
Google+ now lets you use any name you want - srathi
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+googleplus/posts/V5XkYQYYJqy
======
debt
Ha, what a disaster G+ has to be for Google. They must kind of be looking at
it like "ew what do we do with this thing now?"

They should've taken a more holistic and serious approach to bringing your
offline identity online. Instead they tried to copy FB. They should've just
called it Google Identity(with the same level of seriousness as Youtube's
copyright protection product: Content ID) and provided real-life perks with
associating say your Driver's license number with it which maybe would allow
me to renew my driver's license much more quickly. I don't know. G+ is just
_weak_.

I mean at the end of the day, they DO have your identity. I'm sure their
algorithms could within a certainly small margin of error determine who I am
to a reasonably high degree of probability based on nothing other than lines
in a bunch of log files(DoubleClick Ad requests on various sites, YouTube
video watch times, Google Searches based on time of day/location, mobile
usage, etc); again, regardless of where or when or how I use Google(i.e. using
igonito browsers, using a friend's phone, using a computer an internet cafe,
etc.). So why not throw all that information under one umbrella, Google
Identity, and provide it to me once I claim it.

They're likely able to treat online "behavior" as essentially unique online
fingerprints and can just associate that with individual users; that is, they
don't really need uniquely identifying data(unique IDs, usernames, etc.), they
just need to watch your online activity(regardless of if you're logged in or
have identifying cookies, etc.) for a while in order to identify you.

I assume it's because consumers probably aren't ready to know just how much
data Google actually has on them AND how much information can be extracted
from said data. It's likely pretty accurate and pretty scary.

~~~
Aldo_MX
To be honest, one differentiator that would me use Google+ over Facebook is a
-1 button.

I love to dislike things, especially if disliking them would affect their
Google ranking (I'm looking at you Quora and your dark patterns!).

Not only I would love the -1 button, but also negative endorsement, and pretty
much any Google+ feature, but with a negative twist.

That would really encourage me to use Google+, or should I say Google-.

~~~
mmanfrin
A -1 button affecting search rank would be used almost entirely by dark-hat
SEO firms.

~~~
Aldo_MX
How about a -1 that affects ranking ONLY to people who enables the feature and
follows you?

I mean, if I follow an expert in his area, it makes more sense to me to see
that he doesn't endorse spammy-website.com, than to see he endorses "Chrome
Beta for Android".

~~~
nostrademons
This used to exist - SearchWiki gave you the opportunity to either vote up a
search result or to remove it entirely. Both of these actions would affect
only your own results - there were vague plans to eventually use the data to
improve ranking, but the spam/SEO implications were never solved.

Basically people just used it to kill experts-exchange.com. Usage was tiny
otherwise, and the experts-exchange case was fixed when StackOverflow started
getting traction and Panda put the final nail into experts-exchange's coffin.

------
x1798DE
Finally.

I know it's a bit childish, but for my pseudonymous Google account, I kept
getting these notices that they were going to disable my Google+ account
unless I gave them my real name, unless I could show them documentation
proving that the pseudonym was my legal name, so I just found some pictures of
middle fingers and that sort of thing and photoshopped them onto a photo of a
license and submitted that. They give you a few chances to submit something,
so I had a little fun picking out new insulting pictures for a while, until I
got bored of it (which was almost instantly).

Obviously it wasn't going to have any effect other than to virtually flip off
some random person being paid to check IDs, but it was at least cathartic in
the face of such a stupid, stupid policy.

~~~
dogecoinbase
I've always liked just making an image with some leaked-but-still-technically-
classified information, on the (admittedly very unlikely) off chance that
someone with clearance might see it and have to get themselves debriefed.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
You should know that's a federal crime, if you're talking about leaked U.S.
classified material. Simply because you see the _Washington Post_ printing
Snowden's leaks doesn't mean handling and distributing classified information
isn't a crime. It is still classified and carries full force even though it
has been printed; no "cat out of the bag" defense applies.

Very importantly, I'm not stating an opinion on this legal situation, just
pointing it out.

~~~
mox1
100% Incorrect. If the OP has a security clearance, then maybe... At most he
is probably in violation of the NDA he signed, not any criminal laws. To
actually violate the criminal statues around Leaking classified material you
have to CAUSE ACTUAL HARM to the US government.

The original leaker obviously causes harm, but the guy submitting a public
document to Google for fun....that's going to be hard for a judge to believe.

It's remotely feasible that a person without a security clearance could be
convicted of a crime for re publishing classified documents, but it would have
to be some very odd situation.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
No, it depends on the information. Read 18 U.S.C. §793 and §798.

------
drzaiusapelord
Google is in an ugly place right now. Not only are they beholden to the
advertising agency they are now the poster boy for all the NSA spying and
other controversies because of their massive information footprint, real name
policies, constant nagging for phone numbers in gmail, etc.

