Back when I was young teenager, I created the moniker “teepoo” so I could play online games, go on forums and just for general anonymity. Those aren’t things I really care about anymore and I’ve become more open and transparent about the person I am. I’ve slowly been dropping the username from everything, claiming my own name as bi-line for everything I do on social media.
So, you may have noticed that my main tumblr account is now tianafeng.tumblr.com as opposed to “teepoo.tumblr.com”. I was previously using my name for my photography tumblr but for general copyright reasons, I decided that Flickr (and partially this blog) will be the home for my photos. I’ve gotten to the point where uncompensated exposure isn’t something I need anymore, plus it takes time to post photos in so many different places. I love having one (tumblr) account that accumulates all the content I create and collect, so therefore I decided to make the relatively painless switch.
I’ve already changed Ride the Tempo to show real bi-lines around 2 years ago. I became comfortable with my own writing enough that I no longer needed to hide behind a fake name, and I encouraged all my contributors to do the same. Now it’s relatively normal (in the past few years anyway) to have your real name everywhere and if you don’t, people can figure out your true identity if they really wanted to. I’m not ashamed of the things I post, nor do I post anything that I wouldn’t want certain people reading. If you google my name, it’s all things I’m relatively proud of or I would have never hit publish. There’s nothing wrong with filling up the Google Search with things that highlight positive things about me when people search my name!
What do you think about names online? Do you use your own?
Tiana Feng 