I want to be like Uncle Scrooge and swim in a pool of money. So TioGilito is correct.

I've thought about this for a while, and just speaking for myself, this is what I came up with. Not much, but bare with me.

Anything that I show of what I am (was/will be actually) working on, I show as swrdphantom, so it wouldn't make much sense to release anything as Brock, because then only about three people would know who the modder is. Anyways, I don't exactly consider swrdphantom and Brock to be exactly the same person, it's kind of a spiritual thing.
Also, I consider myself a hobbyist rather than an artist, so I don't care that my work is thought to be from someone different than whom people physically talk to. Did that make sense?

When I try to explain I usually write Chaakeech, but I suppose that works too. And name's pretty world wide, just the spelling of the name changes, be it Phillipe, or Philip, or Filip (the latter being the version of my country and probably the same in most slavic countries heh).

YOU have a pretty unique name too, mister!

I kind of relate it to band names and "entertainer names" which are sometimes similar to a person's real name but usually not identical and often "cooler" than the person's birth name. (Harrison Ford, you are the exception to this rule.) People like to use an alter ego online both for personal privacy and maybe something like creative license and also a sense of "uniqueness". I have used mine ever since I had to come up with a user name that wasn't taken a looong time ago on a forgotten message board - so I came up with something that no one else had used and had some significance for me. I am surprised if I find another "Elricwulf" already registered somewhere, as it's only happened once or twice, but if I use my real name, then there are several people with that birth name.

I share a full name (first and last) with an actor and a male stripper that works in my home town. I'd rather not be mistaken for either of, though the actor wouldn't be so bad if I had his money... Elaura did a search for me when we started talking, that's how we found out about the stripper.

I also share a name with a famous, high paid actor. I usually have to state that no, I am not related, if they ask about it. I also happen to be a famous canadian artist.

Thats nothing, I share a name with a white indie rapper and my last name is the name of a famous chicago political family that I may or may not be related too.

I just want to say that I'm very happy to get such honest, courteous responses to my question!

And yes, if you are good at it, and smart about promotion and monetizing, you can make a good living off of a webcomic. Most don't reach that point, but it used to be my job to work with cartoonists to help them turn it into their careers.

I can't sell the mod work I do, but if I can create something enjoyable, maybe even impressive, it will compliment the parts of my career where I do make money. Also, doing mod work relaxes me and sparks my creativity, so it doubles as a kind of meditation for me, I think everyone should be proud of the work they do (most of you are), but I have a better understanding of the mod community, now. Honestly, I had an idea and I wanted to challenge myself to bring it to fruition, and I've been working on it from outside of the mod community... I mentioned my work on these forums a few times but I'm still an outsider and I don't actually know any other modders yet. So, good to meet you all!

Ah don't worry about being an outsider. It comes over time, as you'll post here you'll start to realize you're remembering some names more than others. Some people may not want anything more outside of this community, like you saw in many many posts above, some may become your friends (for example I'm very good with some people I've met here and we talk on almost daily basis), and so on. Depends mostly on how friendly you can get I guess.


To people above mentioning threats- sorry for my ignorant post above. Didn't know there are that kind of idiots out there (that is I'm more than aware, but didn't expect to see it happening to modders over here). Or maybe I just never had to think about it since I'm too unimportant character to attract anyone's rage. In any case, I'm sorry to hear that about Alien Slof, never knew.

Wow, your artwork is impressive! The girl in the 3rd frame from the left on your page - is that the "bad girl" witch character from "The Craft"? Fairuza Balk, I believe? The resemblance is uncannily close.

Also, your Morrowind: Keening mod looks awesome. Damn. Now I'm gonna have to re-install and replay all of Morrowind, at least the main quest, so I'll be ready for your mod! This is a good year for Morrowind and Elder Scrolls in general, it seems. I've seen some great mods come out for Morrowind that have made me want to re-install it (with all the latest graphics enhancers) on ma' brand new machine! Now, maybe after all these years, I'll be able to play with some of the big mods without lagging terribly.

EDIT: Wow, I knew Alien Slof had left the modding community awhile back but I never knew things had gotten so bad. How terrible for her! I've used her Goth mods for Morrowind. The more effeminate male stuff wasn't my taste, but there was some really cool stuff in there. Her horse re-textures for Oblivion, which I also used, were worlds better than the original textures. Really sad for such a talented person (or anyone for that matter) to get treated like that.

Lady Nerevar is my name. It may not be what I have on my passport, but I've used it for half of forever and people know me by it all over the internet. I've been known to answer to it in real life, and I'm proud to associate it with my online accomplishments.