Apple and others have positioned itself as privacy friendly as well, which is
a double whammy.

I'd love to see G+ be the seedy version of Facebook. Fake names, nudity, etc.
You can't beat facebook by being facebook.

Hopefully, "real names everywhere" is a fad that is dying. The search engines
and employers of the world don't need to know my every political thought or
see my every vacation photo. Zuckerberg's idea of the internet exists only
because its profitable for him. In every other respect its insane.

~~~
AVTizzle
> Google is in an ugly place right now.

I disagree. Massively.

After Elon Musk, and possibly partly inspired by him, Page has driven Google
to be, by far, the most ambitious tech titan in the game right now.

Looking past G+ and its nonsense (which is an ugly thing, granted.): \- Loon
is in motion, and in conjunction with recent drone acquisitions, will likely
bring internet to currently unconnected billions. \- Self-driving cars are
actually happening. \- The smart contact lens for glucose monitoring will
change the lives of diabetics. \- Investments and acquisitions in AI and
Robotics speak to a MASSIVE ambition in that sphere. \- The recent
announcements in their consumer lines with TV, Nest, Auto, and wearables are
extremely competitive.

And these are just the things we know about.

Compare all this to Apple (which I love, but a Beats acquisition, a bigger
iPhone, and a watch coming? Woop-de-doo.), and Facebook (how's Slingshot
doing?), it's not even the same game anymore.

To say that Google is an ugly place, or that they're "beholden to the
advertising agency", is naive to the bigger picture.

~~~
judk
Everything you described is Sergey, not Larry. Larry did G+.

~~~
AVTizzle
Right right, I digress there. Still, the point of the case remains - Google is
crushing it and is, along with Musk & co., absolutely one of the most exciting
companies in the world to watch right now.

~~~
newaccountfool
So is the NSA.

~~~
aqzman
How long will it be until every mentioned of Google isn't followed by some
sort of NSA related comment? Everyone knows, to an extent, what happened and
it really adds nothing to the conversation.

------
edoloughlin
"For this we apologize"

There's a lot of sniping at Google here, but I think they deserve some kudos
for using the A word in corporate communications.

~~~
chetanahuja
I was at google while the nymwars were going on. The debate was just as heated
and polarizing inside google as it was externally. I'm also surprised
(pleasantly) to see someone use the A word here. I think this is an attempt to
start over after exit and/or political defeat of certain high level execs. But
I also think it may be too late. G+ has missed the bus to be anything more
than the butt of jokes and hilarious memes (A google employee ate a donut,
here's a picture etc..). Certainly a lesson in there somewhere about hubris
and corrupting influence of power etc.

~~~
aiiane
Vic did, in fact, approve this change well before he left. (It wasn't just an
overnight switch flip, hence why it took a while to actually go live - policy
documents have to be rewritten and approved, ux flows have to be modified,
etc.)

~~~
chetanahuja
Maybe. You seem to have heard it directly from Vic. I think the more plausible
scenario is the CEO finally having had enough and pulling the plug on both the
name policy as well as Vic's tenure at google. How this sequence of events is
then presented to the rest of the public (including rest of Google) would then
be a matter of following a corporate playbook written by experts in that
domain.

~~~
aiiane
You're allowed to be cynical, but I'm also allowed to tell you that you don't
know how Google works internally. :)

------
bane
I pretty much grew up on-line. I got into BBSs when 1200 baud was considered
fast. The basics of having on-line identities really have changed all that
much in all that time. To newer generations it's even more natural. When I see
companies completely screw up basic stuff like this, I wonder if these
decisions are being made by people who were never really part of the on-line
world and fundamentally don't "get" it?

The people at Google making these decisions aren't some 75 year old fuddy
duddy luddites, they're about my age and they're running one of the most
important properties in that world. Screwing up something as basic as this has
just seemed so... _weird_. I can only imagine that the final say-so came from
somebody/people who fundamentally didn't grow up with the same kind of comfort
and experience I did on-line and really doesn't understand it.

But then again, my parents, who never even used a computer until the 2000s,
and never even got on-line until 2003 or 2004 get it. It seems to obvious as
soon as you jump on-line that you are both empowered and need to have on-line
identities that you can control.

I really wonder if the people at the top are really part of the on-line world,
or just completely removed from it and spend their time wondering about all
these digital ants in the digital ant farm and wondering what we're all about?

~~~
rando289
> spend their time wondering about all these digital ants in the digital ant
> farm and wondering what we're all about?

