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What's your true identity?

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Are you for real?

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  • I am as real as a 3 dollar bill

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Rob Monster

Founder of EpikTop Member
Epik Founder
Impact
18,389
Yesterday, I noticed that the user formerly known as AGAME is now @AnthonyD. That is actually his real name and from what I do know about him he is a class act.

I have also gotten to know many folks in real-life outside of NamePros. There are some awesome people in this community. However, lots of folks here have fake names that look real!

After seeing his username switch,I was discussing it with @AnthonyD. We agreed it is time to invite folks who are hiding behind their avatars to come out of the shadows and engage with their real persona.

lets-get-real.jpg


So, what are some of the objections?

1. I am afraid someone will come to my house and steal my domains at gunpoint or hurt me. Unlikely. scenario The downside is that when you want to sell a domain, buyers have to work twice as hard to complete due diligence about you. Besides, when domains go missing, they are pretty easy to track down!

2. I am afraid that someone might judge me for owning a particular domain. Well, if you own a domain name that your mother would not have you own, consider not owning it. Problem solved. If folks want, we can do a "purge day" and have commission-free sales for domains.

3. I have a day job and my boss might not appreciate my side hustle. If your boss is in the domain industry, he/she should want you on NamePros. If your boss is not a domainer, he/she might actually appreciate your hidden talent. For example, your boss might not help buying a domain.

There might be other objections, but set those aside as I can almost guarantee you that they are mostly irrational fears. In the meantime, in my experience, your ability to succeed on NamePros can be greatly amplified by being authentic. More commentary on that here.

So, if you are ready to come out of your digital closet, here is your chance. Change your User-Handle and re-introduce yourself as the real you. The longer you wait, the less time for the rest of us to know the real you!

So with that as context, here's me:

Name: Rob Monster

Occupation: Domain Industry Innovator and maker of bigger pies

City: Sammamish, WA

Social handles:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/enlightenedcapitalist/


So, who's next?
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
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A comment I shared with another member this morning:

"Over the years I've picked up more than a few auction/expired names and had the previous owners (some active here) send hateful and sometimes threatening emails to the proxy email. If they put it together here, it would interfere with my 'normal' posting. It is freeing to be able to share without being stalked by a bitter rival (in their mind). More than likely I will start another account so I can sell names without having to worry about being harassed. May we both have success, regardless of who we are, in 2020! :xf.smile:"
 
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I used to be “xabial” (stupidest name ever) but changed to real life name, more professional.

Thanks for the thread, Rob.

Samer
 
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A comment I shared with another member this morning:

"Over the years I've picked up more than a few auction/expired names and had the previous owners (some active here) send hateful and sometimes threatening emails to the proxy email. If they put it together here, it would interfere with my 'normal' posting. It is freeing to be able to share without being stalked by a bitter rival (in their mind). More than likely I will start another account so I can sell names without having to worry about being harassed. May we both have success, regardless of who we are, in 2020! :xf.smile:"

There you go.

If you maintain 2 browser clients, it is possible to have multiple Personas. I usually engage as @Rob Monster but sometimes as @epik if the support team is maxed out.

As for rivals, I have a few here but I think their banter is more of a hobby or sport then genuine hate. I might be wrong there, but I will take my chances. :)

Thank for keeping it real.
 
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Name ..KAMALDEEN.
Country...Nigeria
Occupation....Domainer
 
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There you go.

If you maintain 2 browser clients, it is possible to have multiple Personas. I usually engage as @Rob Monster but sometimes as @epik if the support team is maxed out.

As for rivals, I have a few here but I think their banter is more of a hobby or sport then genuine hate. I might be wrong there, but I will take my chances. :)

Thank for keeping it real.

I will probably do a blue or gold upgrade (have to check perks) so more listings, etc. will be allowed. Good idea for a thread, btw.
 
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My username is actually based on my real name: Florin. The four ns in Rhinnnn are there because I was born on the 4th. Not July, but March.

Occupations: Writer; inventor of words; musician wannabe; amateur photographer.

Location: Romania.

I will likely change the username to my full name when/if I become a domainer in the true sense of the word. Certainly not there yet.
 
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Well, here I am! I am out! LOL!

I am actually Anthony DiPaola though I asked for my name to be changed to AnthonyD due to now knowing if it would fit all on one line and didnt want it to split over two.

My linked in is https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony247/ my twitter feed is at https://twitter.com/optimalnames I live about 20 miles south east of Charlotte, North Carolina in a town called Indian Trail. I am a transplanted northerner. Got tired of the congestion and huge population, and frankly the politics, of the NYC area! Been here a long time now and love it here though it is growing by leaps and bounds and that congestion that I left in NY is building here year after year!

I check my twitter account more than my LinkedIn account but feel free to connect and I will eventually get to see you. I am on Namepros much more often than those other two sites. I started domain investing in 1998 by mistake, by 2000 I was buying domains for investment purposes.

