Friday 4 September 2015

Who is real in the virtual world

Who Is Real In the Virtual World?

http://www.buzzle.com/images/people/relationships/virtual-identity.jpg

“As the Internet of things advances, the very notion of a clear dividing line between reality and virtual reality becomes blurred, sometimes in creative ways” (Mulgan, n.d.) 
The virtual network can be a dangerous place as anyone can portray themselves as being anyone in the world and even then that person might not be real. We as users of the virtual world are responsible for how our self-identity is seen by the community but it can be very difficult to keep control of our identity in the virtual world as other people and the network itself can in fact make your identity inauthentic.  As said by Ariella Van Luyn in the lecture “in a virtual network, you are not the only person constructing your identity”.

 There are also people who take advantage of being ‘fake’ in the virtual world and use it for personal gain or to simply escape reality. I personally don’t see anything wrong with escaping reality as long as you are able to keep a clear view on what is reality and what is virtual. See this link to see how reality is being blurred.

McNeill says that “Facebook builds on both human and posthuman concepts of the human subject in compelling, and arguably posthuman, life narratives, as its users produce and are produced by accounts of digital life” (McNeill, 2012). I agree with the McNeills statement about there being both human and posthuman aspects to a virtual identity on Facebook. However he seems to think that people are authentically themselves on Facebook unless they chose not to be. I do not agree with this as I think we can’t control every aspect of or virtual selves but we can control a portion of it.

References

McNeill, L. (2012). There Is No "I" in Network. Retrieved from Social Networking Sites and Posthuman Auto/Biography: https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/webapps/Conc-camcontent-bb_bb60/items/getitem.jsp?as_course_code=13-BA1002-TSV-INT-SP2&content_id=_1242562_1&course_id=_42849_1&doc_id=42357
Mulgan, G. (n.d.). Brainy Quote . Retrieved from Virtual Quotes : http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/geoffmulga559335.html?src=t_virtual


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3 comments:

  1. Alesha Granshaw6 September 2015 at 10:23

    I definitely agree that an individual's sense of identity becomes complicated in a virtual setting, as other people and the virtual world itself also play a role in shaping their identity. I think this complexity in identity construction can be attributed to "the digital era complicating definitions of the self and its boundaries, both dismantling and sustaining the humanist subject in practices of personal narrative" (McNeill, 2012). With so many factors contributing to the construction of each person's identity, it becomes difficult to determine what portion of the identities of the people that we meet and interact with online are authentic. In the sense of Facebook, other users commenting false statements and accusations on someone's status or posting on their timeline can influence the way that other users perceive them which creates an inauthentic identity for that user.

    References:

    McNeill, L. (2012). There Is No "I" In Network: Social Networking Sites and the Posthuman Auto/Biography. Project Muse, 35(1), 65-82. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

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  2. Danielle ML6 September 2015 at 23:45

    Well said Mitchel, i agree that being that the virtual world is dangerous to put who you truly are or not. Being in the virtual world brings a different type o danger to our lives. Facebook is one that is commonly used every day by people who have fake accounts or catfish other photos. It’s not only dangerous for the younger generation as there are a lot of predators out there luring them in but also to the older generation. The stories you hear about children taking to pedos disguised as someone younger or the older women who are conned into giving people their bank details or sending them money so that they can move countries so that they can be together. The difference between reality and virtual is the vulnerability of certain people become a lot clear and become better targets. With statistics of over 850 million users and just over 50% of users log in daily (McNeil,2015) you could say that there would be a great deal of those accounts being used for the wrong purposes.


    Mcneil.L(2012) There is no “I” in Network: Social networking sites and posthuman auto/biography. Retrieved from https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/webapps/Conc-camcontent-bb_bb60/items/getitem.jsp?as_course_code=13-BA1002-TSV-INT-SP2&content_id=_1242562_1&course_id=_42849_1&doc_id=42357

    ReplyDelete
  3. Annie Doherty7 September 2015 at 23:05

    You made some excellent points in this blog post, such as how people use a different identity in the virtual world. I completely agree with you; I believe that it’s fine to create a new identity on the internet (as long as it isn’t for malicious or illegal reasons of course) because it can serve as a way for a person to become better or greater than what they are in reality. As Laurie McNeil pointed out “millions of individuals on a daily basis now produce online selves in interaction with both other people and software applications” (2012, 65). It’s near impossible for people to not produce another identity on the internet because being active online almost always involves interacting with people. I also agree that communities online can often make a person feel like their identity is fake or invalid. For example, on Tumblr, the LGBT community is quite powerful and can make heterosexual people feel excluded or feel like they need to change their identity to fit in with the majority.

    Reference list:

    McNeill, L.(2012). There Is No "I" in Network: Social Networking Sites and
    Posthuman Auto/Biography. Biography, 35(1), 65-82. Retrieved from
    https://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/webapps/Conc-camcontent-
    bb_bb60/items/getitem.jsp?as_course_code=13-BA1002-TSV-INT-
    SP2&content_id=_1242562_1&course_id=_42849_1&doc_id=42357

    ReplyDelete

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