This announcement certainly reinforces that notion. Google+ announces as an
anonymous "we", that their name policy "helped create a community made up of
real people." As opposed to fake people? Anonymous people are real, so is this
a reference to bots? The name policy prevented bots? No. It didn't. This is
ridiculous corporate code language. So ya, pushing around their digital ants
is exactly how this announcement reads.

~~~
contingencies
_Anonymous "we"_

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_%28novel%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_%28novel%29)

------
a3n
"When we launched Google+ over three years ago, we had a lot of restrictions
on what name you could use on your profile. This helped create a community
made up of real people, but it also excluded a number of people who wanted to
be part of it without using their real names."

I _wanted_ to use my real name. My legal, backed by a name change order,
mononymic name.

After watching them fumble it, trying to use a space or a dot, and being told
to gtfo or change it to a "real" name (and once again, fuck you very hard
Google, even the TSA is able to deal with this), I left.

And now I'm looking around for the giant hole in my life that can finally be
filled by G+. ... looking ... looking ...

------
eco
I kind of wish Google would have let you pick which display name to use on a
per-circle basis. Then I could use a pseudonym with strangers, a nickname with
friends, and my real name with family.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
I always feel like these services are designed wrong. You want to be able to
have multiple identities for different people, but having one organization
that can associate them all with one another defeats a lot of the purpose of
that. Especially if you're using it for anything that could get you into real
trouble if e.g. someone were to break into that service and obtain or publicly
disclose all the associations, like democracy activists in oppressive
countries.

You can always create completely separate accounts and then use them over Tor
one at a time blah blah blah, but that's a huge usability failure. What you
really want is a UI that allows you to sign in to multiple accounts without
the server knowing they're all the same person (which means native software,
probably with something like Tor automatically using separate circuits for
each account), and then allows you to seamlessly receive messages for any of
them and clearly delineates which account you're sending from when you post
something.

~~~
rm445
For most of us, most of the time, having the central site aware of all our
pseudonyms wouldn't be a problem. Even if they divulged your identity upon
lawful (court order) request. Even if they consistently targeted advertising
at you, through some kind of layer that let advertisers aim at demographics
without revealing ID.

Most of the time, it would be enough to have some sort of unified Google login
(in a Google iframe or whatever), offered as a service to different sites on
the Web, and different pseudonyms available that __don't reveal your 'true' ID
or other pseudonyms to the site owner__.

I'm a little surprised that Google haven't offered some kind of 'Google
Identity' service to the web at large based on this sort of idea. It wouldn't
be good enough for activists in oppressive regimes, but it would offer a
convenience to general people who like to keep separate identities on
different sites.

~~~
JadeNB
> I'm a little surprised that Google haven't offered some kind of 'Google
> Identity' service to the web at large based on this sort of idea.

The problem, I think, is that, given the current "don't be evil, just creepily
self-serving!" attitude that seems to guide Google, no one would trust them.
Even if one could trust them to keep one's identity private _at launch_ , I am
sure that anything like this would come loaded with the kind of "T&C may
change without notice at any time" codicil that would allow them to permit
themselves to disclose your identity later.

~~~
aiiane
The popularity of "Sign In with Facebook" seems to belie that.

~~~
JadeNB
I think that I disagree (that this is a counterexample); it shows that people
want a 'one-stop' identity solution, but not that they trust Facebook to keep
their identity private.

~~~
aiiane
But the statement to which I was replying is "the problem is that ... no one
would trust them". The popularity of "Sign In with Facebook" belies that it's
a problem to not be trusted (at least when it comes to offering identity
services).

~~~
JadeNB
Ah, I see. I was implicitly assuming that the parent's other requirement:

> different pseudonyms available that __don't reveal your 'true' ID or other
> pseudonyms to the site owner__

(which isn't offered by Facebook—right?—and which _does_ require trust in the
issuer) would be part of the putative Google Identity.

On the other hand, having spent this much time arguing that it wouldn't
happen, I'm now wondering why OpenID with Google as 'vouching agent' (or
whatever that part is called) doesn't count.

------
kevinalexbrown
I suspect the outrage had more to do with signalling than the specific issue
of pseudonyms.

I also suspect that signalling will become more important for web companies
than most hardware companies, because I am more directly affected by what
happens behind the scenes with web companies than say, a skateboard
manufacturer. It's difficult to infer behind the scenes - what are they doing
w/ my data, etc - without using some signals, like not allowing pseudonyms.

I imagine that startups face this most dramatically, because their product is
so fragile and indefinite that signalling is used to forecast where things are
headed before I invest significant time and money. This goes for all kinds of
signalling - how likely are they to end the product, to lose funding and shut
down, to dramatically increase prices, etc.

Is this true, or did most outraged (or just indifferent, but not excited)
users really dislike the pseudonym policy itself?

~~~
potatolicious
I disliked the pseudonym policy itself, I found it to be a puzzling policy
considering how immigrant-filled the tech industry is, and Google too.

I was born in a different country, with a different name. I operate with an
anglicized name, which took years to become my legal name. There was a long
period where the name everyone knew me as wasn't my legal one. Nowadays my
legal name isn't the same name used by family members on a different
continent.

