What’s The Story Behind Your Avatar Name?

[Kira Zobel]

I originally joined SL for Star Wars Roleplay, and I had a character I had made up called Kira.  (Back when I thought I had made up the name.)  I chose Zobel cause it started with a Z.  I like Z.

[Pauck]

Usually I choose duck related names, after many failed attempts, I mixed “Pato” the Spanish word for duck and “Duck”, being this one the combination I liked better and was available. 

[Roxy Couturier]

When I joined SL, I had been playing City of Heroes. My favorite character for RP there was Poprocks, whose 'real' name was Roxy. (For those who may wonder, an Earth / Force Field Controller.)

Someone, in SL, that I was interested in had a French Last name. So, Couturier was chosen.

[miaminightmare]

Drive and Only God Forgives are two of my favorite movies. From there, Hotline Miami (which was inspired by Drive) and Ruiner (same company, but cyberpunk) are two of my favorite games. Although Drive takes place in California and OFG in Thailand, I do enjoy the Miami setting of HLM and the tie ins from Payday concerning Jacket & Scarface.

🥰 Given the nightmarish qualities of the settings and the fact Jacket is most certainly a nightmare in Miami due to being a masked killer, I ended up sticking to the name when I needed something on the fly.

I'm also an aesthetic nut for retrowave and vaporwave and whatnot and suffer nightmares in real life which end up being pretty over the top sometimes. So it fits there too. 🤣

[Ajay McDowwll]

I just took my RL initials (A.J.) and mashed them up into "Ajay".  I figured I get called A.J. at work enough that it wouldn't be jarring, so I just went with it.

It wasn't until I'd been inworld for a while that I learned Ajay is a man's name in India.  I end up having some explaining to do when I meet folks from the Subcontinent.

[Vanity Fair]

I used to lie in wait for the list of last names in SL to turn over to a new batch, then snap up good combinations for future use, before they got picked over.

I got lucky with "Fair"; it was only up for a two-week period in 2008. I also got Scarborough Fair for use as a medieval roleplay avatar.

I also have a vampire avatar named Mary Fang 😉

Edited December 2, 2019 by Vanity Fair

[MrsSeren]

Mrs because when I first come back to SL; I was my online partner who I married in another virtual world and my name there was Seren so yeha; MrsSeren although now i get many asking if I married but I haven't been for last 5 years as he left for RL and other reasons he disclosed to my in confidence.

[Cristiano Midnight]

Mine is nothing exciting. Midnight was one of the beta names in SL. Cristiano is my first name, and I liked the way Midnight sounded with it. I ended up in good company in SL with Chip Midnight, Torrid Midnight and Mistress Midnight. When SL launched, my RL last name was an available last name. I'm boring enough that I probably would have chosen it if it had been available. My partner at the time actually did pick it for her SL last name.

[Elora Lunasea]

10 hours ago, Alyona Su said:

Su is among the rarest of Chinese surnames (I was surprised to find it). My BFF in school was named Alyona, which is a Russian name... I admit I hadn't thought of the funny mix-up that makes, but hey, China and Russia are close enough to each other that it's plausible so

Interestingly - in RL I'm of mostly Russian heritage  (grandparents) and found out  I had ancestors living in a part of China. Apparently a good amount of Russian Jews settled there during the revolution in the early 1900's.  So, yea, not so unusual at all.

[Angelina String]

No interesting story here

Big fan of Angelina Jolie back in the day, and String was the first last name where Angelina were not taken...

I have an alt which name differs with only one letter to my RL name though

 

Edited December 3, 2019 by Angelina String

[Amanda Dallin]

Amanda was my RL great great grandmothers first name.  My RL name is the same as her middle name so I choose her first name for SL.  Dallin was the first name Amanda was available on.  There were never many Dallin's for some reason.  I've only ever met one other Dallin in 13 years and if I do a search now he's the only one who comes up other than me.

[Eva Knoller]

Eva was named for my best friend in the whole wide world. We have been friends since we were twelve years old. Through school, different universities, marriage, kids, and all of life’s changes. We text almost daily. 
Knoller was chosen at random without much thought. I may change it when possible if something better is available.

 

[Alyona Su]

14 hours ago, Elora Lunasea said:

Interestingly - in RL I'm of mostly Russian heritage  (grandparents) and found out  I had ancestors living in a part of China. Apparently a good amount of Russian Jews settled there during the revolution in the early 1900's.  So, yea, not so unusual at all.

That's fascinating to know! Though I suspect my names should be swapped as it is my mother who is Chinese. 

