Spyke
asklemmy·AsklemmybyNina

What do you think (this person's) username means, without looking it up?

I don't mean my username! Yours!

I guess this is more of a game and maybe not strictly the right place. But, the idea is to make a top level reply with you asking 'guess' or saying ':)' or what have you, and everyone else should answer what they think the username means or refers to, without looking any words or concepts up! Off the cuff, what do you think it means when you see this person's username?

Not sure about the mobile apps, but if you hover over someone's name in Lemmy it will show their username if they have a display name set. My username is quite boring and straightforward, but I like seeing other people's weird usernames especially on semi-anon places.

Bonus: What do you visually think when you read it? Even if you misread it as a typo, what did you imagine when you read it & saw their avatar?

View original on lemmy.ml
comfyreply
lemmy.ml

Steve is Steve.... sounds too convenient to be true.

4
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I'm not nerd enough! Obviously thinking of a colonel in distress, but everytime I read colonel I think of a middle school friend who would not believe me that it's not pronounced "ko low null"

3
lemmy.ml

You got pretty close by accident because it is a wordplay on the pronounciation of colonel! And like your friend, I initially thought it sounds like “ko low nell” for a very long time until I realized that English pronounciations are just guesswork sometimes :D That's why the word is now stuck in my mind forever (alongside town names like "Gloucester").

2

Wow, that's so funny that a silly memory from my childhood could get it that close!

2

I didn't get it without reading other comments because my spoken English sucks major donkey balls (or should I say... colonel donkey balls?), but now I got it.

1
lemmy.ml

Mine's insanely on the nose... i'm not very creative.

8
lemmy.one

Creativity is not equally distrubuted in your regime. Does not seem very communist to me.

3
lemmy.one

Thank you! I will readily admit to ignorance. I apologize for the tired stereotyping.

Yeah. I see how the concept of equality gets distorted through the pervasive lens of capitalism, or just the materialistic view of things.

Political equality would necessarily strip away expectations of ability or productivity. Expectations are itself often violations of boundaries, just forced upon people.

4
lemmy.ml

This is probably my least enigmatic pseudonym, but maybe someone will have something to say about it.

5
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Well, it means comfy, but I think you probably meant it as a vibe based on your avatar, however I pictured a worn beige recliner. Pretty ratty, but comfy.

2

Hah, I don't even have a fireplace, candles or a warm drink. I'm a fraud!

::: spoiler spoiler yes, it is a vibe. but in hindsight, I also like to treat it as a reminder, or a goal. It's the internet, why make it any angrier? Make a site a home. :::

3

I can't remember who is the Annie that is thirsted over the most, but I assume that one's bossom.

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Hey, if someone doesn't know what didactic is, it is a mystery! It's a big word! Which that someone would be me. I feel like it's in the back of my brain but I've forgotten off the top of my head.

2
lemmy.one

Yay, time to explain! You may be familiar with the term autodidact, someone who crafts their own curriculum and teaches themselves subjects without relying on the guidance of other humans.

So, didactic means to be used for instruction, to teach.

I can interpret my name in two ways I think. First, is that I am an instructive dumbass; my incompetance and consistent foolishness provides lessons, learning from my mistakea. Second, I am a teacher who is also a dumbass.

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

That's a fun one! Plus having alliteration makes it more fun.

2

Yes, I think so.

The self-deprecation might be a little fatiguing, and it is a lifetime habit I am trying to extinguish.

Still, it enforces the wisdom to never take myself too seriously, and that I always have something to learn.

2

Probabalt zepplin like someone else said, but I was thinking more like a final fantasy airship.

3
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

uhhhhhh, I got nothin. At most I'm misreading unkow and unknown so disappearing unknown but also 74. Usually two numbers at the end is year born?

1
ernestreply
kbin.social

In Poland, the term "kierunkowy" can be associated with a phone number and a specific region. That was my first guess ;p

3

In Poland, the term "kierunkowy" can be associated with a phone number, specifically 47 - Norway. That was my first guess ;)

1
lemmy.ml

Mine isn't very interesting, but sure

3

I can't remember any characters named ryuko, but sound familiar. in a bastardization it can be girl/young dragon.

3

maybe it just didn't load but I didn't see that avatar when I guessed!! I can't believe I forgot her name.

1

Pretty much lol, I got into programming in high school by writing programs on my TI-84. Needed a username to post some programs I made online and that's what I've gone by online ever since.

Of course, these days I'm a software engineer and mainly do embedded C and desktop C++ as a hobby with my OpenRGB project.