I have been in Information Technology since the mid 1980s working with very large banks, power companies, travel companies using IBM mainframe computers systems and now I build websites for reasonable costs at https://charlotteinteractive.com/ In late 2019 I began something completely different, working with my hands for the first time in 50-something years. I enjoy it very much and hope to start showing my products locally and via a website TBA soon. Here is an example of the flags I've made and can make them in various sizes and configurations (blue line for law enforcement, red line for fire fighters, etc). Once I get the website up I will post back.

This is a photo my first customer sent me after receiving the large flag (37"x19.5").

upload_2020-2-23_12-39-3.png


In addition to the large flag I now also make two smaller sizes, a medium flag (24"x13") and a small flag (18.5"x9.75"). All of the stars are hand carved. It takes about 10-14 days to create the flags, no matter the size. This is due mostly to my schedule and the weather. For example, I came down with the flu in the first week of February and it knocked me off my feet. Only now am I feeling like tackling my taxes! :) There has been no progress with any flag making since. Hope to get back to it soon.

Also, I cant stain when it rains, have to do that outdoors. Stars on the small flags are actually orders of magnitude more difficult to carve than the largest flag due to the carving bit sizes, etc. At 55 years old my hands are not as steady as they used to be. Tons of these are being made by other folks, I figured I would try my hand at it and so far its taken off! I hope to rent a small booth in a marketplace in April with a large inventory to sell for the "patriotic" holidays coming up: Memorial Day, Flag Day of course, and Independence Day.

Here are all three sizes:

upload_2020-2-23_12-59-52.png


More than y'all probably wanted to ever know about me! :) Hoping to read about other domain investor friends here on NamePros!

Anthony DiPaola
 
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Fake name is ugly I prefer nickname.

Before all this identity and data collection from the big ones we usually registered nicknames.
 
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Interesting. I've been thinking of changing my handle to my real name for a while now. Would be a first, have been using handles since forever (habit I guess) as there are the obvious privacy issues. Same reason I don't do social media.

Real names make it easier to talk though. People I converse with frequently know my real name and what I do anyway. I'm not scared of the crazy. Although someone once did track me down (another forum) and showed up at my property. I guess he didn't like the greeting he got from the rottweilers. Never heard from him again but did find out he had a mental disorder. Nowadays I only have a Labrador present so I rely on my own skills :).

Undecided. Nice thread. Definitely not stupid :). Following!
 
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Well, here I am! I am out! LOL!

I am actually Anthony DiPaola though I asked for my name to be changed to AnthonyD due to now knowing if it would fit all on one line and didnt want it to split over two.

My linked in is https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony247/ my twitter feed is at https://twitter.com/optimalnames I live about 20 miles south east of Charlotte, North Carolina in a town called Indian Trail. I am a transplanted northerner. Got tired of the congestion and huge population, and frankly the politics, of the NYC area! Been here a long time now and love it here though it is growing by leaps and bounds and that congestion that I left in NY is building here year after year!

I check my twitter account more than my LinkedIn account but feel free to connect and I will eventually get to see you. I am on Namepros much more often than those other two sites. I started domain investing in 1998 by mistake, by 2000 I was buying domains for investment purposes.

I have been in Information Technology since the mid 1980s working with very large banks, power companies, travel companies using IBM mainframe computers systems and now I build websites for reasonable costs at https://charlotteinteractive.com/ In late 2019 I began something completely different, working with my hands for the first time in 50-something years. I enjoy it very much and hope to start showing my products locally and via a website TBA soon. Here is an example of the flags I've made and can make them in various sizes and configurations (blue line for law enforcement, red line for fire fighters, etc). Once I get the website up I will post back.

This is a photo my first customer sent me after receiving the large flag (37"x19.5").

Show attachment 145627

In addition to the large flag I now also make two smaller sizes, a medium flag (24"x13") and a small flag (18.5"x9.75"). All of the stars are hand carved. It takes about 10-14 days to create the flags, no matter the size. This is due mostly to my schedule and the weather. For example, I came down with the flu in the first week of February and it knocked me off my feet. Only now am I feeling like tackling my taxes! :) There has been no progress with any flag making since. Hope to get back to it soon.

Also, I cant stain when it rains, have to do that outdoors. Stars on the small flags are actually orders of magnitude more difficult to carve than the largest flag due to the carving bit sizes, etc. At 55 years old my hands are not as steady as they used to be. Tons of these are being made by other folks, I figured I would try my hand at it and so far its taken off! I hope to rent a small booth in a marketplace in April with a large inventory to sell for the "patriotic" holidays coming up: Memorial Day, Flag Day of course, and Independence Day.

Here are all three sizes:

Show attachment 145628

More than y'all probably wanted to ever know about me! :) Hoping to read about other domain investor friends here on NamePros!

