There’s a very simple business reason why Google cares if they have your real name. It means it’s possible to cross-relate your account with your buying behavior with their partners, who might be banks, retailers, supermarkets, hospitals, airlines. To connect with your use of cell phones that might be running their mobile operating system. To provide identity in a commerce-ready way. And to give them information about what you do on the Internet, without obfuscation of pseudonyms. 

Simply put, a real name is worth more than a fake one.

- Dave Winer

The entire post is worth a read, and Dave is pretty spot on. The Google reps I've spoken to deny this, but it's obvious to anyone who understands how Google works. Just about everything they do and service they provide is about search and advertising even if they don't seem related to search and advertising directly.

I'm sure that the real name/common name policy is also rooted in other beliefs held by the heads of the Google+ project. However, given all the pushback on this both externally and internally, it seems like a policy they should have given up if it was just about a misunderstanding of how people operate on the Internets. Throw in the fact that it's about money, better data mining, and the ability to tie what you do online to what you buy, and things crystallize a bit.

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