1

I'm going to pretend you program Calckey to make it interesting

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

a small russet potato! and 08, would be a bit young if it was when you were born, so when you graduated school? Could just be a number of course

3
Che Bananareply
lemmy.ml

It just means there are 7 other russjr's on here.

Kinda weird.

2
russjr08reply

Certainly a good guess! It actually comes from the fact that my name is Russ[ell], and my name comes directly from my father so I'm "Russell Jr". Then the number 08 comes from my birth date, which is the 8th of March!

1

Ah! I didn't think about 08 ever being simply the day of your birthday instead of year, that very interesting.

2

Clever. I actually read it as freewifihotspots before seeing your comments.

Um... Dim Sum but I get my choice of married women? Sexy I guess.

5

well I would assume your wife's hot pots would be 'free' to you in a sense so hmmm....Are you offering your wife's hot pots for free? They're probably good!

1
WhoRogerreply
lemmy.world

Heh... This never occurred to me. I'll just claim that's what it is from now on.

3

I don't think I have enough language knowledge to figure that one out! Your avatar is S with and M overlayed, but I will admit on first glance it looked like a dragon. Like trogdor doodle dragon.

1
lemmy.one

Mine has a special meaning, I doubt anyone will guess

2

Yup, I'm going to guess Pegasus and Celestia combined.

1

Lol that's funny but not even close its an auto suggested world of Warcraft name from almost 20 years ago don't even know why I still use it have not played the game in over a decade

1

One of my professors in college was named kurt vargo. He was in a commercial where he drove the bike across the screen, and in the take that was on the commercial, he drove too far and trashed very very expensive equipment and lighting.

3
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Your name is Catty and you you pat Cats. I did almost read it as Paddy Cake but Catty Pake instead.

2
kbin.social

Ahhh, excellent. Let’s see if I can find my community here. Guess away.

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Hmmm, mrs eavesdrop. A gossipy lady

3

Nope! Though I do like hearing a good story, haha. I won’t post the answer in case anyone else wants to guess, but if you want to know it’s easily searchable. :)

2

In Poland, the term "kierunkowy" can be associated with a phone number and a specific region. That was my first guess ;p

1

Nope! That’s a good guess though considering my recent hobbies. I had a pipe burst earlier this year and ever since I’ve been working to repair the damage in my house. My dad has worked on houses my whole life and I’ve learned a ton from him! It’s nice to be able to stretch the insurance check a bit by doing the hard work on my own.

I have a leak in my roof though, and I’m not looking forward to the quote for that because my roof is old and apparently not well ventilated, so I’ve got moss in my shingles now. That’s something I can’t do on my own.

2

It's been 18 years since I had spanish class but uhhhh, the cat is white?

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

foosel, I can't figure out a meaning. It makes me think it would sound like a type of cute weasel. That's very weird for me to think that of a word that I don't know, but it is what it is!

1

It admittedly is a bit of a tricky one...

::: spoiler spoiler It's a combination of the metasyntactic variable foo and the German word for "lint", which is "Fussel". :::

But I really like the cute weasel idea as well 😄

2
Lvxferrereply
lemmy.ml

"Hex" alongside the pic of Doom guy reminds me Hexen, another old style first person shooter. So I guess that you enjoy the genre?

1

I do enjoy the genre, but the two are unrelated I’m afraid 😅

1

you can teleport large quantities of vehicles all together into the enemy base, can make them invisible in an area of effect, have a somewhat fragile personality for a capital ship, and don't have much attack power

2
nickiam2reply
lemmy.ml

You have tiny pants for your cock? Hmm how would that work...

3

your name is kylee and you like any of the -onite crystal names, and thus you are kionite

2
lemmy.ml

Honestly I just wanted something that sounded funny and non controversial lmao

2

That would be pretty cool. To be honest, what I had in mind when I come up with this (as a teenager) is probably impossible to guess but maybe someone will surprise me.

Yours reminds me of Cardi B but I don't think that's it, right? :D

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

does sound like an egyptian god, don't know any root words. or could be amen ok, which sounds like it could be a sarcastic response or funny in joke

1
amenokreply
kbin.social

Yeah I tend to read it as "amen ok" myself these days... There are actually two letters, o and e, missing from the very end. The one I wanted to use was either taken or I, wisely, figured out a phrase from some random anime isn't something I want to use for the next 20 years :) Can't remember because it's been too long.

0

yeah that's fair! don't recognize the phrase, but I see!

1
lemmy.ml

Two small hints for mine: 1. Latin, and 2. it has nothing to do with the smoking chimp avatar.

