#baurdillard

At a recent count, there are nine version of myself living out their lives online. These nine versions include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblrs, LinkedIn and a few more. I say nine because these are the accounts that I am active/have been active on in the last few months – there are many more forgotten/disused accounts, collecting cyberdust and preserving a version of myself from another time. I would personally find it hard pushed to say which of these the most ‘real’ version of me is. Different social media and web platforms ask for different facets of character and identity, which myself and many others play along with, and so these multiple-realities are created. As someone who has grown up with the internet I’ve always found it easy to communicate online and have a sense of myself in relation to the big wide web –but have always felt the distinction between my physical self and those online identities – I am me and they are a part of me.

In Baudrillard-ian terms these virtual/online versions of myself become Simulacra – as our physical sense of reality and experience is overcome by our experience in these hyper-real virtual worlds. Facebook in particular no longer wants to simulate your life; it wants to become a new version of it, to become your identity in and of itself. With each update and system tweak Facebook takes more of your information and builds a more complete ‘you’ online – which can then be advertised to, seduced, enraged, bought and sold.