Granting a pseudonym

Best pen name I saw was the guy who sent in the Babe Ruth roundup to the local paper: “By Bud Weiser.”

 

If you don't use her actual name, you have to tell readers you're not using her real name to protect her anonymity. Simple.

 

Many years ago we had a contributor for local race track results who couldn't use his real name. He, at the time, worked for the competing paper that owned us, too. We didn't share staffs. The publisher at the time treated us like second-hand shit. The guy providing the racing results just wanted to help the local tracks and drivers.

Our pen name for him - Victor E. Lane

 

My second job out of college was at a really shitty small magazine where we had a 2020-esque freelance budget. So me and the other editor wrote most of the stories, until our idiotic, possibly mob-related "publisher" said it looked bad for us to write most of the stuff. So we came up with pseudonyms for the shit we mailed in. Few months later, someone from a fledgling website calls the office and says he likes a few of the stories he's read and he'd like to see if those writers would like to write for the website (for money, too!).

Website guy: "Who is BYH?"
Me: "That's me."
Website guy: "Who is Not BYH?"
Me: "That's our other editor."
Website guy: "Oh cool. Who is (Pseudonym no. 1)?"
Me: "That's my pen name."
Website guy: "Oh cool. Who is (Pseudonym no. 2)?"
Me: "That's our other editor's pen name."

What a fucking business.

 

We had a guy who was friends with the sports editor of the then-competing newspaper. For whatever reasons, he freelanced a game for the competitor. If his name was William Charles, his byline in the other paper was Charlie Williams. The powers that be never caught on and as far as I know.