Talamo, A. & Ligorio, B. (2001, Feb). Strategic identities in cyberspace. CyberPsychology and Behavior, 4(1): 109-22.

abstract only.

I leaned on this paper in my Masters in Social Psychology, focussing on the ways that kids use online systems in a similar way as offline systems to develop their sense of self.

abstract:

This paper aims at describing, according to the recent advances in social psychology and Computer Mediated Communication, how identities are perceived and constructed in cyberspace. All interactions analyzed in this study were performed within “Euroland,” a collaborative virtual environment. The interacting community was composed of students, teachers, and researchers working on a transnational educational project. Practices and dialogues within Euroland are analyzed using an ethnographic and conversational method. A sample of discourses and actions that occurred during 8 months of time, selected according to the research aims, was analyzed. During online connections, users were personified by an “Avatar.” Avatars are able to walk, fly, and look around the virtual world. They are also able to build and manipulate three-dimensional objects, perform virtual actions, and chat with other connected users. Results showed that “Eurolanders” showed and constructed their identities using strategic “positioning” depending on the interactive situation. Identities are thus dynamic and strongly related to the context, created and constantly recreated by the users. It is concluded that specific features offered by the Euroland environment are exploited by the users as resources to play with, while moving from one strategic positioning to another. Cyber identities involve resources given by specific technological tools and by community. The cyber-identity construction process seems to be highly congruent to the advances in the dialogical perspective in psychology, where identities are considered in their conceptualizations as multiple, “multivoiced,” “positioned,” and context-dependent.

emphasis added

(Wikipedia entry)

I’m most interested in psychological identity, of the individual’s conception of his or her “self”. In Untangling the Web and in my academic research, I lean on theories of social identity, particularly those of John Turner and Henri Tajfel (Social Identity Theory), Glynis Breakwell (Identity Process Theory), and Markus & Nurius’s Possible Selves theory of identity development.

what happens to identity play in an era of Facebook’s “authentic” identity? Here’s a case study from 2008, in which the author was ejected from Facebook because she wasn’t using her “real” name.

Technologist and search engineer Stephen Wolfram analysed the substantial data (some might even call it “Big Data”) he’s collected about his online behaviour - email, keystrokes, calendar activity, phone calls etc - over the last decade (and change).

It’s amazing how much it’s possible to figure out by analyzing the various kinds of data I’ve kept.

I propose that this is one example of one slice of his online self. Wolfram’s personal analysis offers useful insights - the colour to the play by play. I wonder what someone who looks at this with no knowledge of him sees, and what assumptions the disinterested party would draw about who he is.

I don’t know if we will all routinely collect personal data like this in the future, as Wolfram contends, but I already do use many of my online expressions as personal archives.

What’s more interesting about this than the explicit plug for Wolfram Alpha’s data analysis capabilities is that it’s an eyeball into the kinds of datasets that companies, governments and other data collectors use to define us and predict our behaviours.

via Roo Reynolds’ Tinyletter (which directs the HT to @diemkay)

an O’Reilly joint, published in Sept 2011. A good primer on the issues about privacy as they currently stand with relation to the data-driven digital world we currently occupy.

Currently chewing over Chapter 2: The Right To Privacy in the Digital Age, which covers the cultural and contextual variations on privacy interpretations (case studies: US and Europe) - and how these conflict when trying to regulate the digital space.

Two quotes on this:

“In general, the American view of privacy is focused on the home and on the person,” and the right to be “left alone” and free from intrusion.

“The European concept of a right to privacy is centered round preserving the individual’s honor and dignity in the public sphere,” which translates into a greater right over personal information and how it’s presented in the public sphere.

To summarise, the authors say:

How we view and value privacy is dependent on a host of influences that include our history, culture, and social norms. Added to that, age, ethnicity, and sex may influence our expectation of privacy.

makes things complicated, no?

HT @kaythaney

data professionals need shorthand ways to easily think about the societal impact of their work

Coverage of Strata 2012 from Jim Adler, who sat on the panel, ‘If Data Wants to Be Free, is Privacy a Prison?’

Good list of recent gaffes, interesting frameworks, outlines of privacy perils.

HT @kaythaney