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Comment by GordonS | Hacker News Reader

Do we know if this was "the" Julian Assange?

For a while there I was getting emails about open-source related conferences organized by a guy named "Hans Reiser". After the infamous Hans Reiser was in jail. It was a bit creepy, and I felt a bit sorry for him (the non-infamous Hans just trying to organize conferences, not the infamous one who murdered his wife).

EDIT: Speaking of which, Wikipedia seems to think he may be eligible for parole in a week or so. O_o

I sympathize with the whole "why should I change, he's the one that sucks" attitude, but having the same name as a famous murderer is probably a good opportunity to adopt a 'stage name' for professional use, if not get it legally changed.

I understand 'Hans' is related to 'Johannes' and is sometimes anglicized to 'John' (I believe one of my great grandfathers did this.) One of the nice things about the name 'John' is you can change it in various ways without anybody thinking it unusual; e.g. a 'John' can also call themselves 'Jack' and nobody thinks that unusual.

Maybe it’s because I’m not American but if you introduce yourself as Jack and then your legal name is John I would think that unusual.

I thought it was a British thing. As an American, I’ve never met a John going by Jack (at least, I don’t think I have).

On the other hand, C.S. Lewis apparently went by Jack, which isn’t a common nickname for Clive or Staples. But people generally don’t argue over nicknames. And they may not even realize a nickname actually is a nickname; it’s not common for people to ask for your legal ID, after all.

People still talk about Jack Kennedy, the assassinated US president.

Apparently Jack is a generic name, too, for any small boy. So inns would employ a boot-Jack to help guests get their boots off, later supplanted by a gadget.

It’s pretty American - I know a boy named John after his father John, who has been called Jack all his life.

Jack is indeed a common nickname for John.

And not just in America. It's common in Australia too, and apparently it dates back a long way in England. Jack has become a lot more common as an actual given name over the past few decades, though.

On a semi-related note, james is an english form of the name jacob.

Johann/es is usually the given name for Hans.

That reminds me of William Hitler, nephew of Adolf, who was born in the UK and fought with the Americans in WWII. Led to some interesting conversations.

"What's your name, son?"

"Hitler."

"Howdy, Hitler, you ready to help us fight Hitler?"

See http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/08/to-hell-with-hitler.htm... for more detail on this.

Yeah, it is. It's fairly well known in PG circles. :)

The mail address seems to check out.

Hmm, might be because I'm on mobile, but I couldn't see an email address (if you were wondering why I asked!)

Click any of the names of the commits.

Ah christ, I only thought to tap on the committer's name!

Not your fault. Bad UX is everywhere.

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