I know it's obvious, but I'm going to say it anyway because it's been driving me batty.
There are instances in which people blog online under pseuds for really valid reasons. Sometimes it's not as dire as life or death. Sometimes it's a matter of people in jobs where a link between their online behavior and their day job could end up in them losing work. I'm not just talking about pre-school teachers writing smut in their spare time (although so long as they aren't bringing smut into school, I don't see why we care. Most smut writing teachers I know don't bring their smut into the classroom--even when the classrooms are populated by adults.)
I'm talking about people who are trying to shed light on bad practices in their jobs but who are not protected by long term contracts because they're at will employees.
And, I am so, so tired of parts of the media acting like pseuds are fake names. They aren't. They're different identities. I see the clash between the importance of legal names and pseuds every time I go to a fan convention.
Those of us who move knowingly in these circles understand the difference between a pseud and a sock puppet. I resent being denied the ability to use the former because other people who aren't very online don't understand how to suss our or can't be bothered to do the work to figure out when someone is the latter.
There are people in fandom whom I know quite well. I've known some of them for more than a decade. I can tell you what's going on with their kids. I've been to their homes multiple times. Heck, I've traveled cross country to meet with them. Chances are that I know more about what goes on in their workplace and their families than many of their coworkers who would count themselves friends of the folks in question.
And I couldn't tell you their legal last name if my life depended on it. I may not even be 100% sure of their legal first name.
Pseuds in some communities develop identities that are attached to those names, and denying people the ability to hold on to those identities is a very short-sighted move on Google's part.
I try not to be too skeptical, but I an inclined to suspect that it is at least as much about Google's desire to market stuff than about abuse, harassment, and reputation issues. It's much easier to track and market me to non-online stuff by my legal name than by my pseud, isn't it?
no subject
There are instances in which people blog online under pseuds for really valid reasons. Sometimes it's not as dire as life or death. Sometimes it's a matter of people in jobs where a link between their online behavior and their day job could end up in them losing work. I'm not just talking about pre-school teachers writing smut in their spare time (although so long as they aren't bringing smut into school, I don't see why we care. Most smut writing teachers I know don't bring their smut into the classroom--even when the classrooms are populated by adults.)
I'm talking about people who are trying to shed light on bad practices in their jobs but who are not protected by long term contracts because they're at will employees.
And, I am so, so tired of parts of the media acting like pseuds are fake names. They aren't. They're different identities. I see the clash between the importance of legal names and pseuds every time I go to a fan convention.
Those of us who move knowingly in these circles understand the difference between a pseud and a sock puppet. I resent being denied the ability to use the former because other people who aren't very online don't understand how to suss our or can't be bothered to do the work to figure out when someone is the latter.
There are people in fandom whom I know quite well. I've known some of them for more than a decade. I can tell you what's going on with their kids. I've been to their homes multiple times. Heck, I've traveled cross country to meet with them. Chances are that I know more about what goes on in their workplace and their families than many of their coworkers who would count themselves friends of the folks in question.
And I couldn't tell you their legal last name if my life depended on it. I may not even be 100% sure of their legal first name.
Pseuds in some communities develop identities that are attached to those names, and denying people the ability to hold on to those identities is a very short-sighted move on Google's part.
I try not to be too skeptical, but I an inclined to suspect that it is at least as much about Google's desire to market stuff than about abuse, harassment, and reputation issues. It's much easier to track and market me to non-online stuff by my legal name than by my pseud, isn't it?