The Best Commenters Use Pen Names

What do Maximum PC readers like I Jedi, big_montana and Ghok have in common with Mark Twain, Bono and Jackie Chan? They all use pseudonyms. While that might not seem like a big deal – this is the Internet, after all – a recent study by Disqus, empowerer of comments, claims that folks who rock pseudonyms have way better stuff to say than the anonymous horde and jerks like me who use their true name.

Disqus crunched the numbers and found that 61 percent of comments from pseudonymed folks receive “positive quality signals,” such as thumbs-ups and Likes from other readers, VentureBeat reports. Comparatively, commenters using their real names receive “positive quality signals” just 51 percent of the time, while those who hide behind the veil of anonymity only earn the respect of their peers on a relatively paltry 34 percent of posts.

People with pen names don’t just leave quality comments, either – Disqus claims they are much more active commenters, period. ““The average commenter using a pseudonym contributed 6.5 times more than anonymous commenters and 4.7 times more than commenters identifying with Facebook,” the company said.

Any well-articulated, “positive quality signal”-attracting thoughts you’d like to share?