2
Lvxferrereply
lemmy.ml

Wrong guess, but right reasoning! The word is ferre (to bring), not ferrvm (iron).

(Third hint: I don't vsvally distingvish v/u in Latin.)

1

Yup! It's in really broken grammar though; it should be simply "lvcifer", with a plain compound, but... that's a leftover from two decades ago, and my Latin was crap back then, and the nickname was already taken. "I wonder why."

Nowadays I'd probably use "lucislator" (see e.g. "legislator", "bringer of law") or similar instead.

1
lemmy.ml

Ok, let's do this. If you can guess where it's from, you have great taste.

^And^ ^don't^ ^worry,^ ^I^ ^don't^ ^actually^ ^harvest^ ^eyes.^

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Harvesting eyes of cuthulu from terraira?

3
lemmy.ml

Nope, never played Terraria. Here's a hint: I gotta have more cowbell!

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I don't think I understand the reference, haha.

2
lemmy.ml

Alright, I'll explain it: the 'I gotta have more cowbell' comes from a Saturday Night Live skit where the band Blue Öyster Cult are recording the song "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" which has a cowbell playing after the first guitar chords, and the producer (played by Christopher Walken) keeps saying that he wants more cowbell. Tension rises within the band whether to have more or less cowbell.

I couldn't find the full skit for some reason, so here's a video of every instance Christopher Walken mentions cowbell throughout it.

So, to sum it up, this was me trying to hint, in a not too obvious and probably convoluted way, that Harvester of Eyes is a song by Blue Öyster Cult. It sounds kind of anti-climatic now, to be honest.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Nah, that's a fun way to try and connect the two! I just haven't watched much SNL, so it's lost on me.

2

Me neither, it was just really popular in the early 00s so I ended up knowing about it. But yeah, I wasn't sure if people would still remember it after all these years.

1
Lvxferrereply
lemmy.ml

I gave up and looked it up. Thank you for your nickname! (You likely get what I mean, I don't want to spoil it for the others.)

2
Lvxferrereply
lemmy.ml

::: spoiler Explaining it further. As I websearched your nickname, the first mention that popped up was a song, Blue Oyster Cult: Harvester Of Eyes. I didn't know the band or the song, but fuck, I loved it, I'm a suckeer for 70's music. So thank you for the indirect suggestion! :::

2

::: spoiler Oh, I get it now, haha. You're welcome and I'm glad you liked it. Their first 3 albums are great starting points. Out of those, Secret Treaties is probably the most consistent but Tyranny & Mutation goes hard too. Especially Hot Rails to Hell.


:::

2

I know privet isn't private, but it does seem like a solider named moshi.

1

edgy as a clue, huh? hmmmmm...I can't imagine why 3 Vis would be edgy lol. 3 V for Vendettas?

My brain is taking threevi to sound like eevee and 3 IVs but that's because I eternally have pokemon on the brain.

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Well is The Arbiter from Halo, or just in general?

4

Definitely Halo, was a huge fan back in the day and now just keep using the name for consistency.

1

The story of WasPentalive - My normal avatar is a depiction of the R-Pentamino in John Conway's game of life. A 5 cell arrangement that throws off a number gliders in different directions. In one account I was simply PentaLive (Penta = 5 Live=the game of life) but I lost the password to that account at the same time as I no longer had access to the email address I registered. So I had to create a new account - I was Pentalive so I became WASPentalive.

Did I misunderstand the question?

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I thought it was fizzle beam so that was clear, a beam fizzling out. But a Bleam? hmm....Not sure!

2

Ah so my misreading was correct! That's a fun username!

2
lemmy.cnschn.com

Yeaah mine's really hard to make any sense of. It was an automatically generated username some time back, and then I kept using it all over the place because it was kinda short and still kinda unique. I'd love some suggestions on how to pronounce it though, no clue in that regard!

1
six
lemmy.ml

I'd love to participate but I think mine may be a little too easy. haha

1

It's a beat tape, but absolutely! ^-^

1

I feel like changelings are hard to depict their nature, haha. They could be anything!

2

I don't think googling will help, but I'm up for some guesswork.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I don't know how long lemmy posts tend to last/float up and down, so let's just say you're right on time?

Zero The Red, being in The Red means in debt, so you are trying to 'zero out' the the debt in some place. Could be taken metaphorically.

1
ZeroTheRedreply
lemmy.ml

I like that interpretation :p but I had a different thought process with my name

The "Zero" is a nod to Zero from the Megaman X series (I love him mad) and "the Red" is a nod to Axle the Red, a maverick boss from Megaman X5. He's my favorite boss across the MMX games, so I did a dumb mashup of the two lol

1

That's how my best friend makes his usernames! It's very fun that way.

