> "Side note: What about just consistently using a handle? And that handle being part of your "brand"?"
For me, there is too much cognitive overhead when you try to do this because you have to be constantly aware of what you have already said about yourself (going back years) and decide if additional information you are about to give could be used to disambiguate your identity by somebody who had access to the content of all your past online posts.
For example, say that mention that I am from a small town in Vermont. On another website, years later but with the same uncommon handle, I mention that my highschool class only had 27 people in it. On another site, I mention that I once swam a 100 meter freestyle in under 55 seconds. Just with those three things, each fairly reasonable things to mention in various online discussions, an obsessed stalker could probably narrow me down to one of a few dozen people. Now that is not too bad, but those are only three mundane facts, and if I am using the same handle for years or decades...
Handles that are hard to google without getting irrelevant results (such as my current handle) can certainly help, but that will only go so far. Counting on that is making assumptions about the capabilities of future web search technology.
I agree, I found it really not worth it for me to use a handle that was not my real name. I don't know about other people, but when I interact online, I don't act in a way that very different from how I act "IRL". Because who I am is the same online as it is in real life, obscuring just my name doesn't do me much benefit.
The only way I could obscure my information online would be if I maintained an entirely different persona/identity entirely, with totally separate lives. Since I can't or won't do that (I'd feel vaguely dishonest), I just use my real name anyway.
"Because who I am is the same online as it is in real life, obscuring just my name doesn't do me much benefit."
I operated like that for a few years, but then I realized that although my presentation of myself online is not that different from how I present myself in 'real life', there are examples in real life of situations where I present myself differently. For instance, I no longer discuss politics with family (in no small part out of respect for immediate family members who are now in the military. If I said to them what I am willing to say online, feelings would be hurt...)
Yeah, it really is a luxury that many people don't have, being able to not worry about who knows your views. I choose to not share most all my political or religious views in real life or online. But for many people who have views far outside the mainstream, or who would be otherwise persecuted for the things they think, I can totally understand why they wouldn't share many things.
For me, there is too much cognitive overhead when you try to do this because you have to be constantly aware of what you have already said about yourself (going back years) and decide if additional information you are about to give could be used to disambiguate your identity by somebody who had access to the content of all your past online posts.
For example, say that mention that I am from a small town in Vermont. On another website, years later but with the same uncommon handle, I mention that my highschool class only had 27 people in it. On another site, I mention that I once swam a 100 meter freestyle in under 55 seconds. Just with those three things, each fairly reasonable things to mention in various online discussions, an obsessed stalker could probably narrow me down to one of a few dozen people. Now that is not too bad, but those are only three mundane facts, and if I am using the same handle for years or decades...
Handles that are hard to google without getting irrelevant results (such as my current handle) can certainly help, but that will only go so far. Counting on that is making assumptions about the capabilities of future web search technology.