Twitter, on the other hand, has vigorously defended the use of pseudonyms, bucking demands most recently from British government officials who pressed for a real-names policy in the aftermath of the civil unrest across Britain.
"Other services may be declaring you have to use your real name because they think they can monetize that better," said Twitter’s chief executive, Dick Costolo. "We are more interested in serving our users first."
They disabled the page and asked for his ID (okay, your defense, works until now). They got his ID, which according to the article lists a different first name and Salman as a middle name.
Now how can you explain the following discussion? At this point the owner of the account formerly known as Salman Rushdie provided (state issued, no less..) evidence of being that guy - but Facebook claims he has to use the first name listed on the ID instead?
It worked out in the end, but your explanation falls short. The biggest WTF (if we ignore the idea that you should provide a copy of any ID to a site that is used for Mafia Wars and things of similar importance) is the requirement to stop using his middle name.
Even if he _weren't_ the author publishing as "Salman Rushdie" and just some random guy named "Ahmed Salman Rushdie" he should be allowed to go as "Salman Rushdie". Even with a brain-dead real name policy in place. That is his real name.
(Granted: In that case he arguably still shouldn't be allowed to pose as the author. But that's a different problem)
That's what probably happened. And I can also assume that Rushdi never tried to claim there "I am the real Rushdi", only tried to show that "My name is Salman Rushdi [too], see my passport, therefore I should be allowed to use this name". While FB was trying to protect that name for the real Rushdi.
If FB employees really knew this is the real Salman Rushdi they are talking with, this probably would have never happened.
My friend is a semi-famous Jazz singer named Spider Saloff. FB wouldn't let her join Facebook because "Spider" is not considered a "real" first name. She got the run around because her first name isn't really Spider, she just has gone by it for nearly 30 years. Nope. Go by your real name or go home, said FB.
Finally a friend comes up with the idea: "Spidie Saloff" works like a charm.
They ask for official ID from anyone trying to prove that a name they've flagged is, in fact, their legal name. It's their process for getting your account unbanned.
Of my 500+ "friends" on FB, over 40 (at last count) had non-real names of one kind or another. As far as I know, based on status updates, none of my friends has ever been told to change their name. Other than getting free publicity/bad press, not really sure why FB insists on this policy.
Of course I can guess why and understand that, but just seems a waste of resources and customer goodwill.
Do you think it's beneficial to your browsing experience that your friends are able to use fake names? Genuine question. I know personally I would prefer my friends to stick to real names and avoid ASCII art, cute nicknames and such. But I might be in the minority here.
I would prefer real names, or at least the name(s) I know them by.
Many of my friends are Asian and have several "names", most not on their birth certificate or passport. Despite trying, there is no way I can pronounce or even remember many of my Thai friends' names and most of my Chinese friends usually use their English first name that they adopted, rather than were given.
Good point, and I understand legal names aren't always conventional. By real I mean the name a teacher would call you in school. Not a nickname or pseudonym.
Facebook is generally weak at dealing with fake profiles. Their social graph is a mess. Obviously fake names, businesses, support groups and scams go untouched for months. Here's a small sample, which I didn't have to go to much effort to collect (I've seen many more):
Yes, and the business-as-person thing get really annoying in the friends suggestions. You are friends with 5 local businesses that decide to setup as persons rather than pages, and then FB starts suggesting other people be your friends who are only friends with those 5 "people" and are otherwise strangers.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but historically, there is nothing wrong with using names other than your "legal name" as you as you are not defrauding people. If your birth name is "Sam" and you decided to go by "Charlie", even on paperwork, that is okay. People can have known aliases.
Shame that were are getting to the point that people must go by the specific name on their legal documentation.
On CBC Radio One there was a good discussion of how people use different names or characters in their everyday life.
You may be know as Bob to your mother, B-man to your friends and rocketBoy55 online. Your demeanor is different depending on the situation, you wouldn't act or talk towards your mom like you do when you are online as RocketBoy55 or vice versa.
It's unreasonable to expect people to act the same all the time and go by the same description in all areas of their life.
That's true, though I always look essentially the same; my visual image is a sort of a "name".
(OK, yeah, I might wear different clothes in different circumstances. And some of us use makeup which makes even our face look a bit different.)
I guess I'm trying to say that I'm OK[1] with there being a place (Facebook) that requires real names while there are places (Twitter, most of the rest of the web) that don't. Different requirements for different contexts lead to different tones and different conversations.