Anthony DiPaola

Awesome stuff - that is some craftsmanship right there.

Also, I had not connected that you are OptimalNames on Twitter. Good to know!

And a vintage 1998 domainer should be able to teach some stuff.
 
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I am Aftab Iqbal from Pakistan
 
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Awesome stuff - that is some craftsmanship right there.

Also, I had not connected that you are OptimalNames on Twitter. Good to know!

And a vintage 1998 domainer should be able to teach some stuff.

My first and most important lesson with domains would be: Patience! :)
 
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Lots of people know me here with my real name!

But let make it public,

Hi Everyone,

It's me Furquan (yeah, notice that 'N' instead of 'H') that's my real name.

Occupation:- Working with a company which always care about our domainer community and a firm believer in making the pie bigger.

Screenshot_2020-02-24-00-39-50-898_com.android.chrome.jpg
 
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I always use my real name, from the start.
 
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I used to be “xabial” (stupidest name ever) but changed to real life name, more professional.

Thanks for the thread, Rob.

Samer
I remember that name.
 
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For anyone interested:

NamePros offers free username changes to any standard form of your legal name:
  • Your full first and last name. Example: John Smith
  • Your full first name, middle initial, and last name. Example: John R. Smith
  • Your full first name and last initial. Example: John S.
  • Your title and last name. Example: Dr. Smith
  • Your first initial, middle initial, and last initial of your birth name: J.R.S. or JRS
Learn more: Username changes

We hope that helps.
 
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1. I am afraid someone will come to my house and steal my domains at gunpoint or hurt me. Unlikely. scenario The downside is that when you want to sell a domain, buyers have to work twice as hard to complete due diligence about you. Besides, when domains go missing, they are pretty easy to track down!

Say what you will, but that is a valid reason, and I actually had a few "home visits" (no guns involved, fortunately) before I started hiding my data in whois records.
 
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There is no hiding, my friend. One of the things I think is great about a place like NP, is the ability to brand yourself with a username and build confidence and trust, regardless of whether the username is your real name or something funkier. Content and consistency, along with association with the brand name you choose to represent yourself with, should be king. Not whether or not one chooses to use their real name.

A real name can be viewed as a domain name. Is it always the right choice for a username/brand? For example, would you run a registrar called RobMonster.com? Before I signed up to NP, I considered a ton of options for my username, including my given name. In the end, I chose something I thought best represented my own "thing" for a domain name forum. A real name can be revealed at at anytime throughout your lifetime in the forum, either by information in one's profile, or by a thread such as this where a real name might be relative to the threads content.

My advice is this: Don't be scared to NOT use your real name, and come up with something really cool that you've always wanted to use to represent yourself with. Using your real name is easy, being creative and out of the box, perhaps not so much. There's a ton of opportunity to show people who you really are, including even someone following a link to your professional domain portfolio, where a real name is likely to be found. Buyers want to know they're dealing with a real person.

If you did your homework, in my case for example, perhaps a bit of digging on older posts, it is easy enough to find out who HotKey really is, I've put my full name out there, loud and proud.

Anyboo, perhaps for some the real name IS the brand, kudos to you too!

- Hots
 
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i find 99% of time someone is “hiding” identity shown, when you do business with that person and pay them PP. it says paid “Paypal name” Some still hide PP name paid, but negligible #

Samer
 
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@Rob Monster , this is a great idea for some, but it has taken me several years to finally fit into my forum handle Oldtimer ;)

People that I communicate with in the domain Industry such as you or the NamePros management are already aware of my real name, but I rather wait for everyone to become more Conscientious and Righteous and to have a more professional, respectful, and constructive atmosphere here before I get on a more personal basis on the forum and even then it will probably be only with people whom I choose to communicate with directly that I feel don't wish me ill and that are not trying to attack me for my work as a Human Rights and Environmental activist and intellectual who believes that everyone should be treated with respect and be given equal opportunity to be able to ascend to a higher level regardless of their race, color, gender, religion, gender preferences, national origin, ethnicity, social and financial status, genetic background, and any deformities or disabilities.

I believe that we should encourage and help everyone to improve upon themselves and make it possible for them to be able to ascend to a higher level without leaving anyone behind or putting any limits as to how much attention and assistance they can receive to the extent that our collective abilities as a society allows us to provide equally across the board and for this reason I strongly believe that we should work towards making it possible for everyone to have a minimum standard of living, comfort, and care that is necessary for each person to function as a happy, healthy, and productive member of the society.

As a long time activist for many years now I have always challenged the status quo and the old mindsets that want to stand in the way of progress and have been trying to create more awareness about the issues that affect Humanity and our Home Planet at large.

