MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Seriousness Personal Interactions in Internet

beppe · 12-07-2010, 05:29 PM

I am interested in questions related to personal interactions in Internet.

I have personal experience only on MobileRead, the only site to which I belong as a member and to which I take active part, although that part is very limited in scope. I like to state this right at the beginning so that nobody is surprised by my candor or engrossed by my ignorance of the Internet culture, etiquette and practice.

The aspects that interest me are almost all those that one can imagine - except those related to business, knowledge gathering, advertising or any other form of professional activity. In the following, I will describe what I am interested in knowing. As a second step, I will help a discussion by formulating some questions that might be used as guides for replies or posts. But I will be very happy to receive general posts on the general subject of personal interactions. It will be my pleasure to read all with care and learn what interests me, which I do not yet know well myself.

Just to get things to start rolling, let us imagine that between two internauts develops a somewhat close relation, of whatever nature, ranging from torrid passion to friendship (something deeper than MR friendship), by ways of attraction, attachment, even love. There is no doubt that this could happen. That this has happened, and that it will happen. Let us imagine that is a friendship that we are talking about.

In the virtual dimensions (that I will just call virtual), as opposed to the real, where the two would meet, have drinks together, play tennis or bridge, go out for dinner or to exhibitions or ballet, invite each other for the weekend, share materially what they please, our two internauts might not do all these things.

They will have to exercise functions that are similar or equivalent in the virtual and in the real but which require different acts. As an example let me consider one of the first functions in developing a new relation, that is showing interest. In the virtual, it has to be done in view of everyone, while in the real there is more privacy. At the same time, in the real, body motion and tone of voice will be potentially more revealing, and effective in conveying messages with more accuracy. A different “language” is to be used in the virtual. I have the impression that there might be need for more deliberate actions, to substitute the lack of voice and body motion, and on the other hand, having more time for reacting and observing, even a tiny hint might attain a result.

It might be, especially in very public contexts, that they will choose to resort to avatars and nicknames and protect their privacy more strictly than in the real. This will affect their behaviour, and might also influence the resulting relation.

Our two internauts might interact differently in the virtual, compared with the real, not only because they cannot see, touch, or smell, etc. each other, but also because the set of conventions for interaction might be quite different.
In support of this, I like to imagine that the interactions in the virtual are between avatars and not actual selves. This is my trick to put a screen between my real self and the rest, for instance if I feel that somebody is unpleasant or aggressive toward me on MR. The aggression is toward my avatar: it is there exactly to act as my proxy. For other people the avatar is more of a symbol, a reminder, to self or to other, or to both. Both uses of avatar and many more of the two I mention here are in use. There is a thread that one year ago collected many observations and comments on this particular argument, that is how avatar images influence your impression of personality. This opens up a number of sub questions.

What is the role of avatars in all this? Just out of curiosity, I went to the list of members that were online (144), I checked 59 of them and found that 34 did not have an avatar. And the remaining 25 were evenly split between icons of people, animals and objects. I am pretty confident that no more than 15 percent of the members could be interested in personal interaction in MobileRead. Which is still a very generous and interesting number.

The avatar is a mask. There is always the need for a mask in personal relations. People that do not use the Internet much, often comment that an avatar is like a carnival mask that protects the real identity and allows behavior otherwise not easy to practice, because such behavior can be in contrast with the image of the self that one projects in real life and wishes to protect. People more familiar with personal interaction on the Internet, comment that on the Internet there is less need for a heavy mask as time is not an independent variable and the communication channel is forcibly much narrower: there is time for more controlled and deliberate actions.

A further point on the topic, is that Internet personal interactions can be beneficial to those who are more socially inhibited in real life. This would be confirmed by the recent poll on extroversion-introversion. In the poll it was observed that overall extroverts and introverts have similar percentage, while on MobileRead there were about 88% of the 115 who cared to answer, that declared to be introvert (!)

Some questions to stimulate comments and posting.

Is privacy necessary, important, useful to virtual relations?

Are virtual relations comparable to real ones?

Do you think of your ways on the Internet in light of social relations?

Further questions and subjects that I have not expanded here

If the relation is in the virtual world, how does it affect the real world life of each person. Sentiments and emotions arise around events in the virtual world but sprout in the real one. This might imply meta-meta physics

Can an Internet relation develop and attain high levels of personal involvement and gratification without spilling into real life?

Two addenda that might be useful to the discussion:

E. M. Foster wrote the novellette on virtual worlds “The machine Stops”. Written in 1909, it almost magically anticipates virtuality and the Internet. It has obtained a lively discussion in the Book Club. It is relevant to my argument as “… it develops Forster's recurring humanist concerns about connection--of individuals with themselves, senses plus spirit, or individuals with each other and with the natural world”. (Images of a networked society: E. M. Forster's "The Machine Stops.", ).

Do you want to build a relation starting from a new friendship? You can use this map.

