War of the Handles

My eighty-six year-old grandfather beat me to Twitter.

I signed up today, which doesn't mean much in the here and now. It probably won't mean much later, honestly. I doubt I'll be using it much, beyond following a couple of bloggers and online personalities that I find intriguing. I've been told — commanded really — that I need to get on the bandwagon. So, we'll see. Call it a new experiment.

I know myself too well, when it comes to communication and networking. Bottom line: I suck at it, outside of folks that I physically interact with regularly. I've got a feeling that fragmenting my attention into yet another "social communication tool" will only make matters worse. But here's hoping that I'll turn a corner.

What really gets me is the proliferation of online identities. It took me a good twenty minutes to come up with a Twitter handle. Damn near every single iteration of my name was taken. My primary online pseudonym, "kakuzo" (see blog address), was taken. As an experiment I started typing in random stuff, and it was quite amazing how many are already allocated. I've already lost a couple of those battles.

The other day, for example, I found out there's another Designing Me on Blogger. Thank you Maja from Arizona for stealing my thunder, both here and on Twitter. I was around first, just for the record (neener, neener!), but (1) she did come on the scene while I was off on one of my various Blogger hiatuses and (2) she seems to be fairly active on both fronts. So I don't mind too much.

The second I found something I liked Twitter-wise I immediately went around and snatched up the corresponding gmail address (and variations on it), since I'd like to try and keep a handle (pardon the pun) on my internet branding.