It popped into my mind the first time I ever had to make up an online name for myself - probably on some BBS in about 1984.
It's from the Firesign Theatre's 1971 LP I Think We're All Bozos On This Bus. The setting is the Future Fair ("A fair for everyone, and no fare for anyone!"), which is sort of Disneyland crossed with the 1934 World's Fair, on Nembutals. The unnamed (up to this point) protagonist has been watching the demonstration of the Model Government ("It goes in! It goes out!"), which is being presented by two holograms. And after the demonstration closes, they address him and give him a chance to ask a question of the president:
Quote:
Hologram 1: Well then, we must be very close to the president, Mr. Dennis.
Hologram 2: Yes, Dagwood, he's the terminal bus. The output.
Hologram 1: I'll bet he really puts out!
Hologram 2: That's right. Everyone's always asking him questions.
Hologram 1: Oh! Maybe my friend here would like to ask a question! he's been with us since before the beginning. He must be bursting with a short question about his place in the future.
Hologram 2: Oh, is he your friend?
Hologram 1: Yes!
Hologram 2: Well, ask him his name.
Hologram 1: Oh, I'm sorry! I - Could you state your name?
Protagonist: ...
Hologram 1: Please, state your name.
Protagonist: ... Oh, oh, you want me to -
Hologram 1: Please, state your first name.
Protagonist: Uhhh...Clem.
Hologram 1: Thank you, -- UHHH...CLEM -- Now we can introduce you and some of your selected neighbors to our president.
For the entire second side of the record, every time any one of the holograms (and some of the humans) in the Future Fair address the protagonist by name, that's what they call him: "UHHH...CLEM."
I think this may be the earliest example of someone being asked to provide his name to a computer and being stuck with what he picked forever. I'm immensely happy that so few people remember this that I've never encountered another person using this name anywhere, so if you're browsing through some obscure forum somewhere and you see a posting by UhhhClem, it's very likely me.
(Every so often, I see that someone has chosen ThisIsWorkerSpeaking, which in ways is even better. But I'm used to UhhhClem.)
"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play, his labour and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation." LP Jacks
Geschichte is the user name I use for everything. In Bible college, there were many dicussions about Heils Geschichte and Redaction Geschichte while talking about Bible interpretation methods. I know that Historie refers to events and Geschichte refers to the interpretation of those events, that's as far as my German goes, which has been a problem because using a German moniker has caused people to assume I speak German, which I don't.
who I worked at a fast food place in high school with gave me the nickname "Sorrellbo" by adding the bo to my last name. It is a play on sore elbow, although I did not have a sore elbow at the time .
One day, I was watching my non-cable TV one day on one of my off-days, when I stumbled upon a show on PBS called Wishbone. It was a show with a cute dog that would play parts in classic literature. One day, the classic literature featured was The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas. For whatever reason, I was soon reading this great novel and loving every page. The brutal, well plotted vengeance wreaked by the formerly mild mannered Edmond Dantes had me rooting for him. I am always either MonteCristo or SisterJoey (another story) in any forum I am in. And as everyone knows, the number 23 is just plain awesome.
Mine is straightforward. I'm a wargamer and I was born in 1955, therefore Wargamer55. Surprisingly I've been able to port the user name over to many other services including Facebook, Twitter, my AOL and SBCGlobal emails and various other hobby sites so if you see Wargamer55 in some forum it's likely to be me.
My Avatar is from a set of custom Hero blocks for Wizard Kings that Grant over at Columbia Games kindly did for me.
Both the username and avatar are highly stable and I don't expect any changes any time in the future.
This all started when I was young...and played this on gameboy (which I still think is a good RPG). I signed up for an email account and typed in pokemon, and they spit back that it was taken, and gave me this one. I just kept using it, and never changed it because it is never taken on any website I go to (and if it is, I musta forgot the password). It is just easier for me to remember...I might change it in the future...who knows?
Although i'm more into fantasy and sf, i sometimes reread a Stephen King book. One of my favorites is the Langoliers. In this story a boy daydreams of being a lonesome cowboy in the wild west. He then goes by the name of Ace Kaussner. In the story he kind of saves the day and walks away with the girl. What more could a man ask for?
The name always stuck, and i used it many times (always available in forums)
Paladin. Not perhaps so much what i am, as i can be a right bastard every now and then, but definetly something worth aspiring for. I don't honestly belive i'll ever live up to any skyhigh levels of morality and virtue or anything, but i do feel like i want to be the kind of person who at the end of the day have contributed more good then bad to the world.
I've been using the handle back and forth sence pre-internet, and lately the modifier _Fin has been added. First reason, the Nick is quite common in its various forms, second, I'm a Finn and proud of it.
My first contact was with the whole concept of the do-gooder in question must have been when i was like 12 or something, and vandered into my first-ever fantasy/gamestore. Very much the stary-eyed kid i glanced thru some books, completly stricken with all the possibilites of a RPG, and flicking thru character options, i came across the Paladin. Needless to say, D&D games since then (mostly on computer, sadly) have been more or less completely played with said class.
When I started playing Tribes 2 on PC, I had to pick a persistent username for my account. My Everquest name had been Ranajul, and I figured I needed something more modern sounding for the futuristic tribes, so I made up "Kektek." It's been my username for pretty much everything since.
"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play, his labour and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation." LP Jacks
My wife and I used to love watching Akira Kurosawa films. One of our favorites was "Sanjuro" (the sequel to "Yojimbo").
Toshiro Mifune played the Samurai with No Name in both films, and when people ask him his name he just says "Sanjuro" ("thirty-something"). I was in my 30's and started using the name online.
