Online Identity
This week class we discussed the online identity. This subject isn’t new for us, because talked about it before. Last time we talk about how your online identity could be something completely new. On the web you are able to create a person who has nothing to do with your own identity in real live. But this week class we’ve made some nuance to that.
Although you can make up a new you, that doesn’t make it likely that this always happens. For example on facebook. On facebook there is a need for a connection to the real you. This connection is quite clear. It appears on your profile image, or on those little massages under a post like: poster from Rotterdam. It says something about the real you. It makes your facebook profile more reliable.
This connection is blurred when we look to online games. A game creates a new reality, so a connection to the real world isn’t as much required as with facebook. But there is still a connection. Some people make their avatar (the virtual representation in the game) look like themselves, or they try at least. But even if it doesn’t look like the real you there is still a connection. I noticed that in last week class, when we tried to explain the choice of an avatar. If an avatar is a female it could be that the person behind it is a woman. But what could it be meaning when the person is a man? Some people will think the person is too feminine, others will say that this man likes to watch a good looking girl, or it could be a funny experiment. When you choose a fantasy character there is still a connection with the real person. Even an ork or a troll says something about the represented man or woman. Probably that’s why we had such a long a non-academic discussion about orks, trolls and whatever there is more in the virtual world. The online identity is a more sensitive subject than I suspected before this class. Now I know I have to be careful if I talk about orks.
Sanne
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deliodac12 reblogged this from saschasanne and added:
I totally agree with your post. There always has to be a relation between the real self and the chosen avatar. In my...
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saschasanne posted this