12-07-2010, 05:29 PM	#1
beppe Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,161 Karma: 81026524 Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Italy Device: Kindle3, Ipod4, IPad2	Personal Interactions in Internet I am interested in questions related to personal interactions in Internet. I have personal experience only on MobileRead, the only site to which I belong as a member and to which I take active part, although that part is very limited in scope. I like to state this right at the beginning so that nobody is surprised by my candor or engrossed by my ignorance of the Internet culture, etiquette and practice. The aspects that interest me are almost all those that one can imagine - except those related to business, knowledge gathering, advertising or any other form of professional activity. In the following, I will describe what I am interested in knowing. As a second step, I will help a discussion by formulating some questions that might be used as guides for replies or posts. But I will be very happy to receive general posts on the general subject of personal interactions. It will be my pleasure to read all with care and learn what interests me, which I do not yet know well myself. Just to get things to start rolling, let us imagine that between two internauts develops a somewhat close relation, of whatever nature, ranging from torrid passion to friendship (something deeper than MR friendship), by ways of attraction, attachment, even love. There is no doubt that this could happen. That this has happened, and that it will happen. Let us imagine that is a friendship that we are talking about. In the virtual dimensions (that I will just call virtual), as opposed to the real, where the two would meet, have drinks together, play tennis or bridge, go out for dinner or to exhibitions or ballet, invite each other for the weekend, share materially what they please, our two internauts might not do all these things. They will have to exercise functions that are similar or equivalent in the virtual and in the real but which require different acts. As an example let me consider one of the first functions in developing a new relation, that is showing interest. In the virtual, it has to be done in view of everyone, while in the real there is more privacy. At the same time, in the real, body motion and tone of voice will be potentially more revealing, and effective in conveying messages with more accuracy. A different “language” is to be used in the virtual. I have the impression that there might be need for more deliberate actions, to substitute the lack of voice and body motion, and on the other hand, having more time for reacting and observing, even a tiny hint might attain a result. It might be, especially in very public contexts, that they will choose to resort to avatars and nicknames and protect their privacy more strictly than in the real. This will affect their behaviour, and might also influence the resulting relation. Our two internauts might interact differently in the virtual, compared with the real, not only because they cannot see, touch, or smell, etc. each other, but also because the set of conventions for interaction might be quite different. In support of this, I like to imagine that the interactions in the virtual are between avatars and not actual selves. This is my trick to put a screen between my real self and the rest, for instance if I feel that somebody is unpleasant or aggressive toward me on MR. The aggression is toward my avatar: it is there exactly to act as my proxy. For other people the avatar is more of a symbol, a reminder, to self or to other, or to both. Both uses of avatar and many more of the two I mention here are in use. There is a thread that one year ago collected many observations and comments on this particular argument, that is how avatar images influence your impression of personality. This opens up a number of sub questions. What is the role of avatars in all this? Just out of curiosity, I went to the list of members that were online (144), I checked 59 of them and found that 34 did not have an avatar. And the remaining 25 were evenly split between icons of people, animals and objects. I am pretty confident that no more than 15 percent of the members could be interested in personal interaction in MobileRead. Which is still a very generous and interesting number. The avatar is a mask. There is always the need for a mask in personal relations. People that do not use the Internet much, often comment that an avatar is like a carnival mask that protects the real identity and allows behavior otherwise not easy to practice, because such behavior can be in contrast with the image of the self that one projects in real life and wishes to protect. People more familiar with personal interaction on the Internet, comment that on the Internet there is less need for a heavy mask as time is not an independent variable and the communication channel is forcibly much narrower: there is time for more controlled and deliberate actions. A further point on the topic, is that Internet personal interactions can be beneficial to those who are more socially inhibited in real life. This would be confirmed by the recent poll on extroversion-introversion. In the poll it was observed that overall extroverts and introverts have similar percentage, while on MobileRead there were about 88% of the 115 who cared to answer, that declared to be introvert (!) Some questions to stimulate comments and posting. Is privacy necessary, important, useful to virtual relations? Are virtual relations comparable to real ones? Do you think of your ways on the Internet in light of social relations? Further questions and subjects that I have not expanded here If the relation is in the virtual world, how does it affect the real world life of each person. Sentiments and emotions arise around events in the virtual world but sprout in the real one. This might imply meta-meta physics Can an Internet relation develop and attain high levels of personal involvement and gratification without spilling into real life? Two addenda that might be useful to the discussion: E. M. Foster wrote the novellette on virtual worlds “The machine Stops”. Written in 1909, it almost magically anticipates virtuality and the Internet. It has obtained a lively discussion in the Book Club. It is relevant to my argument as “… it develops Forster's recurring humanist concerns about connection--of individuals with themselves, senses plus spirit, or individuals with each other and with the natural world”. (Images of a networked society: E. M. Forster's "The Machine Stops.", ). Do you want to build a relation starting from a new friendship? You can use this map.