Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Gordon Shumway wrote:
So this discussion came up in another forum and was unrelated to the topic at hand, so I thought I would open up a separate discussion here.

What are your thoughts on using real names on forums? Would it help curb the vitriol we so often see online? Would it stifle your expression? Would giving the option to use "real names"TM help you or hurt you or the discussion/debate? Would it allow you to make decisions quickly on who you should be paying attention to? Would it help to turn the tide of the reality dissonance (fake news, lack of trust in experts, explosion of conspiracy theories, etc.)?

Depending on how the discussion goes here, I might raise the issue in the Nuts and Bolts forum (maybe it should go there in the first place--if any mod thinks so, feel free to move it and delete this aside).

I don't use my real name anywhere if I can help it, I don't have a website, twitter account or anything similar and my FB presence is minimal - really only use it for work.

Anything expressed on the internet can be used against you, in or out of context.

I do not particularly want someone to google my name and find (*quickly checks*) over 10,000 posts on a wargaming forum, maybe a few thousand posts on a PC hardware forum, a few thousand posts on car forums, etc etc. Not that I'm ashamed or anything, it's just not what I want people to find if they ever look me up. If I start worrying about what posts people are going to find if they look me up the internet, it won't just change the nature of what I post, it'll completely eliminate most of what I post. One forum where I do post under my real name is a race car forum and whenever I post there I always have my engineer's hat on and that's fine for that particular forum, but 95% of the time I prefer to post more casually.

Very good and accurate post - I feel the same.

Enforcing the use of real names on the internet just isn't going to work. Even if the colossal effort to make sure that everything uses the same real-name account was somehow summoned up, that would at best only throw gay people, trans people, sex workers, political dissidents and similar under the bus for minimal gain. Toxic accounts are already perfectly identifiable, it's just a matter of the platform owners being uninterested in getting rid of them.

 Gordon Shumway wrote:
So this discussion came up in another forum and was unrelated to the topic at hand, so I thought I would open up a separate discussion here.

What are your thoughts on using real names on forums? Would it help curb the vitriol we so often see online? Would it stifle your expression? Would giving the option to use "real names"TM help you or hurt you or the discussion/debate? Would it allow you to make decisions quickly on who you should be paying attention to? Would it help to turn the tide of the reality dissonance (fake news, lack of trust in experts, explosion of conspiracy theories, etc.)?

Depending on how the discussion goes here, I might raise the issue in the Nuts and Bolts forum (maybe it should go there in the first place--if any mod thinks so, feel free to move it and delete this aside).

It would make stalking easier, which is a real thing that I have witnessed twice. Both were women being stalked and harassed.

There are lots of kids (under 18) using this forum, their parents would probably like for them to stay anonymous. I have a story for you of "the game store" creeper that was arrested for molesting boys he met at the store.

The reasons suck, and I hate to have to type them out, but there you go.

In a day and age where "Swatting" is a real thing, it's a good idea never to give out any personal info online. You can be perfectly well behaved and civil online but still draw the ire of a mentally unbalanced, or predatory person and suffer very real and painful (if not fatal) results simply for happening across their path. It's a very scary thing.

 stanman wrote:
In a day and age where "Swatting" is a real thing,

It's not this day and age. I started this whole internet thing back in the days of usenet newsgroups, where 99% of people posted under their own name and organisation.

I witnessed a political discussion between two otherwise grown men with nice careers (as explained in their signatures) descend to the point of one of them contacting the employer of the other guy and basically getting him fired (or at least getting more than an earful from the higher-ups) to the point of that person never showing up again on the group.

At that point I quickly made myself a freenet.hut.fi account under my MUD nickname and never looked back.

jouso wrote:

 stanman wrote:
In a day and age where "Swatting" is a real thing,

It's not this day and age. I started this whole internet thing back in the days of usenet newsgroups, where 99% of people posted under their own name and organisation.

I witnessed a political discussion between two otherwise grown men with nice careers (as explained in their signatures) descend to the point of one of them contacting the employer of the other guy and basically getting him fired (or at least getting more than an earful from the higher-ups) to the point of that person never showing up again on the group.

At that point I quickly made myself a freenet.hut.fi account under my MUD nickname and never looked back.

It definitely is this day and age, and Swatting is a serious problem. Normally it only targets more famous individuals like Twitch streamers and YouTubers, but all it would take is one twisted individual picking up the phone to the police saying you're planning to shoot up the local town, and you've got a SWAT team at your door. With the way the internet is, I don't think anyone is safe from something like that.

Is it likely to happen as a result of an argument over a miniature wargame? Unlikely, but underestimating what people on the internet are capable of is never wise.

