Picking an online name..

[lsatblu]

Hi all,

I am thinking about changing my user name that I use for practically everything to something different. I'm finishing my second year of design school and would eventually like to put a portfolio up online. I'd like for people to be able to search my user name and find my site. Right now my current name is hard to pronounce and isn't an actual word.

It is the words last + blue mixed up a bunch. It is also the name of a character I play in an online game. Lsat Blu. I use this screen name for everything basically.

I made a flickr account with my real firstname.lastname and uploaded some art but my firstname.lastname does not connect to the name I use for my email and on every forum. I'd like to have it all be one thing. I could use my first name on forums but I don't think I want my last name everywhere. Especially since no one would be able to pronounce it. I could do my first initial.lastname but that would still look strange.

The other problem with my real name is that it is the same name as my dad. So searching for me will also come up with stuff for him. This is a pain. hehe.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do? What do most designers do? I was thinking once I get the domain name for my portfolio I could do something like "portfoliositenametom" with my first name "tom" after the site name. That doesn't seem so bad if the domain name is pretty short.

What does everyone think? Anyone else had this problem? On my forums I go by the name lsatblu and if I ever want to put my forums in my portfolio or just on the site it wouldn't make sense having the screen name lsatblu. My family does not understand even when I try to tell them that it is from a character I play. I know some people have really hard to pronounce names on most forums and that is cool but not what I am looking for.

Any suggestions would be great. Thanks.

[eJM]

I have a business that I hope will turn into something some day. I believe a business person should use their first and last name in communications, unless they are a small part of an LLC or Inc. I happen to use my initials as part of my business name, which I am not suggesting you do, but it is what I have done. enterpriseJM is the company name, my name is Jim McClain and I use my abbreviated company name and my company logo on most forums I participate on. My company name is also my domain name (for my web business - I have a number of other domains too), www.enterpriseJM.com.

I also use a nick-name on some forums that was given to me many years ago. "Grump" has other interests besides web design and www.GrumpsPlace.com is part of the expression of those interests (unfortunately, it's at the beginning of a total revamp from several years of damn ugly). But that site and all my others always links prominently back to my business domain - and to other domains I have too.

So, it's up to you. I vote for more disclosure - use your real name in your business and link everywhere you can back to your business site. You might be pleased that, whether people know how to pronounce it or not, you're found easily in Google. I managed to be included at least once on each of the first 4 pages of Google for my real name - and that's tough to do when it's such a common name and there was a famous actor that used that name in a role he played.

Jim

[lsatblu]

Awesome thanks for the reply.

I am just unsure of now if I want to use my real name in my community that is not business related. It is something to think about. I'll probably use my real name when it comes to my portfolio and everything else and maybe shorten my screen name on my community based on my real name.