[Saskia Rieko]

Sadly no good story behind my name. It is quite random, because I don't remember any famous Saskia which I might have liked when I created this account. And Rieko just sounded nice with this name. I thought I would never enter SL with Saskia again and created new avatar Kotelle which was a desperate try to use Kote (not available at that time) and ended up as completely meaningless name. For that one I use display name Liv Kote - Liv name runs in my family and Kote is just a nice word.

[Elora Lunasea]

2 hours ago, Alyona Su said:

That's fascinating to know! Though I suspect my names should be swapped as it is my mother who is Chinese. 

I've joked that this must explain the Jews love of Chinese food

[Alyona Su]

4 minutes ago, Elora Lunasea said:

I've joked that this must explain the Jews love of Chinese food

I love the original names of Chinese dishes. I think westerners would get both a good laugh and be grossed-out. Hahaha. For other readers, here's an example: What you call "Sweet and Sour Pork" is more commonly known as "Husband and Wife Argument" (or variations thereof) ~laughs~

[Walelu Summerwind]

I chose Walelu (Cherokee for hummingbird) because I live close to historic Indian Territory and I love wild birds. Summerwind just seemed to fit Walelu ..pronounced Wah-lee-loo.

[Cinnamon Mistwood]

It's no surprise or secret that I have no imagination.  It is also no secret that I use my real life first name.  It's easy to remember and I can spell it correctly nearly every time.  I might have been more creative with a name if I had known what I was getting into, but I had no idea what to expect and just jumped in.

Edited December 3, 2019 by Cinnamon Mistwood

[Talligurl]

1 hour ago, Cinnamon Mistwood said:

I use my real life first name. 

 

I might have been more creative with a name if I had known what I was getting into, but I had no idea what to expect and just jumped in.

I heard about SL and thought it might be interesting, then I had the opportunity to watch over a co-workers shoulder while he did SL, and I decided to check it out for myself. When I went to do that I discovered I needed a name. I tried to use my real first name, Talitha, but it wasn't available. I just wanted to get on and check things out so I decided to just combine the shortened version of my name lots of people call me with girl, because I have a few friends who call me that. Then as I was typing I got the crazy notion to spell girl differently. More than once I have been asked if my name means I am a T-gurl, which I had to look up when I was first asked. Definitely wish I had come up with something else.

[Cinnamon Mistwood]

4 hours ago, Talligurl said:

I heard about SL and thought it might be interesting, then I had the opportunity to watch over a co-workers shoulder while he did SL, and I decided to check it out for myself. When I went to do that I discovered I needed a name. I tried to use my real first name, Talitha, but it wasn't available. I just wanted to get on and check things out so I decided to just combine the shortened version of my name lots of people call me with girl, because I have a few friends who call me that. Then as I was typing I got the crazy notion to spell girl differently. More than once I have been asked if my name means I am a T-gurl, which I had to look up when I was first asked. Definitely wish I had come up with something else.

The things I have learned in SL would fill a book.  I had no idea what a T-girl was until I entered SL either.  SL is an education if your world started out fairly small.

[Tolya Ugajin]

My real name has no equivalent in Russian, so I took the name "Tolya" in Russian classes in college.  Early on in SL I RP'd as a nasty Russian man, so it fit.

Ugajin was just a name off the list (back when that's how you created your avatar) that I thought sounded cool.  Turns out it's some sort of Japanese fertility deity, which is oddly appropriate, given my appreciation of Japanese rope bondage and of sex.

[Tolya Ugajin]

On 12/2/2019 at 11:04 AM, Roxy Couturier said:

When I joined SL, I had been playing City of Heroes. My favorite character for RP there was Poprocks, whose 'real' name was Roxy. (For those who may wonder, an Earth / Force Field Controller.)

Someone, in SL, that I was interested in had a French Last name. So, Couturier was chosen.

Yay!  Roxy is still alive!  Big hug!

[Gregorian Chant]

Back when we had last names, Chant was in the list of choices and I jumped at the opportunity of making a corny name.

Sometimes I get asked if I sing in RL. lol

[Saravendi]

A lot of you guys mention that your name origin is nothing to tell, but I find all of your stories very interesting and adds another layer of complexity  that makes SL even richer to me! Please keep posting guys, even if you don’t think it’s interesting 🤔 

I love reading your posts! 😘

[Dementia Obviate]

Quote

 

When I first started SL, it was kind of spur of the moment. An online friend told me one night that this might be something I'd like and was ready to take me in right then. So i just picked kind of quickly using a name that I only used once before for a cartoony character that I created using an app. If I'd had more time to think about it, I probably would have chosen something else, but it's grown on me now. My last name was one of the SL generated ones that I disliked the least.