March 1, 2004
Ever played a character in an online rpg, and you didnt know exactly who you were playing?
Or maybe youve seen .hack//sign on cartoon network.
If you have, then I think that it would be easier for you than alot of others to understand what Im about to explain.
Right now millions of people throughout the world live in two
worlds: the Real and the Digital. The Real World is the one in which we
exist for most of our lives. The Digital, on the other hand, is the one
in which, through the benefit of the Internet and related systems, we
come into contact with people who only reveal themselves as their
digital selves.
In many ways, the Internet itself is like “The World” in
.hack//sign. As most online rpgs go, none of the characters, like
Tsukasa, Bear, and Lady Subaru, know the “Real” selves of each other,
only the “Digital” selves. As far as they know, many of the main
characters, their “Digital” companions, could, in the “Real”, live
thousands of miles from Japan, in the most inconspicuous of places.
Amazing, isnt it?
Well, since the Internet has been explained in that way, I
think that such a system as the Internet offers unique opportunities to
those of us who live in the Real.
I mean, when you are, like, chatting, people dont have to know
who you “Real”ly are or how you look or talk. Instead, you can assume a
different identity and say whatever you want to describe yourself!
However, I think that there is a danger when you allow your
life in the Digital to interlope at different intervals with your life
in the Real.
I mean, I personally think that it is pretty dumb (and who
hasnt heard of this kind of horror story in the news) when a teenage
girl goes into a chat room and gives her identity or sets herself to
get picked up by some old dirty bastard (who, in the chat room,
portrays himself as a handsome, sexy stud-monkey), and then the next
thing you know, the two are found by the Greek police in some sleazy
hotel on the Mediterranean, getting their freak on!
Now, I dont know if the girl was really thinking at all when she met this guy on the chat room.
But I think a major rule to be followed by the innocent within the Digital world is this:
Real is real, and Digital is Digital, and the twain shall never meet.
Youre not supposed to give a “digital” person your “real” personal information, and vice versa.
Most of the time, romances carried out in the digital wouldnt make it in the real.
But, besides that, I think that, if you have two
personalities or personages about yourself (real and digital), maybe
even two names as well, then you can do alot more in all aspects of
both of your lives, in the real and the digital.
