I Live Another Life on the Web

After a few weeks of deliberation, I have decided to focus my postings on how new media enables or suppresses one's personal identity.

After today's class and leaning more about social networking sites, it made me think that these types of sites let people express themselves in new ways that they never thought possible before.

But I also believe blogs and social networking sites make it possible for people to create different personalities that they wish they could have, or ones they can hide behind because they are not happy with who they are.

There was a recent episode of True Life on MTV that is titled "I Live Another Life on the Web". In this episode, three young women show the world how having another life on the web affects their everyday life.

Take a look:


Embedding courtesy of Dintillion

If this does not work....here is the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THM16t5Cm_4

As you can see these women use the Internet to create alter-egos and live in a virtual world. They are doing things they wouldn't otherwise be doing if it wasn't for the Internet.

From the article, “Evaluating the Social and Cultural Implications of the Internet,” Albert Borgmann says that “Cyberspace presents an escape into an alternative reality that is illusionary because it presents us with trivialized and glamorized substitute realities that lack context.”

I think this explains what these women are going through in the video because they want to escape too.

For example, the woman who wanted to play in a band but had stage fright, the Internet now allows her to perform her music behind an avatar, resulting in her being able to perform without being nervous. But, as Borgmann says this alternative reality may not be as good as everyday reality, so it might not constitute as an adequate escape from reality.


In other words, she is escaping for those few moments when she is playing behind her avatar, but has it solved her problems in “real-life”? Will she be able to perform one day as herself in front of others?


Overall, I think having a different online identity enables people to show their personal identity in the sense that they can open up online since no one really knows who they are. But, on the other hand, I think it suppresses one's identity because you are not being who you really are. You almost have a fake personality. Why not just be that person who you are pretending to be online?

Hopefully the confidence the online identities give people, can translate into their “real lives”.