1

I picture a frowning tadpole. He's angry, liker super angry. If he had arms he would cross them.

3

I like this game, tho I can't figure out any name in this thread lol, try mine :D

p.s. my avatar has nothing to do with it

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

ulu mulu no die sounds like a spell! which the no die is obvious. or it's a caveman situation of referring to themselves not dying "Ulu Mulu no die today"

1
lemmy.world

Not that far off, not actually a spell, but it's a fantasy videogame, and the "no die today" is right :D

It's from Gothic, an awesome standalone RPG series released more than 20 years ago. Ulu-Mulu is a symbol of peace that you have to craft and wear at some point into the story to avoid being killed on sight while entering a city full of orcs. An orc shaman is helping you in your quest and he keeps saying "stranger wear Ulu-Mulu stranger no die", it was so cute that I "adopted" it into my username.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

wow!! I'm surprised I kind of got the sentiment from it. It is oddly cute.

1
lemmy.world

It is indeed! If you're into RPGs I highly suggest Gothic, it's a fantastic game, if you can stand 20 years old graphics that is lol, but once you're into the story you won't mind the graphics being so old, having a compelling story makes up for it IMO.

1

I'm all about crunchy old graphics, those are the best kind.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

dorthy prothy (I have no idea)

2
prothyreply
terefere.eu

as a hint it begins with M and ends with ass effect

1

I unfortunately did not play those games!

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Magus makes me think of a mage for some reason? I don't remember the word root of why that would be. So, mage bear!

2
Magusbearreply
lemmy.ml

Correct! Magus means mage. It's derived from my first and last name

3

Hey!! Nice, got it right from my in confident memory of words.

1

I would second that, I also immediately had the "mage" association.

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I know you mean satiric as satire but I sort of read it as "sarcastic" which fits with your reply, lol. A weasel that is ineffective on the internet, because satire is dead.

1

THAT weasel might be ineffective, but not me 😈

(I Know, answering 2 days later kinda defeats the purpose of my name... Mine is an obscure and regional reference, so i wouldn't be mad if you don't get it.)

1
beehaw.org

I'm actually curious what people would say about mine!

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

Foon to me is the sound of a pool noodle being thrown.

1

That's hilarious, I think I'll use that next time someone asks me where the nickname comes from 😁

1

Mine's an initialism followed by a homophonic substitution :)

1
lemmy.nz

Haha not quite. It was a fandomly generated gamer tag for games for windows live when I was young. Somehow I remembered it and it just sorta stuck lol

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

If I had used xbox gamer tags when I was young, I'm sure I would have been stuck on some very long standing nonsense name, but we only had nintendo so no real online capabilities lol.

1

Haha bless. Well Nina is a nice name to be sure. Glad microsoft didnt get the chance to replace your identity :)

1

There are 2 parts to my username. 2nd part is pretty obvious. I wonder how many can guess the first part.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

A mailer-daemon that gained sentience (became lucid).

2

Close! Thought the word lucid was cool and am nerdy with servers, so I chose daemon as it relates to my hobby/career.

More or less a realistic kernel service.

1
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

It just sounds like a name, but I'll admit I misread it as Finlin (how my weird mouth says Finland) pretty quickly.

1

Ah, interesting :D Actually, it is a name, but from a fantasy novel

1
alenreply

yeah i don't think this is much better but a name's a name

2
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

wow got no idea on that one. my brain is grabbing "jenny" and "pen" when I'm trying to read it out

1

Arrr me matey! I can't walk the plank, me wings'll get in the way!

2

Agreed! For yours, seems like a pirate captain that will not shut up, even if that's closer to Blah

0
lemmy.ml

It's not what you probably think first...

0
Ninareply
lemmy.ml

I haven't read any PolandBall comics, but the sub came up quite often on reddit r/all, so my only thought is it's a reference to that. But that's also because I'm uncultured and may not understand what the state of mind of poland refers to.

1
lemmy.ml

It's not from Polandball at all, i hate that den of racism, orientalism and all kinds of shitty chauvinism.

It's actually reference to one of the oldest polish memes "Russia is not a country, it's a state of mind" usually being thrown at something weird happening in Russian social media. But since that's just a pot calling kettle black, when i first created that account to spread some polish facts on chapo, what else i could call it :D

-2

Ah good to know, I never looked at those posts because they were like a million panels long and I didn't get it, I just knew that they were popular.

I think I've heard the state of mind meme buried in the back of my head, just couldn't place it. Now I know!

2