Names are fluid, they're significant but ultimately just identifiers to tell
us apart. I find the notion that there is a One True Name to be laughably
geocentric and completely out of place in a social network (as opposed to say,
the IRS).

For me the pseudonym policy was a minor annoyance, making me wonder just how
culturally homogenous a team of product people have to be to cook it up. For
others it has been much more damaging - trans people outed being probably the
most memorable one, though not the only case where an idiotic policy has had
unexpectedly severe consequences.

~~~
vidarh
It puzzling also because in a tech company, surely there would have been a
large number of people with experience from various communities who would know
people primarily by a handle, and realise that in many sub-cultures people
would be unable to connect with people they know very well if they were forced
to use real names.

There are people who have known each other for decades that know each other by
e.g. demo-scene handle only. In which case their real name has an anonymizing
effect to the people they want to connect to online.

------
pessimizer
>We know that our names policy has been unclear, and this has led to some
unnecessarily difficult experiences for some of our users.

Was their names policy ever unclear, or are they pretending that this was all
just a misunderstanding?

~~~
saraid216
Yes, it was unclear. The appeals process was always pretty opaque, and it was
never clear what qualified as an approvable name.

~~~
bronson
What is unclear about "REAL NAME"? Google wanted whatever is printed on your
driver's license or birth certificate. Anything else was not OK.

(which was such an obviously idiotic policy that I hope to hear a candid
explanation one day.)

~~~
saraid216
Ignoring the ethical question of whether or not Google deserved to receive
your legal name, and the ethical question of whether or not it should have
forced said legal name onto you as a real name,

The policy was more than just "put in your real name lol". It was also about
banning accounts that _didn 't_ have a real name, even where those names were
legal. It was about an appeals process when you wanted to show that your name
was legitimate even when the algorithm disagreed.

And these things were not clear.

Don't get me wrong; I've regularly defended G+ and I've used the service since
being an early adopter and I find the claims that it's a "wreck" or a "ghost
town" to be completely bunk. But the names policy _was not clear_. This isn't
an ethical or philosophical question. This is just flat-out clarity. And it
wasn't.

~~~
bronson
I don't quite understand.

> It was about an appeals process when you wanted to show that your name was
> legitimate even when the algorithm disagreed.

If you show your driver's license to Google, and they still don't accept it,
then they are behaving irrationally. But their policy is clear as day.

> It was about an appeals process when you wanted to show that your name was
> legitimate even when the algorithm disagreed.

Again, it sounds like their algorithm was buggy and wrong. But it doesn't
affect their presentation of their own policy.

------
zyxley
And yet it still expects you to put in a first name and a last name. How very
Anglocentric.

~~~
aiiane
That's a whole other can of worms. :) At least mononyms are supported (by
entering a '.' in the last name field).

------
jack-r-abbit
I had no problem with the "G+ uses real names" thing since I just viewed it as
another option for Facebook that never really took off. I did have an issue
with them forcing everything to use a G+ profile. I quit leaving reviews in
the Play Store because of that. And not that I ever really commented on
YouTube videos but once that change was forced, it never even crossed my mind
to comment. I think they should have kept G+ as "real names" and split all the
other stuff back away so they didn't require real names. But I do understand
why people want to use other names. I just never used G+ like that.

~~~
bane
I stopped engaging with Google properties when they changes the youtube
comment system and broke it in Chrome. There's some setting about external
sites or something that I could go in and change to make it work, but why
should I? If they can't create a _comment system_ that works with their own
browser, and double posts everything to my g+ account I don't use, why should
I bother?

It was like shoving peanuts down the throat of a person with a peanut allergy.
No means no.

------
pkorzeniewski
Funny how they make it sound like it was all planned, rather than "This was
stupid idea that made many, who wanted to stay anonymous, avoid using G+". I
remember when G+ launched and almost everyone was criticizing this idea -
maybe they should listen to the majority of potential users and G+ wouldn't be
such ghost-town?

~~~
bduerst
If I were to speculate, it has probably been in the works for months now. G+
changed leadership back in April, and the winds probably changed direction
with it.

[1] [http://bigstory.ap.org/article/googles-top-social-
networking...](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/googles-top-social-networking-
executive-departs)

~~~
psbp
Yonatan Zunger claims that Vic Gundotra approved the change.

~~~
aestetix
I won't believe that unless Vic can prove it.

edit: I'm being downvoted, but remember that Vic is the one who pushed the
names policy in the first place.

~~~
aiiane
It's still possible to change your mind. Also, some things to consider: (a)
Yonatan is the tech lead for G+. This is something he would be an authority
on. (b) I also work for Google, have no particular reason to be loyal to Vic
[I've opposed the names policy from the start], and I'm also willing to vouch
that Vic approved it.

So if you still don't think that's enough to believe it, well, that's your
prerogative, but I doubt anything is going to convince you in that case.