My behaviour probably wouldn't change if I was forced to use my real name, considering I already do so in some capacity by using this ancient and quite frankly silly internet name I made for myself on many websites (If you find anyone with this name 95% of the time it's me. In fact I kinda regret using this name before since now I'm kinda stuck with it). Anonymity has never been an issue for me. It would probably be more beneficial for me since less people would be spewing utterly insane and stupid arguments my way out of shame.

However I should be considered somewhat bias on this since, ironically, my name is so common around here that they had to tack a 5 behind my birth name in the medical records simply because that many people had the exact same name as me in that city block. Not at all helped by the fact that my face is also generic enough to have my college professor once issue me the wrong final grade (I happened to look like some jackass who shirked his work, so my prof came to me one day telling me I needed to shape up. I had to rebute him with all of the assignment grades I had received up till that point). I'm like Emmit from the Lego Movie.

but all it would take is one twisted individual picking up the phone to the police saying you're planning to shoot up the local town, and you've got a SWAT team at your door. With the way the internet is, I don't think anyone is safe from something like that.

Is it likely to happen as a result of an argument over a miniature wargame? Unlikely, but underestimating what people on the internet are capable of is never wise.

Didn't that happen just a few weeks ago and the victim got killed on top of it all? I'm probably too old for this kind of stuff (I don't even understand how people with no skills at all become stars on youtube nowadays), but what kind of idiot would send twitchy police with assault rifles to somebody?

@topic: if I had to post under my real name, I wouldn't. The internet never forgets and I don't want to be held accountable to what I said 10 years ago under entirely different circumstances. Depending on how stable the country you live in is this can get you arrested or killed when the wind of change blows.

XuQishi wrote:
Didn't that happen just a few weeks ago and the victim got killed on top of it all? I'm probably too old for this kind of stuff (I don't even understand how people with no skills at all become stars on youtube nowadays), but what kind of idiot would send twitchy police with assault rifles to somebody?

It may very well have - I'm pretty certain that new legislation has been passed in quite a few countries to do with Swatting because it's such a huge problem; I think some kid in America got sentenced to 25 years in jail for doing it some time ago.

In a world where somebody got killed by their partner after she fired a Desert Eagle point blank at him, with him holding a dictionary to stop the bullet ( ), all in the name of "a daring stunt", I wouldn't be surprised if someone picks up the phone to call in the SWAT team after a bad discussion. I like to think that the wargaming community is classier than that, but we're all still people on the internet, and I'm not convinced that everyone is a good apple when it comes to making impulse decisions on the internet.

@topic: if I had to post under my real name, I wouldn't. The internet never forgets and I don't want to be held accountable to what I said 10 years ago under entirely different circumstances. Depending on how stable the country you live in is this can get you arrested or killed when the wind of change blows.

I think the fact that the internet never forgets can also play as your shield if you're ever called out on something from a long time ago out of context; that context still exists, and you can find it and show it to prove it.

I still stand with about 95% of my statements that I've ever made on this site, for instance, and I doubt the last 5% will ever be used to label me as anything more than a hypocrite. I also refrain from any political debates online since I can't be bothered with it, so really that makes me pretty safe in the department of having dirt dished on me in the future. The problem I have with giving a full name is that it could easily be used to find personal details about you through Facebook and the like. Even so, I know people in this community who use their real names to post up paintjobs and hobby related stuff on social media, and have never really had any problems as a result of that. It's a double edged sword though; it works there because anyone being vitriolic can also be easily identified. If Dakka was ever to promote the use of real names, they'd probably have to enforce everyone on the site to do it for that reason, and good luck doing that while keeping all the community intact and willing to post.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Nick Garai wrote:
I use my real name online and my picture but I do not post any other information than that. I keep my address, place of employment, and other pertinent information confidential. I have no problem using my name.

One of the reasons I don't like using my real name is that it stops me giving location specific information on forums. My name alone isn't going to help anyone find me, but if you go through my post history and are a bit investigative you can probably figure out where I live to within a few suburbs, and at that point the number of people with the same name drops. Likewise you might be able to figure out where I work (not because I've said it, but I think I've said what I do in previous posts which combined with the location info would narrow the options about where I work). I think somewhere I've even mentioned details about my car, which is a classic car with not many of them on the road.

All that information does mean if I gave my real name, you could probably track me down if you REALLY wanted to do so.

If I were using my real name I'd also be more careful about not giving out that sort of info.

A few year ago there was an article about how advertisers can track people online. If I remember correctly they only need your zip code and your date of birth to get nearly 100% accuracy. So even if you don't give somebody your name be careful with your other personal data (even if it feels not abusable).

XuQishi wrote:Didn't that happen just a few weeks ago and the victim got killed on top of it all? I'm probably too old for this kind of stuff (I don't even understand how people with no skills at all become stars on youtube nowadays), but what kind of idiot would send twitchy police with assault rifles to somebody?

It was even worse. A swatted B (who provoked A but gave him a wrong address) thus C died (who didn't even know why the police was at his front door).

