The Great Game

This post idea came from Sockenfussel, thanks!  We were talking about chat dynamics and she brought up the idea that being in a chat room like SST is like role playing, in a way.  The chat room is the stage and you create for yourself your chat character, defined by that user name you chose when first coming on to the site and whom you will forever be known as....so play on dear chatters...

The member posts have sort of touched on the idea that each person has created for themselves a unique persona and that is how they are known.  They are loud, they are hug maniacs, they are deep composer thinkers and so on...just to generalize of course.  It would be interesting to meet everyone from chat just so I could compare them to their chat persona.  I have met two of the members I wrote about on here, I did write little comparisons between their two faces, but two is too small a number to really say if the persona played in chat is really who that person is.  I know to some degree, who you are in chat is a part of that real physical you (though I suppose some people do go so far as to be totally not themselves, but I'd like to think they are a small minority).  Perhaps those characteristics of your personality that are subdued in real life come to the front in your chatting life, you are quiet and reserved around people in real life but in chat somehow you cannot help but be loud and silly.

But regardless of the similarities, there are many things that you would never really do to someone if you met them in real life.  General chatting in a friendly environment would not likely produce some of the crazy antics that have occurred in chat, but that is because you are, in a way, more free in chat.  You have a virtual world at your disposal were reality doesn't necessarily need to come in to play at all.  the chat room, for example, has everything one could need...I even  made a cute little Shaun White snow man yesterday with virtual snow (his pretty red hair was made with licorice).  Istagi has a tail, brought on by Avatar of course, but he enjoys his virtual tail, except when Phire lights it on fire...Little pieces to create that unique chat persona apart from who you are outside.  I suppose you get the idea by now...be whatever you want to be...share as much as you want and keep hidden everything you can.  You are not really seen by anyone, so what would they know?

So we go into chat everyday, put on our username and play along with the rest of the group...hopefully you have fun with it because thats the point of it, to have fun (i hope so at least)