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Since Mikenna bookmarked a New York Times article about Pinterest, I've been thinking about what makes that site different (and, in my opinion, more successful) than other social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. According to this Huffington Post article, "What sets Pinterest apart and makes it so appealing is its focus on who we want to be -- not on what we're doing, where we've gone, how important we are or how beloved. While much of the content shared on existing social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare screams, 'Look at me,' Pinterest posts urge, 'Look at this.'" While I agree with that idea to some extent, I wonder if we can ever engage in social media/social networking without an air of "look at me." This made me think of Goldsmith's idea of Internet identity: "On the Internet, these tendencies move in different directions, with identity running the gamut from authenticity to total fabrication" (84). So, maybe Pinterest allows its users to create a more authentic identity for themselves while Facebook and Twitter promote more fabricated identities.

This article goes along with Lovink's idea in "MyBrain.net" that we "constantly login, create profiles in order to present our 'selves' on the global market place of employment, friendship and love. . . Trust is the oil of global capitalism and the security state, required by both sides in any transaction or exchange" (4-5). It looks like identity fraud is what happens when we trust too easily on social media sites.

Keeping track of passwords is definitely a hassle for most of us, so a service that groups all of them didn't seem far off. It will be interesting to see how this develops, and if it will catch on and be secure.

Interesting in terms of issues of ownership. Once our identities are "published" online, who owns them? Who "owns" our search histories? Google owns most of mine, I'd say, but it also allows me to supposedly delete items. Are our search histories too public now to be hidden? And who ever said we had a right to privacy on the world wide web? It does seem contradictory to the nature of a "web."

This brief article is related to our class discussion on identity and social networking.

This article questions the value of LinkedIn, noting that many users are members without involvement. This raises questions about professional identity in a social media atmosphere-- is it worth it for the user to create a brand for herself here?

This is the social networking homepage of a online gaming website, IGN. I wanted to share this because it seems to overtly combine the gaming and social elements of social media. It also, similar to the AXE site, allows users to follow certain products and claim an identity based on what products the user owns in comparison to other members of the community. Within the site itself members have some level of gaining badges and competing by listing and comparing their games and interacting with each other. Also, on the level of competition, there are prizes available for different interactions on this site which further invokes the sense of gaming and competition.

This article argues that social media aren't just about exhibitionism, and that we can instead view the Web as a painting. Instagram and Pinterest are picturesque, which he defines as "something that is more pleasing in a mediated representation."

Augmented reality means that " . . . our reality is both technological and organic, both digital and physical, all at once." This short post was referenced in both "The Myth of Cyberspace" and "Picture Pluperfect," so I thought I'd bookmark it here in case anyone was interested.

The divide between the "digital" and the "real" is false. This dualism serves a useful purpose, however: "Part of the seductiveness of the cyberspace fantasy is that, by denying the complex, mutually determining relationship between our society and the Web, it makes our lives and our everyday judgments simpler."

I've only given cursory attention to this site (when I checked it out, I found it less useful than I had thought it would be), but we've talked about technology monitoring people, breaking their identity into tiny bits of data, etc. and this website encourages people to do that to themselves to live a productive life ... in some ways it is kind of like the guy who photographs all his food, combined with an OCD, capitalist mindset. See also: any website that tracks your miles run, your calories consumed for the day, etc.

Questions of names and online identity come up in this article, which talks about how Google Plus has changed its policy of requiring people to use their real names when registering for accounts.

This article touches on a lot of the topics that keep surfacing in our classroom discussions about narcissism and how we use social media to communicate with others and share our own identities. It also expresses some of the concerns that I am often torn about; how much privacy can we have if we are going to use this technology, and why aren't we more aware of it.

Cool super-minimal no-style website.