i was very excited when i first saw that google was starting up a social networking service. i am a bit of a social networking geek *looks at dandyid plugin on sidebar* and i love to sign up for new stuff to try and connect with interesting and like-minded people. so when the google+ beta started i was on it like white on rice. i LOVED the way it was set up and i LOVED how easy it was to use. i felt that it was definitely going to be a “facebook killer” like many of my friends were also saying.

however it seems that google+ is going to be just like facebook, because it does not allow us to use pseudonyms in place of our real world names. for the most part, this only affected my friends who are a part of second life, because they prefer to go by their second life name because it is recognizable to others who use second life, as well as a safe anonymous way to browse the net and use social networking services without being tied to their real life information.

sure, i know, this can breed trolls, anything that allows you to be pseudo anonymous will always breed trolls, but i personally just do not feel its safe to place your real life name on the internet. yes i’ve been stupid in the past when i was younger and my name is probably hovering around out there somewhere like a black cloud that i cannot kill, but i try to maintain a consistent online identity with the name “nimil” to allow me the ability to connect with others but not give out my real name. when things call for me to put down a last name, i usually just use the last name i got in second life.

so far the only places that have said no to this name, are facebook and google+. i locked down my facebook so that only those i want to see me can, and use my real name. i keep it open only to those who i know in real life, or those who i have known online so long that they pretty much already know about me enough to know that information.

since google+ has also stated that private accounts are not allowed, i had no choice but to delete my account with them, to make sure i was not risking losing my gmail account, which is my primary email that i do all business though. my friends who have had their accounts suspended due to using their second life name in place of their real life name, also found that their gmail accounts were suspended for “suspicious activity” until they gave up a mobile phone number to have it reinstated. since i do not have a cellphone, it would be impossible for me to get my account back.

i think its rather depressing that google is going the way facebook went. thankfully there are other sites out there that do not mind users having pseudonyms, like twitter, plurk, and tumblr.