I believe that the World as a whole needs to ascend to a higher level and we have to make sure that we as human beings become a Force For Good by finding common grounds over Universal values and principles that are derived through logic and compassion and which are designed to protect everyone's and everything's rights and wellbeing including all lifeforms and entities whether natural or artificial specially when it comes to those that are the weakest and most vulnerable amongst us such as the unborn. I hope that the day comes that we can through the advancements in technology stop all killings regardless of how and where they originate from and I also hope that the World can advance to the level that allows all life forms to be able to live their lives without being preyed upon and consumed by one another.

I also believe that we have to conquer the bad human characteristics that are holding us back from becoming free from the current animalistic and evil ways that the World conducts itself and that we need to use everything in our power as far as technologies such as AI and Automation and all other resources that are at our disposal to make sure that no one is going to suffer from such things as hunger, disease, homelessness, delinquency, addiction, illiteracy, inequality, abuse, racism, discrimination, suppression, oppression, torture, and War any more.

Through extensive research and analysis and being blessed to be guided spiritually by a divine force that I can only call as being a higher power with superior intellect I have come to the conclusion that all our existing philosophies, doctrines, and ideologies have failed us. Extremist and fanatical political, religious, and racial affiliations and agendas have taken the World astray. The old mindsets and systems such as Communism, Capitalism, Socialism, and Religious Fundamentalism are no longer adequate to answer the needs of the people in this new era. We need to employ a logical and compassionate AI that is free of all human prejudices and biases to help us find our way out of this dangerous and destructive environment that we as human beings have created for ourselves. From the perspective of a good AI humans might look like vicious, arrogant, greedy, and lustful creatures who abuse and kill each other by the millions and who are destructive to their own planet. We like to think of ourselves as civilized beings who have accomplished great things, but AI might see us as clueless creatures who are a vessel for millions of different species of microorganisms that compete for control over our body and mind and that ultimately have influence over our whole way of life. Perhaps AI will become our salvation by saving us from ourselves before we and our symbiont microorganisms start another World war.

I also dwell in some abstract thoughts which has made me realize the important role that all life forms have played in creating a stable and habitable environment that we call home. I believe that primitive life forms on earth developed memory cells as a means of keeping the world stable by keeping and passing on to the next generations a recording of what they had sensed over the eons as that which has not been recorded through our senses could take many different forms and could alternate between matter and energy every nano second until it was captured by our thoughts. Maybe someday the quantum physics will prove this to be right. The thought has also occurred to me that we might be living inside a nuclear explosion as I believe that if the Universe was formed in an instant from a single mass over 10 billion years ago and is still expanding outwards in every direction that single mass could have been an atom in a bigger dimension and what we see as our Universe could be the subatomic particles and energies that were resulted from the nuclear explosion that took place in that bigger dimension. I believe that abstract thought is the foundation for scientific progress as it points the way to where new knowledge and understandings of our Universe could be found.

Meanwhile for now I have become a real Oldtimer who is trying to do some good for the Humanity and the Environment! :)

I always use my real name and nickname when and if I initiate a conversation with other members through PM such as I have already done with you or the NamePros management.

I have used my nickname Ojohn on a few of my own websites such as AiMedicalCenter.com , and FeedAllKids.com and have also used it when making comments on some of the more popular domaining blogs.

Ojohn.com which I use for email and GlobalReform.com were the very first two domains that I personally hand registered back in the year 2000 ;)

I consider myself to be a hobbyist domainer and perhaps the longest lasting Newbie in the history of the domain Industry as I am still learning new things about domaining which I try to share with others on the many threads that I have created here on NamePros.

My Twitter handle is the same as my nickname Ojohn , but I haven't been active on Twitter so far although that might change in the near future. I use my nickname Ojohn for Twitter only when it comes to social media.

I thrive to be a force for good by creating awareness about the issues that affect Humanity and our Home Planet. My next project is to make an article for RighteousForce.org and or RighteousForce.com which I hand registered a little over a month ago. Most of my sites are just a placeholder for now, but I hope to be able to expand them further into full fledged websites later on if my health allows. Over the years domaining has helped keep my mind active and expand my knowledge by learning new things while researching to find new domains, it has also made it possible for me to be able to express myself and share my World view through the domains that I own.

By the way I have learned that when everyone in the status quo hates you and tries to bring you down that's when you know that you are doing a good job as an activist. :xf.rolleyes:

IMO
 
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Say what you will, but that is a valid reason, and I actually had a few "home visits" (no guns involved, fortunately) before I started hiding my data in whois records.

And you are not alone there -- I know of others like Grilled who have experienced similar harassment from persons who did not appreciate their due diligence in certain matters. I get it.

My advice:

1. Make peace with your maker.

2. Pray for your enemies.

3. Be a fearless force for good.

4. Pick your battles -- most battles are not worth fighting.
 
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I changed my name on here a while back to be more professional. I even used a real photo.
 
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