The only thing I see here is the ability to add a nicknames - your "alternate names" - to your "real" name. That is not at all the same thing.

Edit: Comment on the page - "I'm sorry, but the only difference I see here is that you're now listing the nickname field on the hovercard and profile. I see no substantive policy change. Fame was already an obvious and hypocritical exception to the policy; now you're just open about it." That's what I read.

But that's not really a game changer. Whether you are at FB or G+, if you are using pseudo name to protect your identity, than you are rendering yourself useless because you can't be hiding and expect to be networking authentically with the people you know for real. What would make sense for FB/G+ to provide is the ability to have each person choose his/her self-identity based on different situations, i.e, provide complete autonomy to the people on how they wish to portray themselves to the different sets of people. I can be a real name in front of my family and co-workers, but at the same time, projecting and sharing different sets of updates based on who am I sharing with. At the same time, I can be a pseudo name in front of the strangers and/or people I may only know online.

It turns out this is extraordinarily difficult, and if users think they can maintain this separation using a single account, and then they get burned, they are very likely to blame the social network involved. Which is a pretty good reason why the architects at FB or G+ would probably think very, very carefully before implementing such a feature.