Or should that be Userid World? Beats me. I’ve been doing this internet signing up thing for a relatively short time: since the end of 2006. Not so long. In the world of the ‘net, forever, but for me, just a blip of time. Every now and then I do a sign-up thing (yes, that’s exactly what I call it) and scan the feeds, the newspaper, other peoples’ posts and blogs, for interesting sites and providers and then SIGN UP. For several. Just to do it. Just to try it. Just to learn from it.
Because I can.
Two results: an array of blogs and other platforms that beckon throughout the day AND a blossoming list of userids and passwords.
If I were a Social Psychology major, as I once was, I’d do a paper or two on how people create and manage these human tags. I’d ask:
How many do you have? Where do you keep them? On paper? On your computer? Both? Just in your brain?
How did you think of them? Whose name did you take in vain, break up, spell backwards, whatever? Do you use upper and lower case? How upset do you get when you can’t remember them? Do you tell anyone these things? Do you post them on your computer, for all to see?
What feelings do you get when you use a password or userid that you wish you hadn’ t created and now can’t change?
Could your loved ones guess them, just in case?
Questions like that. Why? Because there’s a magic to it, that process; and I know this because I’ve felt it, and because I’ve been asking people, informally, in passing, in waiting rooms, at the store, wherever; whenever they’ll talk to me about them.
My “survey” has produced some interesting results – will share one tidbit now: out of 20 people asked, only one answered YES, to this:
”Do you know ‘by heart’ one of your passwords?”
This man offered to tell it to me. I declined. He offered two more times before I convinced him I really didn’t want to know.
More later. In the meantime, give it some thought, that special process, of creating our “human tags.”
