by Random Internet StrangerA theory...
People who've had the same account for a very long time do so because they feel connections to people on here and they want to be easily recognised by other people.
I'm not sure when I joined this forum - it would've been late last year, I guess. I haven't changed my account since joining because this account has no persona to speak of, and I'm too lazy to switch things up by creating a new account. My narrative style would give me away, I suspect - there are some fairly sharp minds on this board. I don't mind being recognized; nor do I crave recognition.
I suspect that there are a minority of people who change their accounts when their internet personas become too real to them. When they form an attachment to their SW persona because it's suddenly evolved into, well, a secondary Facebook account with a pseudonym, they find that they can't handle attacks to it because the attack is perceived to be an insult to their own person. So they create a secondary account, and for some reason seem shocked when the exact same shit happens a month down the track.