Naming Conventions

There is an odd thing I've noticed when interacting with my online friends.

I've been playing now on Cenarion Circle long enough to make people I'd really call "friends"... something that never happened despite playing for just a long on my old server.

It was a little odd when I first started hanging out with the new social group, particularly because people had a habit of referring to someone by a name that wasn't the toon they were currently playing.  Or occasionally, even by their real name.  But I started to pick up on who was who.  Making a handy alt-list to refer to helped.

It was a little odd for a while, too, when I'd change social circles and the name I was called changed.  If I were playing with people who primarily knew me from Horde side, they'd call me "Kezrin."  It was a bit jarring, since most everyone else at the time called me Derscha, or very occasionally, Ketlan.   I am now pretty used to being called multiple names based on circumstances.

But the truly odd thing that caught my attention several months ago was that it didn't bother me to think of people in terms of multiple names.  I will just as easily refer to my friend Arietha with any of her other names.  I have even switched which name I've called her in the middle of a conversation.

This has caused me to think a lot about the meaning of names, and the etiquette of names online.

Before I moved to Cenarion Circle, I was Ketlan.  Sure, I had a vague notion of the type of person Ketlan if she were a character I'd write, but I wasn't roleplaying.  Ketlan was just the online name I used.  I was the healer, I was the priest, and you would call me Ketlan because I didn't want you to know my real name.  I didn't play any other characters with any regularity.  That's how it is online, in communities where people generally only go by one handle.

But what about World of Warcraft, where people regularly play more than one character? Who use different handles? And in roleplaying communities where we constantly preach that we are not our character?

Now that I'm a roleplayer, it bothers me vaguely to be called Ketlan.  Ketlan has her own distinct personality, opinions, and history.  She is a character in a story I help write.  Calling me Ketlan is like walking up to Sir Author Conan Doyle and calling him Sherlock.

I am not Derscha.  I am not Kezrin.  As roleplayers, part of our culture is to remember that we are not the toons we roleplay, and to keep IC interactions seperate from OOC interactions.  Yet, at the same time, we mix IC and OOC by calling players by their character names.  It takes practice to keep that mental separation.

It is practice born out of necessity.  People refer to me by these names out of convenience, because they don't know the name of the player behind the character,  just as I refer to them by their character names.  However, I don't believe that the player of Arlston is Arlston.  Arlston is just one facet of a player who controls multiple characters.

It has caused a strange disconnect in my mind between person and name.  It is like the player is this nebulous being, and in front of the player is a cloud pf multiple names, each equally valid.  Is it odd that my mind has adapted to the concept of a person with multiple names?  It would be like living in a world where someone introduced you to their coworker who was wearing a name badge that said 'Bob,'  and said, "This is Sarah."  And then everyone immediately adapted to saying Sarah.  And it would be perfectly normal and natural.

It's because neither the name Bob nor Sarah have the same meaning we usually associate with names.  As kids, were were given books with a picture of a dog and told "this is a dog."  That's not true with players.

The name doesn't represent the player, but is more of an arrow pointing to the nameless player that is behind the character. Everyone has multiple names, multiple arrows, but they all direct my mind to the correct - if nameless - concept of the player.  When I say, 'Arietha,'  I am not calling that player Arietha, but merely giving a kind of clue to other people that I mean to address the player behind Arietha.

(This can get very confusing when I'm talking about the character Arietha while in a conversation with the player of Arietha, as you can imagine.)

My mind has even become more efficient at making these connections, as I've found I can more easily adapt to people introducing new alts.  If Arietha were to log in a new character named  "Sandy,"  I'd instantly start thinking of Sandy as Arietha-player.   There is very little downtown while my brain has to build the connection between new name and old concept.

I wonder if that is how other people think of their fellow players, as nebulous, unamed personalities they slowly get to know, in a center of a cloud of more public, yet completely fictional, personalities.

What name you use to refer to another player depends a lot of circumstances, and how close you are to that player and anyone else in the conversation.  It can say a lot about the social dynamics.  If you're comfortable with  a player, you may refer to them by their "main" character name; for example, someone may call me Derscha even if I'm currently playing Mirtadel.

It can also say something about your history with that player.  As in the beginning of my post, friends from Hordeside were more likely to call me Kezrin, the name of my Horde character,  but I would not be surprised if an Alliance-main player were on a Horde alt and called me Derscha.

As for group level of trust: when I'm in a group of people I don't know well, I will try to call people only by the name of the character they're playing, to avoid confusion.  When I see someone call a player by another name, then I'm clued in to the fact that "these people know each other reasonably well."

It can depend on the circumstances of a conversation.  When discussing AAMS topics, I will be referred to as Derscha.  When talking about Terra Incognita, it is more appropriate to use Ketlan.

The same applies to what name you call yourself in public.  It says something about the topic at hand, your level of openness, and the community.  People have been criticized on the forums for posting on alts, if the other forum posters feel you are trying to hide who you are.  Who you chose to post on adds a specific flavor a tone to your post. For those who know who your alts are, it can be an insight. If were to post on Ketlan or one of my lesser known characters, people would probably wonder why I didn't want that post associated with Derscha.  The appropriate selection of a name can be a big deal.


The whole situation makes me think about the stories of "true names" that appear in folklore.   Someone's true name in this case would be the one name that always refers to them, the player.  We may call the player by various character names, but they're just convenient pointers that don't have any real, significant connection to the player.  Some of those names may be deleted and discarded, even.  But the player's true name refers uniquely to the player herself.

And just like in folklore, you only give your true name to those you are close to.  If someone gives you their true name, it means you are part of their inner circle.  And like the magic of true names, it can change the way you think and interact with someone: the player suddenly solidifies in your mind as a distinct being and not a nameless concept.  That person becomes more real, even if intellectually you understood there was always a person.  It gives you power to address the player directly, without the confusion of character-vs-player. True names have immense power.

Just as in folklore, people jealously guard their true names, and you should never, ever give someone's true name without their permission. 

A true name can the player's real life name, but within the World of Warcraft, you can argue that someone's BattleTag can fill in for a true name to an extent.  It is a name that refers directly to the player, and if you have that name, you have knowledge about the player: who their alts are, what they are playing, their in-game location.  You can whisper them whenever they are online.  That is why people want more limits on Battletags.  We are nervous about granting other people the power of our true name.  We have already gotten the power to share tags without using our real names and emails, but we would also like to be able to hide or have a "do not disturb" status.  It is too useful to share Battletags, but we don't want to give out our true names.  The less like a true name a Battletag is, the more it will be used.


In the meantime, however, I take the following lessons:
1) Names are not the concrete "this item=this name" concept we learned in picture books
2) Choosing a name says something significant about you, and the message you wish to convey
3) Names have the power to alter the way you think about a person