can. I would like to have it on my passport
etc, but I cannot without legally changing it. I guess legal ID is less
important than most people think, as I am able to use my pseudonym reasonably
well.

And as far as I am concerned, I have changed my name, that is why I use the
term "real" name rather than pseudonym. To me the legal name is actually more
"pseudo" than the name I chose.

I have contacted those in charge of passports and birth certificates etc, and
let them know that I have changed my name, and offered them the chance to
correct the mistake in their files, but they have decided not to do so, which
is up to them I guess.

I may undergo the legal process of "changing my name", making it official, at
some stage, but to me that is like me paying to help someone else correct a
mistake in their files. Also there isn't really any pressing need to. It may
even be advantageous to have my real name, which gets used everywhere, and
which I am known by, but the government knows me by a different one.

Heh you know I shouldn't even be talking about the government as if it were a
single entity. I just checked my tax stuff, and it is all my chosen name
there. Not sure how that happened.

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romey
This seems like making a site like whohatesshoes.me, advocating for banning
restaurants requiring shoes. If you disagree with the requirements of a
service, you shouldn't use it (assuming the requirements are legal).

That said, the design of this site is pretty slick

