To be honest, I'd much prefer to believe that the users on here closely resemble their avatars. Silly or not, it helps me to remember who does what, who says what, and who likes/dislikes what.
As such, Dr. Stantz will always be Dan Aykroyd, Algernon is some version of Big McIntosh, Daniel Vasquez is something…in black and white…and somewhat disturbing. Badsitrep is an alien (I know it's a puppy it just looked like an alien from the thumbnail and I like a bit of delusion in my life leave me alone I don't want to be probed.)
And Vinyl Scratch is actually Vinyl Scratch. (Those are the ones I've interacted with longest on here and have a somewhat constant theme to their avatars.)
EDIT: Oh, and Platus is that pirate thing. And burning_phoneix is philomena by default. Avatar being damned.