Name Dropping

I was reading the public time line on Twitter and saw two different negotiations going on for a user to “buy” another user’s Twitter profile because the name matched their website or business name. It would be a safe bet that the seller didn’t know that the selling of a Twitter account violated the terms of service.

This new land rush for Twitter names that match websites, businesses and trademark is almost like the Internet Domain name buying frenzy when the Internet first became commercialize. The problem is there are more people online now than there was in the early days of the Internet. It should become a standard practice when you register your domain name that you go ahead and register that name as a user on Twitter. Currently it cost nothing to register for a Twitter account which means there is no acceptable excuses for not protecting an interest in name.

One of the other prongs on the Twitter fork that is frustrating is all the celebrity impersonators that have pulled a seat up to the table. It was a couple weeks back when Keith Olbermann used part of his broadcast to complain about a person impersonating him on Twitter. Olbermann also complained that it was taking too much time for Twitter to take action against the account. It will only be a matter of time until we will be reading headlines about an impostor (Twitposter?) luring a fan into a bad situation.

With so many stories of a person’s identity being stolen onlne, perhaps the smartest move anyone can make is to go ahead register their name on Twitter even if they use another persona. To add an extra level prevention registering your name as an Internet Domain Name (i.e. BobKatt.com) just to prevent someone else grabbing it up and start sending out e-mails with your name. I hate to spend ten dollars on something I may not use, but it could save a lot of time correcting damages another person does in your name.