On the other hand, I don't keep my real name secret, either. When modding, or doing any other hobby work, I'd sign "Lady Nerevar". If I was working on something more professional, I'd undersign "Darya 'Lady Nerevar' M."

How do you pronounce that? I bet it's similar to Polish "Daria"

My real first name is Micha? (with that funny crossed l at the end) and it's a counterpart to English Michael or Mike. My last name has a "rz" phone, which you read same as ? (z with a dot over). It also contains ? (e with a "tail") which you read as, like, English "eww". Even Poles have roubles with writing down my last name when I tell it to them, so I guess using my nickanme is better. So far my mods and the readmes I've been credited says Minamir, just one Hrnchamd's one says Michal, because we were working on that mod by e-mail and my e-mail displays my real name as an author.

Long story short, not many people outside Poland would be able to fully understand or pronounce my last name.

It's Russian originally (well, Persian, technically, but I'm not getting it from there) so I assume so. It's spelled Дарья in Cyrillic.

Why would I tell anyone on the Internet my real full name? I know better than that.

I brought up Slof's case to illustrate the dangers of showing who you are online. While there's always a degree of danger in being famous, when you're famous online, it can be even more dangerous because more people have access to your work, which means more disturbed people have access to your work... As for Slof, she was persecuted for her art and if she had signed it with her real name, she may not be making it anymore. If you want to sign your name to your work, Superkitten, by all means do so. Just remember that doing so can, though not necessarily, carry with it a higher degree of risk than just signing it "Superkitten".

Plus, to be honest, using a forum name is much more memorable then a persons real name. My ID has history to it, as my first website, The Pirates Retreat was for an old game called Stars! and I thought it would be good to give it a little theme. From that, Piratelord was born once I was introduced to TES, the forums, and then the curse/gift of modding.

Besides "Creatures by Stuart Douglas" just doesn't sound as good as "Creatures by Piratelord"

And yes, my real name is Stuart, if anyone wants to waste their time hate mailing me, feel free Anyone who has emailed me directly gets my name in the reply, so no real secret.


I do now actually get a bit annoyed if I try and make an account somewhere, and find that Piratelord has already been taken. Grrr, that's me, and only me, hands off the name

People sent Slof death threats just because she wanted to fetish up the lads? Jeez. Some people need to put down the Internet and step away for a while. It's only a game!

Anyways, I've spent pretty much my entire time on the Internet under some kind of username. It's my identity. I'm Rave. My very best friends know my real name and still call me Rave. I've already gotten credit under a small variation of this name (which used to be my username here, 'til a combination of forgetfulness and the last hacking attempt locked me out of the account) as a proofreader in a few Infinity Engine mods. Why would I want to use my real name now for that?

I used to make games back in the late 80's for Commodore 64, under the name Zelf (Yes, I was 13 and my friends actually called me Zelfy), and I called my "Company" Zelffics. I actually found some downloads for my 1986 games in rom form on a chinese website. Blew my mind. Admittedly, if I wasn't thrilled about my real name, I'd be tempted to use a handle. I guess, in the end, I'm just like y'all, except that I went downtown and dropped the cash to change my name legally. Zelf, however, stayed in my childhood.

I'm going to take a wild guess and propose that anonymity might be part of why some people are more aggressive on the internet. It's easier for someone on edge named angryguar to get mad at someone named alienslof. Probably harder for Al Guarino to send death threats to Alison Slofburg (I know that's not her name LULZ). In my case, using my real name give ME the power. If angryguar006 gets mad at me because Voryn Dagoth in my time travel scene of Keening isn't what he's imagined, I just remind myself that angryguar006 exists only online, whereas I exist in real life. But, that's my survival technique. I respect how other people do things differently, and I respect their reasons. So far, I've had some people come out and tell me I'm doing something wrong, or have kind of a bossy front, but they really just want to help and are interested. I've had some people telling me to drop dependency on MCA, but they don't understand that building on that mod and its resources is the reason I even started my project. People are quick to judge, for sure. But in my case, they have to say it to my actual face.

Honestly, I think that some of the things I'm doing with my mod haven't been done yet simply because it's scary how people react to certain types of things. One of the quest givers is Indoril Nerevar, during the time of the First Council. Some people will be like, "Wow, that was so much fun to see one modder's possible interpretation of that era." Others will probably think I stepped on their mom's grave and spat on it. Hopefully my website and open identity will ease things over for some people who might misunderstand and react rashly to my work. In the end, it's like... play it if you like it, not if you don't.

