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What's the story behind your username?

If you are one of us folks whose username is not your actual name, what is the story behind it?

I'll go first.

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  • 3
    Uh-oh, good luck proving @MikeEdenfield is not a false name!
    – Möoz
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 2:57
  • 1
    I just copied my username from StackOverflow. Prosaic as hell :)
    – DVK-on-Ahch-To
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 3:04
  • @DVK : Short but sweet, both the story and the name! ;-)
    – Praxis
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 3:05
  • @Praxis, point of clarification, in my opinion, part of what's the story ought to include why did you pick it
    – ThePopMachine
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 5:50
  • 7
    @ThePopMachine : I'd prefer people be able simply to contribute whatever they think is interesting.
    – Praxis
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 6:29
  • 6
    Fun question! Why the downvotes?
    – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 6:57
  • 11
    @Wikis, (Not me but) I would imagine people are voting on the legitimate position that this is not on-topic for meta because it's not about questions, answers, scope, or how the site works. (But I find that position to be no fun.)
    – ThePopMachine
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 14:18
  • @ThePopMachine: thank you for that explanation. If that is the case, they should vote to close rather than downvote.
    – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 14:59
  • 5
    @Wikis : To counter ThePopMachine's explanation, cataloguing memes and organizing movie nights are also not about questions, answers, scope, or how the site works, but meta has been used frequently for those purposes. Therefore, there is plenty of precedence for this type of question, and they should not vote to close this without voting to close those too.
    – Praxis
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 15:05
  • 1
    @Praxis: all possible theories. But unless the downvoters explain, we can only speculate. It seems a wasted opportunity.
    – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 15:10
  • 1
    @randal'thor: how do you know it is one person? Each answer has two downvotes, maybe we have two unhappy campers.
    – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 20:42
  • 7
    @randal'thor : To each, their own. Let's not let it stop us from doing something intended to be fun and community-building. :-)
    – Praxis
    Commented Oct 12, 2015 at 20:52
  • 1
    I would have taken my usual username (used at online game services like Xbox Live, Steam, UBI, etc) if I hadn't registered at StackOverflow first and there I found it appropriate to use my real name, even though it is a rather common one.
    – Thomas
    Commented Feb 2, 2016 at 14:28
  • 13
    This question is inspiring to me. I should start a meta post on the many passwords of SFF se...
    – CHEESE
    Commented Mar 11, 2016 at 19:05
  • 1
    While I see guys had a lot of fun here, new answers get to third page of answers now. Not much chance of many people seeing them. Closing seems reasonable.
    – Mithoron
    Commented Aug 28, 2023 at 17:50

71 Answers 71

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My name is Niffler. You want to know why? Well it's because they're so darn cute!

If that isn't adorable I don't know what kind of person creature you are.

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  • I love Nifflers! They are the cutest creatures in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - I love how they are attracted to shiny things and are constantly trying to collect treasure. In Order of the Phoenix a Niffler tries to steal Pansy Parkinson's gold watch during a Care of Magical Creatures class. Great name!
    – Slytherincess
    Commented Apr 27, 2020 at 20:56
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My username is "Stormblessed", from the name people in his squad called Kaladin in The Way of Kings, "Kaladin Stormblessed". Goes with my avatar because he is forced to fight in the same war as House Kholinar’s troops and (The Way of Kings major spoilers)

joins them, eventually

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Amarth was an evil necromancer character I made for a very old "rogue-like" Tolkien-based PC game Angband, and later on a similar necromancer in Diablo 2. It's been my recurring gamer name since back in the days.

It was picked at a whim while I were browsing through Tolkien's Silmarillion and it simply means "Doom" in Sindarin. Most famously in Amon Amarth, Mount Doom, the volcano where the One ring was forged. A fitting (though admittedly silly) name for a necromancer.

Now as it happens I'm from Sweden and there's a somewhat famous Swedish death metal band named Amon Amarth. So everyone thinks I took the name from them and that I'm a fan, though neither is true. I simply took it from the same original source as them - Tolkien.

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Tuor from Tolkien's Legendarium is my favorite fictional character

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I took my username from one of the characters in the John Knowles novel, A Separate Peace. Loved the book when I read it, as a teenager, and admired the character Finny/Phineas. We both have the habit of passively listening to what is going on around us while focusing on something else, then replaying/recalling it later. Anyway, whenever I tried to sign up for something online using Phineas it was always taken, so I spelled it Phyneas and the usernames were generally open, so it stuck and I've been using it for almost everything (online) ever since.

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  • Wow! I've been wondering it if was A Separate Peace reference, as it's one of my favourite novels!! :-)
    – Praxis
    Commented Jul 13, 2016 at 21:43
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Fell in love with Black Library books ever since they started making em a long time ago... Fell even more in love with the works of Dan Abnett. His Inquisitor trilogies, Comics, Titanicus book, First and only series etc. is what makes me come back for more and more. One name stuck with me ever since I read it first time "Cherubael". So that is when I started using it as my nickname on the internetzz... As time passed by and my brain cells evaporated Cherubael became Cherubel.

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It is just a nickname from my friends and family... there is no meaning or secret reference.

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A combination of both my initials and "Penguin". Incidentally, idea for my avatar came first as it appeared on the image bit of the "Life at a glance" bit on Windows 10 while I was trying to think of a username.

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EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINAAAAAATE!!!!!

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I just played with the phrase Stack Exchange.

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The SS part of my username is the abbreviation of my real name.

The numeric part 3.1415926535897932384626433 is the value of ratio of circumference to diameter of a circle. In reality, this value is infinitely long, but I had to trim it down to 25 post-decimal digits because of the limitation of Stack Exchange. I picked this ratio because I was always interested in it. Also, there's a supernatural kind of thing attached with it. When I was kid, I realized I already knew certain things like speed of light is fastest. The value of ratio of circumference to diameter of a circle being infinitely long was also among them.

The entire username signifies that the mystery of SS is infinitely long just like ratio of circumference... oh, leave it.

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    What about the anagram part? ;-)
    – Rand al'Thor Mod
    Commented Oct 31, 2015 at 12:56
  • 1
    You do know that pi = 3 for small circles?
    – user48960
    Commented Feb 1, 2016 at 22:31
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    It's not your name anymore!
    – Reinstate Monica - Goodbye SE
    Commented Jun 10, 2016 at 14:45
  • Super Saiyan Pi
    – Neo Darwin
    Commented Feb 1, 2019 at 3:20
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