Request from @negromaestro

Dom

Dom

Administrator
Staff member
All,

Posting this in case you aren’t following the Doctor Who thread. @negromaestro has requested that people don’t refer to him as his given name on the forum but use his forum name.

Having done a search, there’s a number of us who interchange between the two including myself, @Neil Gow and @First Age. Let’s do our best to reflect his wishes.

@negromaestro, I’m presuming that using your given name is okay in con reports as you go by it there?
 
Can we have some clarity as to whether it is standard forum etiquette, as @negromaestro said, to always refer to people by their username and not their actual name, even if we know them face to face as well?

I wasn't aware of this, and it sounds like several of us have unintentionally caused upset over a significant period of time - which I'm sure wasn't the intention, and it would be great for it to not happen again!

I know that on twitter / etc both handles and names tend to be used interchangeably, and I wasn't conscious of forum etiquette being different.

Personally, my preference would be for people to use their actual names, or variants thereof, because having a good faith conversation about Tom Bombadil is harder with N00BCRSHR181 (no offence Noobz) than with an actual person, but I realise some people may have very valid professional and personal reasons for using different handles/names for their Bombadil discourse.
 
The general position we have is that we don’t have a position unless someone expresses a preference.

This is the first time we’ve had this come up in my memory, although I will defer to @Guvnor here.

However, much as if someone had changed their name or pronouns, we should do our best to respect their wishes.

Personally, I’ve never used a pseudonym here although in other forums you’ll find me as @cybergoths and I will answer to either.
 
We have never had a policy.
I try to avoid using given names in case, so I try and use @ , but even I have not always remembered.
Maybe we do need a policy for etiquette on this?
 
Not trying to be difficult, just logical.

On a large forum with hundreds of people, not everyone can know every other person's name if it is not listed on the profile. Hence, using a known private name in public conversation when not on a profile is like deliberately or inadvertently outing someone. It does not have to be considered malicious.

It only gets malicious if another person deliberately states they will be the one to chose the name to address you. My father taught me the history and significance of people's names, especially the lost names of Black Africans in America. So when someone choses a name for addressing you without you giving permission, that can be a slight, it is overlooked in close friendship, like when missionaries offered Christian names and those were used in Baptism. Many of the younger generations of Black Britons have started to take back and present their traditional names, though they then face the mispronunciation dilemma.

My own real name is short, but almost everybody still mispronounces it. I do not correct often, since it is not a big deal to me. But the reality is that my full name is universally mispronounced by almost everyone not from my tribal region. That is the sad reality.

Anyway, I see no mandate or reason to force a particular names policy, just logically, unless you know someone well, on any forum with hundreds or even thousands of users, the obvious choice is the name presented publicly.
 
It may be impolite to use a given name when requested not to do so but it is not racist IMHO.

I think we may be moving to the first change of our terms and rules. I'll review later on.
 
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