I agree that if there is no good reason, no need to hide ourselves. But there are many good reasons. Safety for example, or real life profession, some may be public figures, you never know. I think I read in here somewhere about a hacker who succesfully made a mess over someone's rl computer years ago bcause she gave him too much information. He made a mess with family photos and friends photos (now I remember, I read it on other website, forgot the name, something like Second life rating for kids). We can be open about our rl, but NOT with everyone and with certain boundaries until we really get to know the persons well (exchanging information, not only 1 side information), even so, it is still not a guarantee tht it is safe. Also, people are different, they come to SL with different reasons, they have different lives, different background, different abilities. Not everyone is the same. We don't really know unless we are on their shoes. I used to work with traumatic ppl and lets say, different people. No, not everyone is the same. That is a good advice but too bad, in reality, it is not as simple as it sounds. There are also some people who come to SL just to live a fantasy, like being a cute bear, or some other animals, they may not taking SL seriously, and leave after weeks. They don't feel the urge to be themselves, they just want to 'play'. And many other types of people..