I get this e-mail from them. You know, I wish they would use their “real name” when they talked to me. Being stuck inside a bureaucratic system – Kafkaesque.
On Aug 9, 2011, at 10:40 AM, Google Profiles Support wrote:
On Aug 9, 2011, at 10:40 AM, Google Profiles Support wrote:
Hi,
Thank you for your appeal. It seems that we are unable to pull up your Google Profile with this Email. Please reply back with the Email and the Profile URL associated with your Google Profile, so that we may further continue the review of your name appeal.
Sincerely,
The Google Profiles Support Team
Dear Google,
I went to “My profile” and copied and pasted the URL into the box. I put in my kaliya@mac.com address for my e-mail BECAUSE I don’t use my g-mail for my e-mail, e-mail. I am not going to go and check my g-mail again and again to see if you wrote me there. This is the address where I have ongoing e-mail conversations with real people.
I just use my g-mail account for subscribing to e-mails lists. This dot-mac e-mail account IS linked to my g-mail account – so I have no idea how to help you find me in your system. Don’t know know everything already like who I was logged in as when I sent the form in?
Srsly,
-Kaliya, Identity Woman
UPDATE:
I went to sent them my profile URL as they requested and then this screen was there:
Sigh. I don’t know what to do. I put a lot of work into “circling” people and was just about to really start diving into and using the service.
There is a comment below about Google’s policy being in place from the beginning and saying I am being hostile by not giving them what they want which is my “real name” as the headline of my profile.
I chose to use gmail and reader a long time ago with my professional self/persona being the primary expression in their services.
I originally chose to express my last name as a * – my profile had that for a few years. I didn’t want to pick any one of my last names or my handle either. I thought it made more sense to go with a mononym. Then they changed and said you can’t have a last name as a * so I was like my e-mail address is identitywoman@gmail.com and so I’ll go with Identity Woman as my last name (it is that way in Quora BTW). I had my last names in the other name category and I honestly thought this was going to be just fine.
It is MY profile on line about me that I am defining.
It is hostile of them to insist on choosing my name for me. It is hostile to insist that I use my last name to represent myself when I feel it is “other” to me. It is hostile to prohibit me from speaking in a medium/social space that all my professional colleagues are in.
Hi Kaliya Identity Woman, I’m sorry to hear about the frustration that you’ve been having with your Google Plus profile, but I do think it’s interesting to see how most sites (including Google) index their user database by email address.
I think you’re being unnecessarily hostile towards Google.
If you want them to help you, you might consider actually doing what they ask of you. They’re asking for your Gmail address because that is what you use to log in to their system. Your @mac.com address is not associated with your Google+ account in any way.
Also, their real name policy has been in effect from the very beginning. You agreed to those terms when you signed up, so I don’t really understand what the “injustice” is here.
you have to give them the gmail account you used for your g+. you can’t give them a mac address! give them a little help.
Choosing to reveal what one wants and when is not deceptive, but is consistent with physical world conventions. When I meet someone in a bar, I am not compelled to share my passport before I say hello. Why should I be required to do that for online connections? Keep strong Identity Woman.
I agree that being able to be as open or closed as you choose with your identity is a personal liberty that should not be taken lightly, especially on the internet. The problem comes in when that personal libery is at odds with the individual company’s right to run its business the way it chooses. It becomes one personal liberty at odds with another.
In a truly free world the resolution is for the customer to take their business elsewhere. If enough people are dissatisfied with the policies of a particular company, and vote with their feet/wallets, either the policy will change or the company will lose out to others with policies that the customers support.
Complaining and petitioning the company are both perfectly valid approaches for the customer to take, but if the company chooses not to change their policy, then that is their right. In that case it’s time to shop for an alternative. This is not without significant inconvenience to the customers at times like this, but it is the only fair and free way to settle such a dispute.
identitywoman, what’s the big deal with just giving them your gmail and having all mail forwarded to your @mac address. I don’t see you complaining about Apple making you use their @Mac address for their services, Oh I forgot Apple can do ANYTHING to you and it’s OK because they’re products make you ‘COOL’. G+ would probably be best served without-cha, go listen to iTunes or make an iMovie about your frustrations….
Kaliya Young Hamlin, you don’t want to give your information to someone trying to help you but, you`re willing to post it on your complaint about them being unable to help you because you don’t want to give them the info they need.
Confusing.
Complaining that Google will not comply to what you believe is or isn’t your real name is futile and retarded. Its like arguing with Skynet. If you don’t want to get burned, don’t play with fire. If you don’t want to be treated unfairly by a truly soulless business venture that wants to sell everything about what makes you an individual, then don’t use Google.
the biggest challenge i’m having is that in many contexts i *have* only one name. people in those contexts do not expect my ‘legal’ or ‘real’ name (whatever that might be).
under common law, it is perfectly legal to use any name you like through common usage. [ironically, that is the origin of their precious ‘real’ names anyway o.o]
i have had a google account under this name for years, yet all of a sudden this ‘identity’ is no longer acceptable for not being ‘real’?
just don’t use it??!! how is that?
You wish to use the service that Google are offering, comply, if you don’t like their rules, there are other services, jog on.
I don’t understand so many peoples belief that they somehow have some kind of right to access these services and certainly not your proclaimed irritation when the published rules won’t be changed to suit your own individual preference. These are usually the same people who weep for free speech and a free market yet won’t let the free market decide which service is successful and try to force their will on the the market by bleating in a corner about how hard done by they are.
I agree with Deni.
Sadly, though, Google owns its website and can enforce any rules its folks see fit. We cannot just pretend that the “garden is ours”, just because we just planted seeded there some flowers.
Our information, but their servers, right ?