The Significance of Lower Case

A large percentage of PC members begin their screen names with a lower case letter. Out and about IRL I can't remember anyone doing this, officially or not.

What does it mean? Does it mean anything? Here's this simple choice: lowercase OR uppercase and many people choosing lower case. Self-esteem? A choice on joining a new group where one anticipates starting at the bottom? Anyone have any better ideas? Take care!

internet etiquette says that a post in capital letters indicates that the author is yelling. i like writing in all lower case because it expresses informality and a laid-back, friendly reflection of who i am. using capital letters seems very formal and leads to typos.

i have used lower case almost entirely since i retired from the federal gov't. my choice. unless i am writing something official..anything you get from me has no cap's..except if i feel the need to yell something from the rafters. if it was good enough for e e cummings..it works for me.

as for joining a social group...no thanks...tried joining one here once & got flamed over something that was not my fault big time...since then..have no desire to join one...

Hmm....hard to tell. I think it's a matter of what looks best to the member. I like the look of both upper- and lowercase letters combined. What I don't like, though, is the use of numbers. A funny or personal nickname catches my interest in a member better than a set of numbers.

Just sayin'! Not meant to offend anyone.

I'm usually very good with punctuation and grammar because I was raised old school. When I 1st joined here I was upset and new to the internet - in my rush to join I accidentally typed the 1st letter of my name lower case...I don't like it either. Wish I would have thought it through better and not used my real 1st name lol.

Save a keystroke! Hey, that would make a good bumper sticker, if had a car. I notice that when I am signing emails to my T, I will capitalize the first letter of my name if I am feeling strong, but usually it's all lowers also. when I was working, and using a regular keyboard, not a stylus!, and all 10 fingers, I rarely even spelled my first name correctly, as I was just typing too fast - you know, like how you type "teh" instead of "the". People would comment, but it's like I had no identity at all.

I used to make my screen names with a capital first letter, but it just made logging into forums trickier. I got lazy, and switched to using lower case usernames instead, it made it easier.

My name has a certain irony and it is a double entendre at the very least lol. I chose to drop the h and and use lowercase to avoid the appearance of pretension.

I've been a technical writer for many years, where anything written has to be precise and exact. I've had to get used to the abominations of language (shudder) that I see in email/text/tweets, but there's no fighting progress. After getting a cell phone and laboriously picking out the letters for a text message, I understood fully the all-lower-case thing. I like Jay Leno's joke about texting when he said maybe someday someone will invent something where you can just SAY the words. Yep, I'm sticking with voice messages.
Bottom line is - old habits die hard, so I continue to try to punctuate and spell correctly, no matter what the medium. Hence my "properly capitalized" user name.

I didn't even give it much thought when picking my name for PC. I am old school as well and had a history teacher that took points off for penminship, it was a Catholic School and she was a nun. So perhaps it is just the way someone was taught and reinforced in education. I guess now a days there is so much freedom about how we interchange messages that there is just a very informal acceptable way to say anything.
Open Eyes

I've seen it IRL.... seems all the email addresses "automatically" send or list in lower case?

When I use drjean it's to soften my position as DrJean can look arrogant to some, I think.

I honestly didn't care. When I first made the name, I never planned on posting on PC (at all), and I only registered to take the sanity test if I recall correctly. Usually I capitalize my usernames properly.

And now, I regret this unfortunate mistake because the shortened name is "haha". It gets a little confusing between the laughing term, and the person.

Same here - that's why I used the apostrophe in my username even if it looks awkward with no space between "Indie's" and "OK". I thought it looked worse when I added the space.

Interesting question Ygrec. In my case all lowercase for my user name doesn't mean a thing. I didn't even think about it when I created the username.

When I post in the forums I try to use proper uppercase, lowercase, etc. In chat I rarely bother to use caps. No idea why I do either.

As a side note, before my Little One integrated she typed in all lowercase. It was a way of trying to make herself less conspicuous (sp?).

i used all lower case because my username begins with a verb, and is a sentence fragment.

I was trying to think of the word last night, and it came to me as soon as I reread this post this morning: GERUND! isn't wingin' a gerund? and I think technically this could be considered a complete sentence, cuz you know how like in "command" sentences, the subject is not stated, it's implied - e.g., "(hankster, you) stuff it!" Ergo, "(i be) wingin'it" - is a complete thought, and therefore a sentence, and not a mere fragment. Altho fragment is a delightful word. FRAAAAGGGMINT!

even tho i used upper case for the first letter of my name, that was just habit. you all may have noticed that i do not capitalize the first letter of a new sentence, or many other "traditional" uses. i do not think this is because i have poor self esteem, or any other lack of wit nor wisdom. i applaud any effort to modify the usage of the language to make it more modern. history is nice, but spelling really would be nice if it matched sound. yes, i know what phonetic is, and i would love to see more of it, if so many others didn't feel compelled to become so excited over it and deduce a lack of intelligence and education. good typing to you's all~ Gus

For me, the significance of using lower case is a matter of perspective. Is spending energy on the significance of an imponderable more important than using the resource on an issue we face?

Ponderables and imponderables. The real world isn't divided into such categories. The real world (IRL) is divided into ninety percent nonsense, a bit of romantic interaction and a tiny, tiny bit of what some people call serious issues. While this may bother some people at least it's accurate. The significance of lower case could very well turn out to be serious. However much we'd like to, we don't know everything in advance. Take care.

I did not know I was dealing with someone who had such a grasp on the accuracy of his perceptions. For my edification, please provide links to your sources.

I don't agree about the percentage of nonsence in real life Ygrec. However there is a great degree of ignorance, we have yet so much to learn. Honesty can help that process in my opinion, if we are truely held to be more honest and scorned when we are not, perhaps honesty itself can lower the percentage of ignorance greatly.
Just my HONEST oppinion.

As far as addressing someone all in lower case as to not seem to be superior to them, I have never heard of that. I was taught to address everyone with correct sentence structure and honesty. I do my best for everyone and openly admit I am not perfect.
Open Eyes

My beef is that most websites don't let you start your username with uppercase... This irks me so bad. I'm all about design. So if a name looks better in lowercase - I'll just do that. For instance, my DA account is all lowercased because I think it looks superior that way. But generally speaking, it irks me to no ends to not have my stuff capitalized. D:

I'd probably go into a fit if it were 'okami'....... Haha.

greylove.....Greylove......Greylove......greylove......Greylove......
Hmmmmm......this has got me thinking. I guess greylove just looks friendlier to me. Greylove feels more.....formal? I was greylove on a greyhound website. I just dragged it with me. I forget that it isn't my real name.

SORRY!!! CRANKY!!! Don't know what got into me. I thought Elan was picking on ygrec and I was like, hey, that's MY job - okay, that's not funny either. Thanks mcl for making me laugh in the other thread, about wanting an elvis outfit. I didn't realize how cranky I was feeling until I laughed at that. And I didn't realize how negative my post was. Wow, what IS it with me and cute smart new French guys on PC?! Way to impress them - insult them. I am SO sorry, Elan AND YGrec.