When I moved in...

When my cousin sat me down in front of my computer last year and stood over my shoulder until I signed onto her new boyfriend, myspace, it was my first experience in creating an online persona. I wasn't sure what to do, where to begin, or where to end. I couldn't believe that I was expected to display all this information that usually only my friends would know. My birthday, hometown, education, occupation, even my height! LoL. My initial profile didn't have pictures, top friends, or even a background. But, as a few weeks passed, people I knew from elementary school, middle school, and high school that I hadn't seen in years began sending me friend requests. I thought this was cool, and it lured me in a bit more. Then I discovered uploading pics, videos, and posting little notes and comments on my boyfriend's profile at the time for EVERYONE to see. I don't know what got me, but within months I was on myspace everyday, checking others peoples profiles and updating mine. I'm not sure how to explain what it means to be a virtual entity so I looked up the meaning of entity to give myself a more precise understanding of what I should be talking about. Entity means a thing with distinct and independent existence. I think being a virtual entity is different than just simply "being". Virtually, I can be who I WANT TO BE. I present to others who I want them to believe I am. I control what they know about me. It's almost like creating your own world and deciding what, and whom you want in it. I think being part of a "global community" gives me a different sense of who I am and what I know about myself. As I became more and more into this "global community", I realized that I took a lot of time to figure out exactly what I wanted to portray about myself, when I would do it, and how. Everything would be on my terms. I didn't simply say "here world, this is who I am". Instead it was more along the lines of "hello world, this is who you're going to think I am". I became somewhat imbedded in this lifestyle and have come to realize that this new community is like a 2nd world, just more interesting than that of the real one.