In the late 1990's, I started to find "Sanjuro" was already taken on some systems, especially those with a strong Japanese userbase. Instead of adding a number, I started using "Shijuro", or "forty-something". My wife used the name briefly (not knowing that it implied she was older than she was) but when I turned 40 I appropriated it and have been using it most places since.
Several years ago I was in need of an internet alias to use with different user name requests. At that point I had already decided that I wouldn't use part of my own name on said alias so I had to find something else.
A recently seen movie gave me the answer. In Cutthroat Island one of the most short lived relatives to the protagonist was Mordachai (with that spelling, at least in the subtitles). I found the name catchy, adopted it and have been using it ever since in different settings.
Later on I constructed a complete name for the alias Mordachai Cervantes Etmalka, based on another pirate reference and my own family name. Etmalka has since been used in a couple of instances as well as MordachaiC when Mordachai is taken already. With that spelling it doesn't happen all too often though.
I started going by my initials back in 1992, when Scott Haring asked me to write reviews for his magazine, The Gamer. I've been using them ever since for my primary online activities (I have throw-away accounts elsewhere, with different screen names).
Belgarion (also called Garion) is a fictional character and the chief protagonist in The Belgariad and The Malloreon, two fantasy epics written by David Eddings.
I really liked these books... In those days we started playing online games so I needed a username. The first name that crossed my mind was Garion: both his name and my real first name (Geert) start with the same letter and the preposition "Bel-" was a nice extra (I'm a Belgian)
Since then I ALWAYS use this nickname (forums, gaming, ...). Very convenient...
Knoel is short for 'Koele Noel' (Cool Noel in English, believe me, it sounds much better when pronounced in Dutch). A friend gave me this nickname in University. He must have been kidding, because he got all the good looking girls back then. Maybe I was just a little bit too cool. Those were the days...
I came with my name when I started playing Anarchy Online mmorpg. It's a combination of two things I like...
fractals + cartoons = fractaloon
Often, at least in the game, it was shortened to fract by folks. It's got a benefit of being very unique and I've used it quite regularly since. I also use it for my currently down website.
Not to be confused with Doctor Ugavine, my Star Wars RPG character. I created Doctor Ugavine back in the 80's, before SWRPG. He's based on an Ugnaught and his personality has become a bit of a mix of myself, the 2nd Doctor(Who) and Randal from Time Bandits. Dr Ugavine is a computer tech, so as a favourite character, unique and I work in IT it seemed appropriate to use as pseudo.
The name is formed by me trying to make a Star Wars Sounding name. This was at a time when the Emperors name, Palpatine, was not well known. So, 'Ug' from Ugnaught and 'atine' from Palpatine became 'avine.'
Bossko B. is another character, the one in the avatar and already explained in the avatar thread.
My late father Richard Charles and mother Beverly owned a business. Friends called it RC & Bev Co. (rcbevco) I use it everywhere I can in their memory. (eBay etc...)
When our daughter was about 6 or 7 years old, she was frustrated with the number of parental directives she was receiving one day, and told me, "You think you're King Daddy..."
Through school, I was an unabashed Trekkie, and have seen all of the Star Trek TV shows multiple times. At one point, I had a group of friends over, and was able to identify episodes of Star Trek when the TV was turned on after the sound came up- but before the picture appeared. By series, and episode name.
I became the Trek-expert; they just got mashed together to Trek-spert.
Believe it or not, the first time I tried to sign up for Trekspert online, it was taken- so I became Trekspert1. I've never seen either Trekspert or Trekspert1 taken since. So, odds are extremely good that if you see Trekspert1 out there, it's me.
I've spent close to 30 years working in the interactive games industry. Most of that time, I've worked on the product development side of the business even though I was a corporate executive by title and through reporting structure on org charts.
A group of my employees noticed that I spent about half my days wearing a suit and tie and the other half in dockers or blue jeans and aloha shirts depending on whether I was spending the day with engineers or senior level business staff.
One day for my birthday the division awarded me a plaque with my new official nickname .... McGuit
The wording on the plaque stated that I was the first person to successfully walk the line and still be respected as both "Geek" and "Suit".
"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play, his labour and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation." LP Jacks
I love this list!
I'm often curious about usernames, and I've found even the "straightforward" backgrounds interesting.
This size viola da gamba is like a cello with frets. I started playing at age 48.
My user name is from the instrument in my avatar picture, a viola da gamba ("leg viol"), sometimes called "bass viol". I started studying it about eight years ago to complement my recorder playing. I also play the tenor (medium-sized) and treble (small) viols. Viols are related more closely to the guitar than to the cello, since they have frets and six strings tuned in fourths with one third. My dad snapped this photo in my parents' kitchen, and it showed such good form with the bow that I adopted it as my avatar.
The username I use "Wizalou" comes from my magic user when I used to play the computer game MIGHT AND MAGIC 1. I have used it ever since. I use a couple different usernames on other ites but Wizalou is the one I use the most.
. What more could a man ask for?
Those were the days...
Indianapolis
Indiana
Most of that time, I've worked on the product development side of the business even though I was a corporate executive by title and through reporting structure on org charts.
A group of my employees noticed that I spent about half my days wearing a suit and tie and the other half in dockers or blue jeans and aloha shirts depending on whether I was spending the day with engineers or senior level business staff.
One day for my birthday the division awarded me a plaque with my new official nickname .... McGuit
The wording on the plaque stated that I was the first person to successfully walk the line and still be respected as both "Geek" and "Suit".
McGuit
Absecon
New Jersey
I'm often curious about usernames, and I've found even the "straightforward" backgrounds interesting.
I hope more folks will add their stories.
Henrico
Virginia
Kankakee
Illinois
Indiana