I'll definitely revisit this topic if I get a death threat! I know my project will annoy some people, but that's just the nature of doing anything that builds on an existing work... All of us modders are George Lucas in some way.

I have a feeling that a lot of modders abandon any thought of doing something like that out of fear of insults. If there's any type of ES fan that I despise, it's the people who freak out whenever something breaks the lore, or even just comes close to doing so. Granted, I'm not much into mods that introduce real-world firearms and spaceships and random stuff from other games that looks really out of place, but I'm not about to go out of my way to upset the people who make such mods. It's not like WoW, where every patch that comes out that changes something you don't like is forced onto you, and you're left with the choice of dealing with it or quitting. When your Keening expansion is finished (which I'm looking forward to), only the people who want to play it will be affected by it in any way. Everyone else is free to have it not take up space on their hard drive.

I've barely begun developing ideas for my Solstheim overhaul project, and I can already tell you that a good portion of the people who frequent PES aren't going to touch it with a fifty foot pole. They're going to hate what I'm doing to the island, the way things work there, the way I've re-written a great deal of Tamriel's history, what I've done to the lore, the way it probably won't be compatible with a good number of really popular mods, everything. I anticipate a massive amount of hate. And you know what? I don't give a cave rat's behind. I'm doing it anyway. This time next year (yes, I said next year), "Solstheim Conquered" will be up on PES and TES Nexus, and no amount of insults is going to prevent that.

yeah, you're a smart lad Dan.

I don't think I am imaginary. I exist in the real world quite the same as you, thank you very much!

A name carries a person behind it, completely regardless of whether or not you chose your name, your parents chose your name, or you chose your name then paid money to use it on your passport. I am actually quite fond of my given name, regardless (and partly because of) how common it is; for pragmatic purposes, however, and in direct answer to your initial question, I use something more unique online because the people I interact with do not for the most part, have any other way to know who I am except for my name and it is easier for both myself and them if that name is easy to remember and recognize. It means no more and no less than the name you paid money to make official in the real world.

And I have to say, I do disagree with you; in my long experience jerks who are nasty over the computer are usually just as nasty in person. They MIGHT be more subtle about it, but if they are, it tends to have more to do with your ability to get back at them in some way or your position of authority than with you being a real person to them and not a name.

This thread lead me to another, related thought, which might help those who still don't quite understand why some people do and some people don't. While some folks will use their real names in their usernames and in various online communities, you still see very few people, even among those who use their real names, using photographs of themselves as their avatars. Why is this? I would think, in the majority of cases, it isn't because of fear or because the idea of gaining r/l prestige hasn't occurred to them, but because many of us still enjoy the aspect of playing a role. Each online community is like moving to a new town. You can re-invent yourself as many times as you wish, as long as you use a new avatar and username. This is appealing, especially among those who cannot always control their impulse to be rude and burn their bridges.

Yes, usernames can be traced, but most of the time, people are just living their own lives and don't take the time to track down sock puppets. Eventually, when the game gets old, folks settle down in one community or another and keep whatever name they showed up with. Just as folks settle in a town they like IRL and go with whatever persona they developed there. I don't think anyone ever targeted the Morrowind modding community with the idea of becoming famous, but when it happens, it is usually with the name we happened to choose when we walked in the door.

I know only a few people with their real name I think, but I won't reveal them to anyone who asks for them because I want to be respected of others and how do I get respect from others just respect them as they respect me. Personally I like the forum environment because I won't need to use my real name as an username upon registration if I doesn't want to and that suits me just fine, but I don't like Facebook because you must use your real name if you want use its service to meet other people from around the world. Besides I haven't really being interested in chatting with other people on the internet, so that's probably why I don't use Facebook/Blog/Twitter since I don't like to let anyone know my real name except for a few of course.

Keep in mind that I specifically wrote "wild guess," "might be," "part of," and "some people" to make sure that no one misunderstood my sentence as in any way applying to all or even most cases. But yes, outside of the few people that might fall under what I was proposing, nasty is as nasty does.

I hope you don't think I was calling people here imaginary... but there are a number of responses here that indicate that some people create personas on forums that don't exist off the internet. I think of everyone as real, and even if I'm anonymous, it's all still "real life" to me. But as a veteran of Second Life, I know that there are plenty of people that take on whole new identities and even modify their personalities online. Certainly, we all have our own valid perspectives on how we perceive and conduct ourselves. Remember, I started this topic because I wanted to learn, not make declarations about other people.

I'm only just now learning that mods are often developed and released on forums... that hadn't occurred to me. I'm going to pay closer attention to these pages so that I don't miss something awesome that doesn't get released on, say, planet elder scrolls.