~~~
aestetix
Vic has been particularly offensive about this. The restaurant analogy comes
to mind. He also stonewalled for a long time, was kind of a dick about it, and
refused to budge when presented with evidence. If something magically made him
change his mind, I would love to know what it was.

That said, do you know what evidence made Vic push the names policy in the
first place?

~~~
aiiane
I don't think anything "magically" changed it - more just it evolved over
time. See the quote from Yonatan I posted elsewhere in this thread regarding
the original motivations and successes or lack thereof.

No idea on evidence question.

~~~
aestetix
Surely there were discussions which lead to the names policy, as well as more
discussions that lead to the repeal of it?

I have a hard time believing that a single person at Google (Vic) would be
given so much free reign to make policy changes based on how it "felt" without
having a shred of evidence. Unless I'm misunderstanding?

------
incision
Now the handful of people who've been waiting on such a change to start using
G+ can see be immediately disappointed with how half-assed it is.

I say this as someone with what seems to be an above average engagement with
and opinion of G+.

Circles and communities are solid concepts that could work well, but the
busted functionality for posting and commenting severely limits content and
conversation.

Nobody, not even Google puts effort into G+ profiles. It's just another target
for dumping links and hopefully driving some clicks back to your actual
site/community.

------
thristian
Great, now my online friends can find me by the name they know me by, rather
than my real-world name.

Or they could, if I hadn't deleted my G+ profile a year or two ago, in favour
of just hanging out with them in the original venues I met them in.

------
mindcrime
I wanted to like Google+. Hell, I still _want_ to like Google+. And it's still
better than Facebook in some ways, IMO. But there are just a couple of nagging
issues that are such big turn-offs that I can't stand visiting G+.

For one, the two-column stream layout is a steaming pile of shit with no rhyme
or reason to the layout and selection of items you see. And the single-column
layout wastes so much space with those huge empty spaces on either side of the
stream, that it just about drives me batshit crazy.

Add in the fact that they have shown zero interest in giving the world a
usable API, and no support for open standards (no RSS/Atom, no OpenSocial, no
ActivityStrea.ms, no FOAF, etc.) and G+ - for me - falls so far short of its
potential.

It makes me sad, as I was really hoping Google would come along and give us a
truly awesome alternative to Facebook and they fumbled the ball.

~~~
aiiane
For the single-column layout,
[https://userstyles.org/styles/87624](https://userstyles.org/styles/87624) can
help. (Though I get it - it's not a built-in thing, which reduces the value.)

------
tn13
Is there an opposite of "Streisand effect" ? If not then we might as well call
it G+ effect.

Google took some unreasonable steps to make G+ popular that is precisely why I
stopped using G+. After G+ I have not commented on any of the YoutTube videos.
When Google started uploading every photo on my android device to Google+ and
downloaded all PicasaWeb albums on my phone I switched to a fake Google id to
be used on my phone. I now use Flikr instead of Picasaweb (now G+).

I now have around 6 fake Google Ids just to make sure Google+ does not put all
my info in 1 place.

I am waiting for the day Google will make G+ Compulsory for using Chrome.

~~~
vidarh
You can turn off the image upload. In fact, I believe you're asked if you want
to enable it in the first place.

~~~
tn13
I was very early adopter. It was by default enabled. Yeah, we can turn off
features but it is hard to explain how to do it to my father.

------
f055
So they got to a meeting and said: "Listen guys, if allowing nick names won't
jumpstart Google+ then I don't know what will. It's either this or we'll close
the damn thing." 18 months from now, we'll read about the all-along-planned
integration of G+ into Gmail, Drive or YouTube :P

~~~
frandroid
You mean un-integration?

~~~
fleitz
Were you looking for disintegration?

~~~
f055
Disintegration! into pieces spread around gmail, drive and YT. That's probably
what'll happen :)

------
hysan
While a step in the right direction, Google's move to force real names AND the
integration of G+ into their various services over the past few years has
killed all of my goodwill towards anything Google. So, what I'm wondering is
how does Google plan on rebuilding that lost goodwill? An apology is a nice
gesture, but it doesn't make me trust the company. Nor does it fix any of the
various screwed up UX issues due to the forced integration of G+ everywhere.

------
barking
I have an anonymous identity on YouTube as well as a readily identifiable one
on gmail and it's been ticking me off no end the way, it seems that, google is
always trying to trick me into replacing the former with the latter on
youtube.

Will this end now too?

~~~
Shooti
The design tweak they did 2-3 weeks ago to the Account switcher on Youtube
makes it readily apparent which Google account/gmail address the channel
belongs to.

------
dcc1
Wow the whole post reads as if they planned it all along.

When it reality it seems like this is a last ditch attempt to save the wreck
that google+ has become.

------
iandanforth
I almost never read posts on G+. Looking at this one reminds me why. Only 16
(16!) percent of the available area is devoted to the post content. On larger
screens it would be worse. What a nightmare.