Anyway, this is all a bit beside the point of this post, which seems to just be about an overzealous FB employee demanding a famous person (that presumably they didn't recognize) had to use the name on his ID.
[1] Yes, I'm privileged and have a standard Western-style name and nobody dangerous stalking me that I need to hide from, etc etc.
genuine question - why do people put up with stupid, arbitrary "rules" like these? FB is not "necessary" for life (it is not a drivers license or any other important identification requirement that is "needed"). Rushdie is famous enough that he can interact with his fans by having his own site, or in other sites (twitter) which don't have such stupid rules.
In short, why is FB so important? There are phones, emails, twitter and a whole lot of other means of communication.
I never use my first name anywhere (most of my frineds don't even know Abbas is my middle name, not first) and have never had any trouble with FB. The point is that Salman Rushdie is a highly controversial figure and I bet this is not the first time someone has tried to create an account with that name. If FB didn't block folks from doing this, Rushdie would be complaining how FB never checks on reals vs. fakes. The point is, FB is trying to maintain the integrity of it's data, and people like Rushdie are often attacked for their opinions and are a target of those who disagree with them.
So, a Salman Rushdie account appears. Facebook is afraid that, given Salman Rushdie's sometimes infamy, that this might be a troll account that can be more inflammatory than it's worth.
So they verify Rushdie's identity and are suitably convinced that it really is him.
... So they make him change his account name? How does that make sense?
They don't make him do anything outside of what he is supposed to do as per their policy - use his real first and last names on his FB account. The problem arises when he is well known by his middle name and has been using it as his first name. Which once they clarified with him was allowed on the site.
Side note: It is common for people from that part of the world (Indo-subcontinent) to use their middle name as their first (like Salman and I do).
So therein lies the fatal shortcoming in the "real names" policy. Looking beyond privacy and anonymity issues (though those are important), the policy itself doesn't work simply because the concept of a canonical name for a person doesn't really exist.
In some cultures it's prevalent to go by your middle name. In some others preferred names are shortened from its legal form. Some people have multiple names, each one just as legal and valid as the other (I have both a legal English and Chinese name, for example).
Nothing that Facebook (or to be fair, G+) does accounts for any of this, and without a framework to manage a person's many names (not to mention identities), a "real name" policy is both shortsighted and unenforceable.
My original point stands - we've established and agree that asking Salman Rushdie to use Ahmed Rushdie is stupid and unacceptable. Rushdie got this decision reversed because he's famous and published. Anyone else would not be so lucky. So why does this policy continue to exist and get enforced?
[edit] And something else: my parents had the foresight to officialize my English name when we immigrated to North America. Many other Chinese I know have gone by English names for decades and yet never got it cemented legally. According to Google/Facebook these people have no claim over these names, despite the fact that all of their friends and family have known them by only that name for decades.
So I guess what these companies are trying to communicate is, if I pay the paltry fee to get my name legally changed to Superfly McAwesome tomorrow, that's a-ok by them. But an account belonging to Ho Li-Jen, who's gone by "Jean" all her life, who is known by her neighbors and friends by that name, needs to be found and made to fix their account.
I understand your frustration, but the point here is famous people versus regular. Not western vs eastern culture (for naming conventions). And I think its ok for famous people to be able to go by their public persona or stage name.
I agree with you that the examples you cited seem to have no remedy. What's your proposed solution?
Not have a real-name policy. Identity is too complex a concept to be reduced to simple data structures, no matter how much us engineers desperately want to.
If one is concerned about impersonation, attack impersonation - impersonation can and will happen even with a strongly-enforced real-name policy (name changes, anyone?). Empower support to deal with impersonation on a case-by-case basis.
Open-endedness in this sort of enforcement can be risky, but it's certainly better than the "baby with the water" policy the way it is right now.
The real story is actually that FB, which is known for having a pretty lean staff, has busybodies that go around effing with (presumably mostly) famous people's accounts in the first place.
No, they assumed he was an impostor, asked for ID then insisted his account matched the name on the ID.
Whoever did that clearly didn't realize he was famous and typically went by a different name - they just wanted his account to match the ID he sent in.
Twitter, on the other hand, has vigorously defended the use of pseudonyms, bucking demands most recently from British government officials who pressed for a real-names policy in the aftermath of the civil unrest across Britain.
"Other services may be declaring you have to use your real name because they think they can monetize that better," said Twitter’s chief executive, Dick Costolo. "We are more interested in serving our users first."