Identity Management

Identity management is a condition that many people have today. Online identity management can be seeing on all the social networks, from Facebook to Instagram people have different personalities when they interact with other people online. Social networks are a place where people can experiment with their different identities without having to leave the comfort of their home. Experimenting in a virtual world may sound as if there is no risk involve but that’s not true there are many risk that can affect you, your family or your friends.

People act different online they choose a specific personality to represent them on the internet. For instance teenagers may present themselves partying all the time just to attract more attention and more friends. But that’s not the only method people use online to attract others as stated by Stephanie Rosenbloom “using a screen name like “batman” or “007” when in reality one is more like Austin Powers” This basically explains that the nicknames people use online are to persuade others into seeing the part of their life that they want to reveal. The post, friends and status that people have online are all determined by the person willingness of showing their qualities with the world.  Facebook friends are specially chosen so that other people can visualize a specific picture of you. Stephanie Rosenbloom also states that “people are not as likely to deviate too far from the truth because their network of friends will simply call them on it.”  I agree with this statement because for some people being embarrass on the internet is bigger than being embarrass in public.

Online communication has a lot of characteristics, for instance a person may have different personalities for encountering someone on social networks. As stated by Tory Higgins in the article by Siibak  Andra  “we have three types of self domains: the actual self, the ideal self and the ought self.” This refers to identity management which is how a person presents itself and how a person perceives others.  Online sites like Facebook are use as testing sites for these three identities. People often interchange personalities depending on the message that they are trying to send.   Profile pictures can be used to verify or deny the qualities of a person. A study by Monica T. Whitty prove that on dating sites the profile picture and description of the users were showing their qualities in a persuasive way to attract the attention. People choose to post pictures where they appear the best looking possible. Boys and girls have different priorities for the pictures that they post online, girls prioritize how beautiful they look and boys don’t care how they look on the internet. According to Siibak  Andra “The virtual selves exhibited on the photos of SNS are therefore constantly constructed  based on the values associated with the “ideal self” or “the ought self.””  This means that the version of ourselves on social networks has the qualities that we would like have and the qualities that we should have.