 Zingraff wrote:


Given the current climate in the Dakka forums, I would have no objections to using my real name here.

Considering that I've had a still active user on this forum threaten to shoot me due to a disagreement here, I'm not with the idea of using any identifiable information here.

 General Annoyance wrote:

jouso wrote:

 stanman wrote:
In a day and age where "Swatting" is a real thing,

It's not this day and age. I started this whole internet thing back in the days of usenet newsgroups, where 99% of people posted under their own name and organisation.

I witnessed a political discussion between two otherwise grown men with nice careers (as explained in their signatures) descend to the point of one of them contacting the employer of the other guy and basically getting him fired (or at least getting more than an earful from the higher-ups) to the point of that person never showing up again on the group.

At that point I quickly made myself a freenet.hut.fi account under my MUD nickname and never looked back.

It definitely is this day and age, and Swatting is a serious problem.

I'm not downplaying the swatting issue, just mentioning that even in the earliest, super-friendly internet olden days when everyone used his real name posting your opinions online could lead into trouble.

Rosebuddy wrote:
Enforcing the use of real names on the internet just isn't going to work. Even if the colossal effort to make sure that everything uses the same real-name account was somehow summoned up, that would at best only throw gay people, trans people, sex workers, political dissidents and similar under the bus for minimal gain. Toxic accounts are already perfectly identifiable, it's just a matter of the platform owners being uninterested in getting rid of them.

Another one - you've effectively ended the social lives of anyone who's employed by the public sector, especially teachers or other people who work with children. We've already seen ridiculous situations where a teacher has had some perfectly legal activity done on their own time at a place with no connection to their workplace found by a student and subsequently been sacked; if every action you take and word you speak online are unavoidably linked to your real name, it's not just marginalised people who'll suffer, normies will get it in the neck as well.

 General Annoyance wrote:

jouso wrote:

 stanman wrote:
In a day and age where "Swatting" is a real thing,

It's not this day and age. I started this whole internet thing back in the days of usenet newsgroups, where 99% of people posted under their own name and organisation.

I witnessed a political discussion between two otherwise grown men with nice careers (as explained in their signatures) descend to the point of one of them contacting the employer of the other guy and basically getting him fired (or at least getting more than an earful from the higher-ups) to the point of that person never showing up again on the group.

At that point I quickly made myself a freenet.hut.fi account under my MUD nickname and never looked back.

It definitely is this day and age, and Swatting is a serious problem. Normally it only targets more famous individuals like Twitch streamers and YouTubers, but all it would take is one twisted individual picking up the phone to the police saying you're planning to shoot up the local town, and you've got a SWAT team at your door. With the way the internet is, I don't think anyone is safe from something like that.

Is it likely to happen as a result of an argument over a miniature wargame? Unlikely, but underestimating what people on the internet are capable of is never wise.

Their point, Drax, is that people were doing gakky things to each other even when their real names were on display for all to see. Swatting doesn't require the internet to happen, the only thing the internet has done is make the twisted ideas of one predatory nut-job visible to the rest of that small fraternity in a way they weren't before. There was a brief fad a few years ago before folk wised up to it where trolling scum would photoshop people they wanted to torment into porn images. In a couple of years they'll have come up with some new way to torment people, and a couple of years after that another, and so on.

You don't stop a tiny minority of people engaging in bad behaviour by taking actions that affect everybody, because then you're just punishing everybody for the actions of that minority, and they always find a way around it in the end - look at DRM, all it's done is make the experience of buying and playing games objectively worse for legitimate customers, and last time I looked people are still file sharing.

 skyth wrote:

 Zingraff wrote:


Given the current climate in the Dakka forums, I would have no objections to using my real name here.

Considering that I've had a still active user on this forum threaten to shoot me due to a disagreement here, I'm not with the idea of using any identifiable information here.

I rarely visit the Off-Topic forum though, and I've yet to experience any negative interactions, unlike the sort of discussions we used to get on Warseer where I was an active member before coming here. On Warseer you could get death threats for claiming that Forge World was owned by Games Workshop (which it is).

I get why you might want to keep your personal life and your career separate, but I've never felt that my interest in board games reflected badly on my character or didn't fit my chosen career as an architect and city planner. The acceptance of board games as a hobby has come a long way in the last decade, and I rarely have any difficulties explaining how my interest in board games relates to my profession, as both are essentially about how you create and operate abstract models, using maps and drawings.

Miniature wargaming is in some ways a very different kind of beast, and sits less comfortably on my CV, so you might be right.

 Ouze wrote:

 Gordon Shumway wrote:
What are your thoughts on using real names on forums? Would it help curb the vitriol we so often see online?

It probably would result in marginally less rape and death threats for fear of prosecution, but definitely no measurable decrease in vitriol.

Less? I would imagine more rape and death threats!