Thread: Mac OS X Lion: How to get your name out of the menu bar

This is a quick tutorial, but it took me a while to figure out how to do it. I hope it helps somebody else!

When I updated my MacBook to Mac OS X Lion, I noticed that my name (taken from my user account) was sitting in the upper right corner of the screen, in the menu bar, next to the date/time. Not only is this no fun when making screenshots for T-I, but it also kind of sucks when you're sitting in a cafe with your laptop and people can read it over your shoulder.



Your name is there as part of the Fast User Switching feature. Here I'll show you how you can either change it to an icon, or disable the Fast User Switching display entirely.

1. Open the Apple menu in the upper left of your screen, and select System Preferences.
2. From the list of preference panels, select Users & Groups under System.
3. In the Users & Groups panel, click the lock icon in the lower left to allow changes (if it's not unlocked already).
4. In the left-hand pane of the Users & Groups panel, select Login Options:
   
5. In the Login Options panel, you have two choices. You can either change the display from your name to a generic icon (if you want to be able to do Fast User Switching from the menu bar):
   
   
   
   Or, you can disable the Fast User Switching display, which will remove your name from the menu bar entirely:
   

Congratulations! Now you have a little bit more privacy on your Mac.