~~~
vlad003
I find it much easier to read when the text is in columns of that width (like
newspaper) than when it's full width. According to Wikipedia, it's actually
recommended to put your content in columns of about 60 characters[1].

And it's not that narrow; facebook's newsfeed is about the same width as that
post on my 23" monitor.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Column_%28typography%29#Typogra...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Column_%28typography%29#Typographic_style)

------
darklajid
Bwahaha..

Okay, now which number do I call to get my account (moved _from_ my full name
to 'Ben .' in protest during the nymwars) unblocked? I mean.. I'm not even
sure I'd care at this point but are they even thinking of all the blocked
users? Or do I need to send in my government issued ID to get my profile
unblocked so that I can .. move away from my real name..??

Actually I just visited plus.google.com and surprisingly enough I wasn't
greeted by the loop of death (previously I had a page that said that I'm
blocked, with a link saying "You can check here why", which redirected to the
very same page). Now I can "upgrade" and enroll. It seems.

I .. need to provide a first name and a last name though.. How does that
compute? Why can't I be "Ben" or "Randomthingyhere"? Real names aren't
required, but first and last names are?

Can't. Stop. Laughing.

~~~
aiiane
You can be "Ben".
[https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1228271](https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1228271)
Enter a '.' as the last name to use a mononym.

~~~
Leynos
If you enter a '.' as your surname, will G+ omit this when displaying your
name?

~~~
aiiane
Yes. It will be rendered in G+ as a mononym.

~~~
Mithaldu
If it does, then it does so inconsistently. For me it doesn't on the About
page:
[https://plus.google.com/u/0/115709092170300569371/about](https://plus.google.com/u/0/115709092170300569371/about)

~~~
aiiane
There was a bug uncovered as part of the launch today where some of them
aren't rendering properly - there's a fix in the works; the dot should
disappear when it goes live without any action on your part. (Don't know when
it will go live yet.)

------
zmmmmm
So this seems like a first concrete sign of a change in direction since Vic's
moving on. After arguing passionately against their real name policy for so
long it feels strange now that they have actually done it. On the one hand
it's a hopeful sign, but on the other hand it reminds me of companies that
open source their products only after they decided it failed. Is this a sign
Google is positively steering G+ in a new direction or have they just given up
and decided now they don't care any more they should just off load the bad PR
of the real name policy? At least now I might start reviewing and rating
Android apps again now that my real name isn't going to be publicly displayed
to the developer.

~~~
aiiane
FWIW, this policy change was in the works long before Vic left (and Vic was
the one who initially approved it). G+ hasn't been given up on.

~~~
zmmmmm
Interesting info, thanks! And good to know. I like G+ and I don't want Google
to give up on it.

------
trhway
what is the fuss about? My version of "Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov" (translation:
"John J Johnson") was ok on Facebook, Google+, etc... yesterday, ok today and
will be ok tomorrow :)

I have never used my real name on Internet except for the LinkedIn (where
obviously i have nothing that can be construed as an opinion of any sort :)
and cases where i had to enter my CC/bank info.

Ability to maintain several identities is the gift of the Internet, an
additional virtual dimension added to our lives. Why wouldn't we explore it?
Why voluntarily confine ourselves to the plain boring and sterile world of
"real name policy" places like FB?

~~~
SixSigma
Facebook is asking for official ID for new accounts in some places.

I have had to change my Facebook name also. "We see you're not using your real
name".

I just changed it to a real sounding name that is also not my real name.

------
higherpurpose
What does this really change? I mean seriously. Google is the company that
lets you "turn off web history", and then goes ahead and _tracks it anyway_.
Do you have Do Not Track enabled in Chrome? Tough luck. It's just for show
there, because Google doesn't respect it.

So how am I to believe that using a different name and e-mail address on
Google+, Google won't know I'm the same person, because of all of their
tracking from Chrome, Youtube, search, and so on?

And if they do that, then how is this any different than using an "alias"
right now on Google+? This seems more like a PR move from Google.

~~~
josteink
If you're worried Google is tracking you through chrome, you might consider
switching to a more privacy centric browser you can trust, like Firefox.

------
Aldo_MX
My favorite part, is when they tried to sell us the idea that the real name
enforcement was the best improvement that could happen to youtube.

I would had preferred a sincere apology for screwing things up, was it really
hard to admit failure??? Even Microsoft has apologized for previous failues
like Windows 8 and Internet Explorer!!!

But anyway... with this announcement Google+, and in general, any Google-owned
public website like Youtube has lost any credibility to me.

~~~
MartinCron
I once even got a product manager apologize for the woefully substandard test
automation tools built into Visual Studio. Perhaps my finest hour.

~~~
bignaj
The people who work at Microsoft are just regular humans, too, you know. Why
does it make you so gleeful to hear this?

