So rather than promoting myself as my name, I have chosen an alias, stealingsand, that I feel represents me without being my actual name.

1st Law of Name Choice: Unique works

A lot of problems people have with choosing names stems from the fact that they haven’t chosen something unique. Like an unexpected combination of a gerund + a noun (laughing squid, anyone?). They instead choose something like “hook’em horns” which is a phrase every Texan is familiar with, and probably every fan of American college football has heard it. 1st Law of Name Choice:

The regularity with which the name you have chosen is used in common language is inversely related to the availability of that name on internet services.

Basically the more people who know or regularly use your phrase (or if you see it on a t-shirt, ever) the less likely it is that it will be available in every web application (yahoo, gmail, del.icio.us, etc.) and every new web application.

Ever tried to sign up for a web service with a name you thought was special? If you choose something common to the language you’ll end up being hookem_horns.75203@gmail.com instead of uniquely you. And every time you sign up for a new web service, you’ll have to choose a new variation of “hook’em horns”, maybe with a zero for the o or something absurd like that because someone else has gotten your name before you.

So what if I have a different one every time?

In the new web era of multiple social applications, we have friends who want to share in our endeavors online. And most of them may not have any idea what our real name is. I am on twitter as stealingsand, and when I opened a brightkite account I signed up as stealingsand. I sign up for every single service as stealingsand.

Now if my friend/business contact/potential employer knows that I am consistent (because I told them so), and that I have an account on a new website, they can guess what my alias is, and find me, and connect to me. They can see my work, my abilities, the breadth of my accomplishments or craziness. I can be found.

Now, if you don’t want to be found, or enjoy trying to remember if there’s an underscore or not in this particular login, go for it and sign up with everything with a different alias.

Why be found?

I haven’t never gotten a job above minimum wage that I didn’t know somebody before getting it. Never. Not always directly, but my social circle has been the path through which I became employed or got contracts.

And though everything is moving online, I believe that the essential social nature of people will not change. The modality will change, but not the essential nature. So people will continue to hire people they know or people their friends know, whether this knowledge is based on personal contact or on 140-character tweets.

So you need to be findable, and especially in my industr(ies), able to show a diversity of interest, talent and experience if you want to get jobs, and internet networking helps.

Now what?

So now you may be on board with the “unique, consistent identifier” concept I am proposing. How do you choose an alias to represent who you are?

This is a difficult process to recommend because only you know who you are. Look at yourself and figure out:

• who you want to be to the world
• what features about you are primary
• what features about you would sell best
• what you like/love/enjoy
• how your friends perceive you
• jokes you like
• ironies that piss you off
• other random stuff

You could ask friends hokey things like “what word come up first when you think of me” but then you’ll get answers that may be jokes or people saying, “what, is this a quiz?” or “I don’t know”. Or not.

Blogger Heather Armstrong of dooce.com fame chose dooce because it was a common typo she made while typing IMs. Yeah, really. You can get inspiration from anywhere.

Random name generators

There are a bunch of websites like bandnamemaker.com that help you to find huge lists of random names. A simple google of the phrase “random name generator” pulls up 320,000 results. Not too bad. Most of those are for actual “names”, subject to the 1st Law of Name Choice (see above). And those ones that link to “buy a new identity” sites, that’s not what I’m talking about. Am not advocating stealing someone’s identity, SSN, etc.

So why random? Random is good because it stimulates (simulates?) creativity for even the least creative person, and gives you ideas that you would never come up with alone. I just searched for “ocean” on bandnamegenerator and got these:

• Ocean Auction (huh. weird.)
• Deficient Ocean (not so much)
• Ocean Counselor (not so me)
• Eating Ocean (hmm)
• Ocean Judge (??)
• Frugal Ocean (so not me )
• Indecent Ocean (too…indecent)
• Septic Ocean (eew, but maybe if I were an alt band)
• Southern Ocean (too likely taken)
• Ocean Canal (nothing special)

But hit the refresh button and you get…ten more. And those ten can spark ten more of your own ideas. You can brainstorm and write down garbage until you find a gem. Or you can keep refreshing until you hit one that speaks to you.

Choosing my alias

When I was choosing it I seem to remember long lists of word combinations that I would reread and feel out. I was looking for something longer-lasting than a mere color fad or music craze. I wanted to represent myself.

I knew I wanted “sand” or “beach” or “ocean” or “sea” in my alias, but I didn’t want to be all little mermaid or kitschy flamingo-sounding. I wanted an edge. I didn’t want to be associated with those acrylic seashell decorations you see in the bargain bin.

I chose stealingsand because every time I visit a beach (lake, sea, etc.) I collect a tiny bit of sand, usually just a little baggie full and place it at home in a glass container with a calligraphed label. It reminds me of the vacations and relaxation I had there, the time I collected it, and it takes me away from the grind. And it’s fascinating for the scientist in me to see the contrasts between sands from beaches that are even just a few miles away, the composition of the sand and its ratio of shell particles to stone and coral.

On some beaches it is illegal (green sand beaches in HI, for example) but I have yet to actually go to those kinds of beaches. Either way, if I went to one, I’d totally still take a teaspoon of sand, at least, maybe get a bunch caught in my toes or my shoes and say “Wow, I didn’t know I had ten pounds of green sand in my Keds”. I would then be stealing sand.

Now, you could argue that inclusion of the verb “stealing” as an alias sets me up to be a thief to people who don’t know me, or maybe makes people go “ooh, she’d steal stuff”. But seriously, sand? The fact that sand is so often accidentally brought home, and rarely stolen, takes the bite out of the theft charge. And it makes you wonder, what would this person be doing with stolen sand anyway? The name associates with the sea, the ocean, the beach, all of the things I love so dearly but rarely get to see living here in Dallas.

Use it well, my son

It’s possible that eventually someone will be using the name you choose, no matter how careful you are with the choice. But in the meantime, maybe you can make a case for yourself with primacy in signing up for all of your web services with a single username. If it ever went to court, you’d have been there first.

If you choose a unique identifier and use it consistently (even to the point of using it as your “name” on certain services that don’t allow a distinct alias) you will never have to worry about:

• what username to choose (no more Jonj0n_234)
• forgetting what your username is
• whether someone remembers that it’s a dash, not an underscore in the name you chose
• being lost in the shuffle
• contact info that is long and cumbersome
• contact info that is forgettable

A cautionary note, though: don’t choose something very underoos. It needs to be flexible enough to represent you personally and professionally. Because you’re out there if you’re online, like it or not…