How this sucker actually plays out

nataliedee.com

Due to the fact that part of our assignment (see below) was to comment on our peers' blogs, I found myself perusing the past and present musings of some of my fis classmates, some of whom I know in real life, and some of whom I did not.

Wednesday night, for example, I posted on Nathaniel's blog. Thursday morning we found ourselves in a Management of Information Organizations work group, and met in person for the first time, although our online identities had been (it turned out) corresponding for weeks regarding student council elections.

It is awfully easy to detach reality from Internet exchanges. One does not (often because it is impossible) have a picture of a real person in mind when they interact on the Internet. You interact with a hazy image, a head with no determined features, rather than an individual, with a face, and an identity discerned from and linked to their physical persona.

This is beating the dead horse of the self beyond exterior appearance, but it is brought home quite forcefully when you meet the people with whom you have only had online interactions, or, in contrast, with whom you have only had real life interactions.

Due to the genius of Google reader, I came across a friend's blog. A fis classmate, and fellow student council member, I have hung out with him, greeted him in the halls, and together thrown student council events. His virtual persona revealed aspects of his personality and thought processes which our real life interactions had not. The coupling of virtual and actual identity revealed a more complete picture of his personality, but one to which I had not been officially sanctioned to experience. I found his blog by chance, and was provided with information which I had not been given permission to receive. Seeing him in person, I felt guilty, because I had learned about him without his knowledge.

I'm not sure what to conclude about this- this melding of virtual and physical identities. "Meeting" people first on the Internet allows for interaction without the possible hindrances of cliques, appearance, age, or prejudice, and, in those areas, is surely a boon to meritocratic relations. One is perceived by their intellectual ability, and their mastery of language. However, that is not the complete tale of one's self, and when you are not privy to the rest of a person's identity, can you actually be said to know them?

I'm going to stop now, because even I am becoming bored with my own pretentious musings.