~~~
Aldo_MX
Because, unlike the other 99.99% of tech companies, they acknowledge publicly
the frustration they have caused with the issues of their product.

The least I want is a company that claims everything they do is perfect, and
pretends nothing is wrong.

------
mladenkovacevic
I wonder if this was done to appease the existing YouTube users that refused
connect the account to a Google+ account with their real name.

Anybody who was already on Google+ didn't mind the real-name policy, but they
certainly weren't going to tell millions of YouTube people "Sorry we don't
have a place for you anymore."

I am still skeptical that many YouTube members will create Google+ profiles as
a result of this.

~~~
angersock
_" Anybody who was already on Google+ didn't mind the real-name policy"_

...because those that did didn't join up in the first place. Nymwars.

~~~
saraid216
Both of those statements are untrue. The nymwars took place _on Google Plus_
as much as they did anywhere else.

------
kevinwang
Man, this is way too late. Definitely feel bad for Google about Google+.

~~~
c23gooey
yes - it must be a harrowing time for sergey and brin

------
pacomerh
I still like G+ but this comes a little too late

------
moomin
Great, now I can use my secret identity there. Admittedly, pretty much
anything is effectively secret when I use G+.

------
guest666
Google still won't allow their users to use the url name as my nickname

for example, my email is guest666@gmail.com, i want to use url
plus.google.com/+guest666, but google won't allow me to do that, even when
guest666 is available to be claim. They force me to use +(my name)

~~~
balladeer
That was the final blow to me. That day I removed G+ account from Google Apps
mail. It is just stupid.

1\. My name is "Firstname Lastname".

2\. I've checked and for plus.google.com/+<URL>, both "FirstName" and
"LastName" aren't used by anyone. Hell, even "FirstnameLastname" is not taken,
or even the part of my first name which is my nickname let's call it "First"
is free.

3\. But Google wants me to have a stupid URL like
plus.google.com/+FirstnameLastname<some stupid characters or numbers here>,
just because some algorithm thinks "a lot of people might want that name".

Well, then fuck you Google!

IMHO they just want to shut-down G+ with little grace or sth.

------
yuhong
I wrote this submission, notice I emphasized the irony:
[http://slashdot.org/submission/1778830/google-is-gagging-
use...](http://slashdot.org/submission/1778830/google-is-gagging-user-
advocates)

And for the record, I don't like real name policies but I also don't like it
when people have to use throwaways or pseudonyms either. For example, I still
remember this:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7809766](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7809766)

------
hendersoon
I want to be able to change my Google+ name to a nickname, not showing my real
name at all. And I want my gmail email to still come from my real name. As far
as I can tell, there is no way to do that.

------
lugg
And once again they miss the point that so many of us never touched google
plus over.

The name thing was a big deal for many, but for far more was the banning
itself.

Getting banned on google plus for whatever google decides on a whim is against
its terms of use that day (e.g. stupid name policy) will also nuke your gmail.

Far too many people were dependent on a free service with zero guarantees back
then, many still are - there is just no reason to risk losing your gmail over
cat updates when facebook is completely separate.

~~~
timothya
False. In the past, if your profile was suspended (for example, because of
your name), it _only_ affected your Google+ profile. Your Gmail still worked
exactly the same.

Some people spread rumours in the early days of Google+ that your Gmail would
be shut down if your Google+ was suspended, but that was never the case.

~~~
lugg
I recall the suspension thing being the whole reason the name thing came to
light, perhaps I am mistaken?

Edit: Seems you are correct:

> Horowitz also took time to dispel the rumor that a suspension of a Google+
> account means that a user loses his or her access to Gmail, Google Docs or
> other Google services. "When an account is suspended for violating the
> Google+ common name standards, access to Gmail or other products that don’t
> require a Google+ profile are not removed," he said.

[http://mashable.com/2011/07/25/google-plus-common-
names/](http://mashable.com/2011/07/25/google-plus-common-names/)

~~~
davidgerard
Except there were a shitload of reports of it happening anyway.

~~~
timothya
I believe that in the early days, one or two people had their whole account
shut down and went around complaining that it was because of Google+'s name
policy when really it was because of something completely unrelated
(distributing illegal content from their account, I think). The rumours spread
from their, making it seem like it was happening to a lot of people, when it
really never happened at all.

------
viraptor
> but it also excluded a number of people who wanted to be part of it without
> using their real names.

And people who didn't mind using their real names but were worried that Google
won't think they're real enough and block their access to all services they
used for years. They failed hard on that one, but now it's not even mentioned
anymore. I'm slightly disappointed they just want to sweep that under the
rug...

------
weitzj
Maye they finally reached a critical mass in their social graph of real people
that it might be possible to match the anonymous, active people.

