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I use real nicknames of the real people in my life.
Me too. I maintain a blog, and use fake names or nick names for everyone. My friends get a kick when they recognize themselves, as the nicknames I give to people are always based on personal stories. Now I've got friends clamoring for me to include them in my memoirs!
Altho my son was not happy when I posted a picture of us on vacation, because I'd exposed his identity to the cyber-world!
A close friend of mine has published two memoirs. When he used real names he had to have each person (myself included, and he wrote nice stuff about me!) sign a contract that they would not sue the publishing house, author, editor, etc. Actually, come to think of it, even when he changed the name of ex-wife she had to sign a release.
So, I think unless you want a real legal hassle you may want to change the names, but if details make it obvious who the person is, even without revealing their name, you may still have to wade through legal sludge.
I often use real names when I write. It helps me manage my characters.
When and if it's going to be published, I change the names. Word processing makes it easy.
That is what I was going to say. When it comes time to change names you can always make the names VERY similar. Change Liz to Elizabeth or Betty to Bethany. You can get a baby name book from the library and find versions of the same name too.
I found some journal type writings last week of when I was in a sorority over 25 years ago and I put some of them on a blogger blog. I just used first names and if it was something sensitive I used a fake name (for instance one of my sorority sisters was murdered in a bad drug deal a couple of years later). Really, there are no major revelations here. It's mostly just stupid and funny - and funny probably only to me. But now I've been told to change all the names. Should I?
When I have done blogging, the only actual name I keep is my own. I never know if the next person wants a given fact of history to be broadcast or not. If I was doing actual journalism or writing a book, it would depend upon how much documentation I can obtain to corraborate what I remember.
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