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submitted 3 days ago by pip@slrpnk.net to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

This has probably been asked before but I wanted to add another layer/an alternative.

So, I ask, where did your username/pseudonym/nickname originate from? What's the meaning behind it?

Or alternatively, which is the most creative/interesting nickname origin you have come across?

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[-] Birch@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 day ago

Birch, please.

[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 day ago

I had a job doing QA where I had to create user accounts. Some Guy was one of the three that I created every day.

[-] Resol@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

Resol - can mean a number of different things. It's the first 5 letters of the word "resolution". It's also the word "loser" spelled backwards. It's two notes on a keyboard (D and G in Anglo-Saxon music notation). And it just looks and sounds cool in my opinion.

van - the Dutch word meaning "of" or "from". Note that I am not referring to actual vans (the German equivalent being "von", which also appears in a lot of names). Also I prefer spelling that word completely in lowercase.

Lemmy - isn't it obvious? It's this wonderful website.

Put them together, and you get "Resol van Lemmy". It sounds pretty nice, don't you think? Especially since I really hate my real name.

[-] Vandals_handle@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

CB radio user names are called handles. One of my nicknames is The Vandal. I think Subterranean Homesick Blues is one of Dylan's best. Violà.

I studied abroad while the Two and a half Men season with Ashton Kutcher aired. A guy at a pizza place always wanted to chat but he barely spoke any English and somehow he really wanted to tell me that I look like Ashton Kutcher. Had similar length beard and hair at the time. A few days after that I signed up on Reddit.

[-] nimble 2 points 1 day ago

I opened a physical dictionary to a random page and pointed to a word without looking.

First attempt was diarrhea

[-] LouSlash@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I used to play GH3 on PS2 a lot and i played boss battles quite frequently

One time, in another game called Soldat, when a clan was recruiting they told me to change my old nickname since it was bizarre (i was 15 yo). I was looking for inspiration and quickly came up with Lou (final boss in GH3), added ` so i would be recognised easily while also not impersonating anyone unintentionally.

Few months passed by and i saw someone on some Soldat-related IRC channel chilling with my nickname and that person wasn't actually impersonating me (he/she used that nickname for much longer time than me since "Lou" is actually a first name which for me, as a native polish speaker, wasn't that obvious at the time) so that huge coincidence made me come up with an addition to my nickname - 2nd boss in GH3, famous guitarist - Slash. In the end i started using LouSlash`

As time passed by, in some places/websites/games i couldn't use ` so i drop it occasionally.

[-] VeganCheesecake 1 points 1 day ago

I was eating something when I made the account. Make a wild guess what it might have been.

I was promoted from the rank of Commander.

[-] hollerpixie@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago

My husband’s nickname for me. I was born in the holler in Appalachia and am a woodsy pixie. It stuck and is now my trail name.

[-] CaptainBasculin@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 day ago

First shiny Pokemon I ever got. Basculin carried my team a lot, hence the name "CaptainBasculin".

[-] white_nrdy@programming.dev 4 points 2 days ago

I really liked Weird Al when I was like 12. Still do.

[-] AA5B@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I love airplanes and was excited to see a “modern” one where you could slide back the canopy just like in all those old WWII movies! It’s even ok to fly with it open (a little)!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grumman_American_AA-5

[-] antiquity2038@reddthat.com 1 points 1 day ago

Bitwarden username generator 👍

[-] The_Picard_Maneuver@lemmy.world 65 points 3 days ago
[-] neidu3@sh.itjust.works 36 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

All of Lemmy knows. Never stop. Your account is basically a cultural heritage site at this point.

[-] callyral@pawb.social 1 points 1 day ago

Tally Hall (band) → callyral (pseudonym + username) → cally (nickname)

[-] fmstrat@lemmy.nowsci.com 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Way more years ago than I would like to admit, when I was in my teens, I learned to play a Fender Mexican Stratocaster. It became my name on my BBS, and has stuck ever since.

Most people think it has to do with FM radio.

Edit: Also, this question has managed to get replies from almost all of the prolific participators on Lemmy. Nice.

[-] Vandals_handle@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Do you play the Steely Dan classic FM on your FMstrat?

[-] TheBraveSirRobbin@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

Username should be pretty self explanatory. If you still don't get it you can either ask me or bravely run away.

