I recently came across a lensmaster who was saying an advantage of multiple accounts was to make sure all her lenses were ranked, by ranking them from each account. This shocked me — it was a respected lensmaster, and I told her I thought it was against the TOS! Sure enough, within a day or so, Squidoo HQ sent her a note. Multiple counts should NEVER be used to gain some kind of advantage one can’t have as just one person!

But I’ve used the internet and participated in online communities since before the web began. I’ve shared different parts of my life with many different groups of people.

I have an online handle known in the Lord of the Rings community.
I have an online handle who writes popular literary bodice-rippers, and I am not about to let the Lord of the Rings community know what that is, because there are teens and young’uns in that community. My bodice-rippers are posted on a site with aggressive adult filters that work in tandem with parental blockers to keep out the kiddlybeans until they reach the age of debauchery.
I have relatives, classmates, colleagues, old high school chums who know my academic work but don’t necessarily need to know about my fandoms.
I also have two livejournals, one for people I know through the net, one that is locked so only my closer real life friends see it. (Over time, some net friends cross into “real life” friends, but they are different levels of acquaintances.)

So on the one hand, one could say I have multiple accounts because some are shameful — the literary romance writer is certainly a little sheepish (and currently on leave).

On the other hand, these multiple accounts have nothing to do with marketing. They have everything to do with social filtering. In real life, you share different levels of intimacy, different interests, and different topics of discussion with different groups of acquaintances, friends, and colleagues. On the internet, ANYBODY can use Google to search for your name, and anything you say is archived on the Wayback Machine forever.

Perhaps we all ought to let everything hang out. Perhaps we ought to be unafraid to share our video game walkthroughs and romantic fantasies with grandma, the boss, and students. But I prefer to maintain a few social partitions online just as I do in real life.

So fan-Greekgeek has a separate account from scholar-Greekgeek-who-shares-her-real-name. And that writer of goofy romances will continue to use a nom de plume.

Or my real name isn’t Edith Pargeter.
Greekgeek´s last blog ..What Is Haitian Vodou (Voodoo)?

I thought about starting my own blog too but I’m just too lazy so, I guess I‘ll just have to keep checking yours out.
LOL,

Take care

Paul

Now whenever anyone asks me what I think about it, I can say:

“Er, what Drifter said!”

“Let the buyer trust us or expose us” – what a great line!!