D. Boyd, M. Chang, and H. Goodman present an extremely explicit view on the term identity and the usage of personal identity in a media driven world in their article titled “Representations of Digital Identity”. A lot of the focus in the article deals with the construction and execution of a personalized identity system called Computer-Mediated Communication or CMC for short. Although, I was and still am a bit unaware of the origin and usage of the system, it provides a lot of paths in which people take to identify themselves in any setting.
The article is most definitely an eye opener for within the first few sentences the authors point out the various common usage of identity in the real world and compare it to that of the virtual world. In doing so, you can clearly see explicit similarities between the two. Many elements in personalized identity in the virtual world are borrowed from what we learn about people in the real world. D. Boyd, M. Chang, and H. Goodman connect identity as one of the biggest forms of communication neglecting the need for verbal communication. Some of the basics in which we have grown up knowing is that we often times create an identity of someone based on their age, gender, weight, height, body build, dress code and much more. The article explains that these same traits make their way to the virtual world in the form of avatars, message board usernames and ranking codes, gamertags, email address and screen names. It was also interesting to note that in the real world, a sense of extended pressure is placed upon legitimacy of one’s identity and proof of one’s identity is often needed to continue communication.
Well, in a world now dominated by technology and the internet, these same elements are used all the time. For instance, we can take ebay for example. One may immediately jump into this giant online auction website to purchase and or sell goods, however, the quality and outcome of a purchase greatly depends on the reputation or identity of the seller and or buyer. Approval ratings known as feedback is listed under the avatar of the buyer and or seller and the higher the rating, you can bet that your item(s) will be legitimate and will be delivered to you and it won’t be part of a scam. An even larger scale of legitimacy on ebay is the use of PayPal which requires one to route their checking account to the system in order to become a “verified” identity. This is only the beginning of the use of personal identity and communication in our world today.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I see what you mean... It’s very ironic actually how for years we’ve been warned about posting our identities on the internet and now some of the most confidential information about us is all accessible online (like bank accounts, loans, billing, etc). And I never really thought about it, but you’re right. Most people’s screen names, passwords, and those little attributes all tend to revolve around some aspect of who we are. So in trying to hide our identities, we end up revealing little characteristics about ourselves for memory’s sake or otherwise without putting much of a second thought into it. I suppose a part of that revolves around how much the internet has melted into today’s society.
ReplyDeleteI see what you mean with this sense of identity in reality in how one would have to prove their existence. I’ve had problems with this sort of thing before. I do what I can in person to leave a memorable impression so that at least one person may remember me. But if that’s the only one, then it would seem like I hardly exist.
ReplyDeleteI have similar difficulties online with some of the art websites I post work on. The usual dilemma I face is that I’ve had an account for longer than a good number of other users on the site, but few if any are interested in my own work/progress.
I think bringing up the idea of identity in relation to technology is something we really have to think about today. Because of the use of various technologies it becomes even easier to become someone else or pretend to be someone else. Protecting your identity is something that everyone has to be aware of these days. It's important for us to find new ways to verify our own identities as well as others when using the internet.
ReplyDeleteAlso as far as artistic responsibilities go, protecting your work online is another issue that is becoming even more prominent. Anyone with access to the internet could take your work and pass it off as their own.