------
ianstallings
I won't say that having my name keeps me from saying stupid things, but I do
tone it down and work towards more positive posts because of it. Just like I
_try_ to do here (and often fail due to a huge, yet stupid, ego). I think
everyone should have a choice but I encourage everyone to use their real name.

------
stonogo
I'm not interested in using a web service that "lets" me do things I can
already do without it.

------
zak_mc_kracken
> We know that our names policy has been unclear

No, Google, your names policy was never unclear, it was crystal clear and also
completely moronic.

Glad to see you finally see the light, even if you won't acknowledge that
you're simply correcting a mistake that everybody else but you saw.

------
theophrastus
ah the final act before G+ is shut down in favor of G++

------
hereonbusiness
Next step, remove G+ from Youtube. More specifically, use G+ for
authentication but bring back Youtube accounts. Alternatively maybe add a
site/application specific alias option to G+.

I don't want to have 2 G+ accounts (like I have now) for no real reason.

------
hashberry
I refuse to become emotionally invested in G+ because Google is infamous for
shutting down products that aren't used by the majority of its users. Reading
all the negative comments from this post reaffirms my decision.

------
CaRDiaK
Twitter = Perceptions,

Facebook = People,

Google+ = Passions.

Each have their respective place. I like G+ and I actually get quite a lot out
of it. It took some real time investment to fully appreciate it. I hope it
doesn't go the way of the dodo or reader though.

------
phazmatis
Ah, they finally realized that there are non-trollish cases where people want
to express a thought online without having it indexed and searchable by
everyone they ever meet in life.

Or they just want to compete with facebook...

------
bhartzer
Just as the NSTIC was defunded, Google changes it's real name policy.

------
aestetix
Happy #nymwars anniversary, Google!

Finally.

------
taksintik
I'm actually really starting to like g+ .. Took me a while but it far superior
to any other social network.. The problem for me is still trusting google with
that much Data.

------
badloginagain
Thank you, no. My account is going to remain deactivated.

------
smegel
Why bother, it will be shut down by years end anyway.

------
agumonkey
This wouldn't have been that bad if they didn't accept obviously fake names
such as 'agu monkey'.

------
shmerl
Really? Diaspora* did that from the start.

------
kyro
Thanks for leading the way here, Google.

~~~
tdicola
If leading the way is making a bad decision that has a huge public backlash,
sticking with it for 3 years while the service languishes, and then reversing
it in a last ditch effort to save face... I really hope no one else follows.

~~~
Sarkie
Woosh, that's the sound of sarcasm flying past you.

------
mrcharles
This will be a great feature for 2011!

------
frik
So Google+ wants to pivot to become MySpace? The only problem their G+ brand
is weak and uncool.

------
leke
Just changed my name to Northern Lights. They still pissed and whined when I
tried.

------
znowi
"We shoved this product up your ass real hard, but we still failed to compete
with Facebook. Today, we are taking the last step: allowing you to choose any
name you want. We hope to gain a little bit of Internet karma with this before
we become irrelevant."

------
saraid216
Wow. That's a lot of comments being unhappy about the change.

~~~
fl0wenol
Yeah, and I find it funny how many people equated to the policy change being a
harbinger of an onslaught of trolling.

Meanwhile I have at least three Google profiles, all with obvious (to me) fake
names that I've used for a long time, since G+ ever asked me to merge my
Google Mail with them.

I think they're latching onto the wrong aspect of social networks, identity,
and such in their complaints.

The real issues are that there's no signifier for "verified" individuals (like
on Amazon, maybe by way of Google Wallet?) and no way to limit +1s or comments
to such users. I think that's the only way to really impose the feeling of
non-anonymity on a user's comment or whatnot.

Also, some of the complainers are just idiots who don't understand how to use
circles to restrict interactions or comments on their content... which sucks
because I actually dig Google's model there.

------
egypturnash
Too little, too late.

------
ulfw
Backpedaling is the name of the game...

------
praeivis
Awesome changes, just 3 years too late.

------
smegel
so YouTube comments are back?

------
bane
Whatever.

------
bhartzer
I don't know about you, but I have no problem using my real name. Anywhere.

~~~
teddyh
Good for you. This isn’t about you, then. The people who it is about are
listed here:

[http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Who_is_harmed_by_a_%22Rea...](http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Who_is_harmed_by_a_%22Real_Names%22_policy%3F)

~~~
Kiro
Not only those. I don't want to use my real name ever and I'm definitely not
on that list. I just want to be anonymous and be able to write whatever I want
without it harming my real persona.

~~~
Shish2k
On the flip side, I don't want to be anonymous, I want my achievements tied to
my real persona --- but my real persona is "Shish" (with no surname), and G+
didn't allow that... (And apparently it still doesn't -- despite the policy
change, "surname" is still a required field)

