I can no longer live this lie. I invented 'Mike Loader', a college student
struggling to get by on an internship, to hide my real, boring identity.
In actuality, I'm Tom Cruise.

You ain't buying it, I see. Drat.

Seriously, though, the above can help you reduce your level of paranoia
somewhat. If your best friend on the net purports to be a college
student, a retiree, etc, he/she is likely telling the truth. Who'd invent
a everyday person?

Depends on what the fictional persona is for.  I can think of a couple of 
reasons for inventing one, one of which would be to hide from someone or 
ones that you didn't like or that didn't like you.  Changing ISP's and 
online identities isn't all *that* difficult.  It's maintaining the facade 
that's the hard part.

I once played around with a character on Kawaii MUCK to see just how long 
people would interact with him before they figured out it was me.  It took 
them about an hour.  I'm a terrible actor, it seems.  *shrug*

Hm.  Then again, I wasn't really trying.  ;)

But, here's the somewhat on-topic idea, although I think something very 
similar has been suggested before.  Would anyone be interested in a 
multi-author "crossover" fic in which the authors could pick anime 
characters to play, anonymously, then have an editor string the story bits 
together?

Just a thought.

Damon Casale, damoo@universal-net.com
Who is wondering what character would suit him best...  @_@