[-] db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 46 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Mine stands for "Divided by Zer0", based on the programming error "division by zero". Amusingly, people keep assuming it stands for "database zero" or "dragonball zero".

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At first I lurked on my boyfriend's account. We had both left Reddit during the API debacle, but I wasn't ready to rejoin social media yet, so he hopped on Lemmy first.

But as he shared links and news and memes with me, and I scrolled the comments, I started wanting to participate. The first few times I felt drawn to comment (but didn't yet), I wanted to ask people what the reasoning was behind their thoughts. That stuff is interesting to me.

So when I finally sat down and made an account for myself, it was the first thought in my head. I haven't found myself asking anybody about their reasoning since then, but I still like the name.

[-] nimble 1 points 1 day ago

What's your reasoning for not asking someone's reasoning? Or in other words, if the reasoning behind their thoughts is interesting then why stop before your started?

Also sorry i just have lots of questions. Was there a certain type of comment that you wanted to know reasoning behind, or just in general? For instance were you wanting to understand hateful comments, or political perspectives outside your own? That sort of thing

Neat username regardless!

Pretty much all of the above. Sometimes it was a silly comment or argument that didn’t quite make sense. Sometimes it was like, “what are you trying to say?” but specifically asking for one’s reasoning helps clarify things.

I still might ask it some time, but I’ve found the environment here to be more hostile to rational thought than I’d originally expected… which was a sad discovery. A lot of people seem to react without first comprehending what they’re reading.

Also, thank you!

[-] gigachad@sh.itjust.works 39 points 3 days ago
[-] WoodScientist@sh.itjust.works 34 points 3 days ago

My username is literal. I'm literally a wood scientist. Or more specifically, I'm a current PhD student in civil engineering and wood science. Identifying Wood by Hoadley was actually a textbook in one of the courses I took.

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[-] squirrel@discuss.tchncs.de 40 points 3 days ago
[-] tuna@discuss.tchncs.de 24 points 3 days ago
[-] olafurp@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Caveman eat tuna

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[-] Patrik@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago

Patrik/Pat is just my name, sometimes use Legendbird on sites because once it was the first thing I thought about (Zapdos, to be exact).

[-] JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl 7 points 2 days ago
[-] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 1 day ago

Perhaps the best name in the thread.

[-] Rin@lemm.ee 1 points 1 day ago
[-] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 6 points 2 days ago

It sounds cute.

[-] Im_old@lemmy.world 29 points 3 days ago
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[-] YtA4QCam2A9j7EfTgHrH@infosec.pub 26 points 3 days ago

Mine is my password I use for all my accounts. It is very convenient for the frequent times I forget it. I can just come here and there it is.

[-] LouSlash@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

How many login attempts did you just receive?

I wish there was a way I could tell.

[-] Stalinwolf@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I was playing some crappy F2P MMO (Perfect World, maybe?) and I made a warrior of some werewolf race. Just played with random wolf-related combinations and settled on this. Quit after two days and the username carried on for probably 15 years now.

I don't even really know all that much about Stalin. I just pulled it out of my ass.

[-] ChaoticCookie@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 days ago

I’m chaotic and I like cookies, nothing more to it!

[-] ericdavidmorris@sh.itjust.works 26 points 3 days ago

I got onto Reddit back in the day for the electronic music production subreddits. There was an old Daft Punk interview during the big Ultra Music festival days where they made a joke that all EDM music was made by just one guy, Eric David Morris.

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[-] Walk_blesseD 1 points 1 day ago

Just a greeting used in an RPG I really liked. As pretty much the only formal greeting in its setting, it seemed very overused, so a friend and I started using it in our friend group as a meme, and I decided that it actually goes pretty hard as a username.

Finn from Enderal

[-] VirtigoMommy@sh.itjust.works 7 points 2 days ago

I get dizzy during sex

[-] BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

Title of a book by my favourite author Jonathan Carroll. Almost all of my various handles over my time online have been some variation of one of his book titles because they're so unique. I used one on Reddit and some Nazi started stalking me, and it turns out some lady on Twitter uses it as her handle there, so he kept messaging me and calling me Stephanie.

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this post was submitted on 23 Jan 2025
101 points (100.0% liked)

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