[eikenberry]

This seems pretty obvious to me. When you are working to build a positive reputation online you use your real name. When you are taking part in things you don't want associated with your reputation you use an alias.

You don't want to never use your real name. You want to be googleable, but you want it to be mostly positive.

[BillyMaize]

The only account I have so far used my real name on is my stackexchange account so I can potentially use it in interviews to show I am active in the community and in my own learning.

[aestra]

>You want to be googleable

I do not want to be Googleable.

[epochwolf]

I go by epochwolf online and I very much care about the reputation I have under this name. Somewhat by accident there is an entire group of people that only know me as "epoch" in real life. My reputation among those people is just as important as my reputation among people that know me professionally under my real name.

I do try to keep my professional and personal relationships separate which part of the reason I have a pseudonym. In a bit of irony my company uses github and I use my epochwolf account at work. The seperation is less important than it used to be but I will always be epochwolf online.

[unicornporn]

If things were that easy. The things you want to be associated with your name today might not be the things that you want to be associated with in 5, 10 or 20 years.