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Posted By: dalehileman handle - 01/07/06 05:09 PM
I'm looking for a term or terms--neologisms--meaning roughly "handle" (not "password"), as one's given or nickname in the author or topic column of an index.

Eg, I have two of them, Dale Hileman and dalehileman. David of WW has at least four, including Wizard of Oz and the abbreviations WoZ and Wiz. One has to know the difference between one version and another because the website algorithm treats them differently and each serves a different function in the overall scheme of things

Just as it is important to distinguish between contributions called a thread, a reply, or a followup, one might suppose each kind of "handle" would also have a different name

Thanks for all present and past help in straightening out such terminology--
Posted By: Buffalo Shrdlu Re: handle - 01/07/06 05:44 PM
log-in name, screen name, there are more that aren't coming to me right now. someone might mention avatar, but I believe that's really the picture used, as opposed to the name.

I don't see that the name for the name has much meaning beyond the need for a moderator or board administrator needing to be able to know what a particular user groups' privileges are.

I was thinking that we did this recently, but haven't searched for the thread.

here's the thread: handles
Posted By: dalehileman Re: handle - 01/08/06 12:09 AM
Eta: Thank you most kindly for that link. Now I suppose I shall have to look up a definition for each of the 14 terms
Posted By: Buffalo Shrdlu Re: handle - 01/08/06 12:23 AM
> look up

well, I think they all pretty much mean the same thing!
Posted By: dalehileman Re: handle - 01/08/06 05:39 PM
In my book pretty much isn't good enough. For instance, "thread" used to mean topic. With the advent of the Web, however, it has also come to mean just the initial question or contribution, while the overall thread is further divided into the first answer or reply to it (which needs a name), or any followup to the answer or reply to the followup (which also needs a name)
Posted By: Buffalo Shrdlu Re: handle - 01/08/06 05:44 PM
thread in my understanding is, as you say, the first topic post, and all the subsequent replies.
Posted By: dalehileman Re: handle - 01/08/06 06:14 PM
Eta: Nonetheless I think Fallible is fallible and they don't. As to "thread,", however,you are absolutely right. I had recalled instances where it was used to mean "followup", but don't remember where. Hence my editing
Posted By: Faldage Re: handle - 01/08/06 07:08 PM
I take thread to mean the entire collection of posts. The first post in a thread is generally called the OP, for Original Post.
Posted By: TheFallibleFiend Re: handle - 01/09/06 03:47 PM

I think "avatar" originally meant a 3D, at least partially articulated representation on The Net. Think "Snow Crash" or "Neuromancer." That has been extended over the years to include both animated and static 2D representations. The extension to "screen name" is tenuous. At this point, it's probably okay to say that it is an incorrect usage. But it's not clear to me how wide-spread a misusage has to be before one just accepts it.

Are "web" and "net" synonymous? Of course not. But for many people they are. In my mind it's very difficult for me to not consider this an erroneous usage - and yet, for many people, they're the same.
Posted By: dalehileman Re: handle - 01/09/06 04:10 PM
Fal: Thank you for these synonyms, I will give you full credit for contributing them. Incidentally my No. 1 Son is an IT, says this about "net" v "web":

web – Network, Internet, E-MAIL =NET (DAS) Technically, however, “web” specifies traffic on port 80, SSL port, etc.; not, eg, email [Port 25, 110]. The WEB refers to port 80 traffic designed to deliver images and hypertext to user’s desktop. (WEB is technically not synonymous for Internet or network)–Lee Scott Hileman
Posted By: TheFallibleFiend Re: handle - 01/09/06 04:54 PM

I agree with your son completely. The web fits over the top of the Internet. The Internet is a service upon which the web relies. However, many people very commonly conflate these two very different things. And my question is: how widespread does a mis-usage have to be before one just gives up and says, "Okay. Have it your way!"

Right now I can't stand the terms "DIS" or "disrespect" used as a verb. First, it doesn't sound right and second, there's something about people trying too hard to be cool that I find offensive. But the world is passing me by. The usage is already very widespread. I reckon that in the near future we'll start seeing these in dictionaries and then it won't matter how much it sounds like fingernails on a chalkboard to my ears. (I get the same irritation when I hear people say "taters" or "sgetti.")
Posted By: AnnaStrophic Re: avatar - 01/09/06 05:51 PM
Quote:


I think "avatar" originally meant a 3D, at least partially articulated representation on The Net.





Actually, it originally meant something quite else, and still does to many people.
Posted By: TheFallibleFiend Re: avatar - 01/09/06 06:05 PM

"Actually, it originally meant something quite else, and still does to many people. "

Of course. I wasn't thinking. I ought to have said something like, "When the word was first coopted from its philosophical usage, it meant ..."
Posted By: AnnaStrophic Re: avatar - 01/09/06 08:16 PM
Quote:


"Actually, it originally meant something quite else, and still does to many people. "

Of course. I wasn't thinking. I ought to have said something like, "When the word was first coopted from its philosophical usage, it meant ..."




Posted By: Faldage Re: handle - 01/09/06 11:14 PM
Quote:


Right now I can't stand the terms "DIS" or "disrespect" used as a verb.




Dunno about "DIS" but your dislike of "disrespect" can't be because of its status as a neologism. It ain't been one of those for almost 400 years.
Posted By: tsuwm Re: handle - 01/10/06 04:15 AM
while other verbs in that neighborhood, such as disrepute and disrest and disrestore(!) went all obsolete on us.
Posted By: Faldage Re: handle - 01/10/06 10:59 AM
Disrepute just moved to the nominurbs.
Posted By: TEd Remington Re: handle - 01/10/06 12:29 PM
Quote:

while other verbs in that neighborhood, such as disrepute and disrest and disrestore(!) went all obsolete on us.




Said he with disregard (who was Beauregard's dashing but disagreeable cousin).
Posted By: Jackie Re: handle - 01/10/06 02:04 PM
Disrepute is/was a verb??
Posted By: tsuwm Re: handle - 01/10/06 02:12 PM
Main Entry: 1disrepute
Function: transitive verb
Etymology: 1dis- + repute (v.)
obsolete : to bring into discredit : DISESTEEM

Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002.


evidently saw much sermonic usage in the 1600s; e.g., "Is it not infinitely better to be unjustly defamed by men, than to be disreputed by God?".
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