Gameology: Commentary and Resources for the Game Studies Community

Google actually makes me feel quite eerily unified online. If I am signed in to my gmail account, I find that the Internet recognizes me as Amanda when I use a search engine, go shopping in places that support Google Checkout, and even on certain blogs now. I think it's very creepy.

But then many people consider anonymous online identities creepy. I remember arguing in a queer theory class last year that fear of the anonymous online identity is ultimately fear of the virtual closet - like the anxieties about the closeted homosexual, anxieties about online acquaintances ultimate lie in the suspicion that they are sexual predators. There is no way to verify "real" sex or age of the person behind the avatar or screenname, and this makes people uneasy. The article that Toby just posted is a perfect example of this: King of the World does not want people crossdressing online.

If you follow the other link in that article about the disbanded ERP WoW guild, you'll see that they have similar trouble with sexual content on their servers. Blizzard also has no good way to stop the activity, because the guild appears to be reforming itself over and over.

A lot of people would argue that a unified online identity is really the only way to keep us safe from all the perverts out there, since it would hold people accountable for their activities online. This could very well be the case.