Last week, in class, we discussed Sherry Turkle's Life on the Screen. In this reading, Turkle discusses things that I would have never known about the computer. She talks about how people go online and make false identities about themselves. She says that they make up identities from a fantasy of theirs. I think what Turkle is trying to say is that people make up multiple identities of themselves online and their identities, most of the time, have something to do with their own personalities.
Before I read Life on the Screen, I thought that the computer and internet were for only studying for classes and going on facebook. I used to think that online chatting was only for facebook and Skype. After I read the second paragraph on page 12 of the article, everything made sense to me now. When I go on facebook, I see all these profiles of beautiful women, but the profile is just something that can trick young men, like myself, into going on a dating website. I wondered why people still do that today on facebook but I guess it's just apart of a business or to get people to check out their website more.
My professor gave the class random buddies to talk to on this chat site called AIM. We created a profile and made up a person to experience what Turkle had said about people making up fake identities. I got this person that I never met before in my life. All I know is that he or she is in my class but I do not know who this person is exactly. This experience is amazing and I hope everybody in the class thinks this is cool too. I chatted online ot a random person that had a fake identity as well as I did. Now I know why people tend to make up fake identities and that is to express themselves online without anybody knowing who they are. Although this project is fun, I will not intend to make another fake profile in the future.
