Virtual Worlds and Transparency
Who are you? Are you your self, sitting at the keyboard, or are ‘you’ a pixelated character running inside a computer architecture?
How on earth did we arrive at this question – it is preposterous. To suggest that a person can become a bunch of pixels, independent of the person at the keyboard is a non-statement. You ‘are’ that person behind the keyboard. Whatever identity you have split off from your real life and thrown into a pixelated character is more in need of therapy than any other part of your psyche.
Virtual worlds are fantasy worlds, or if recreation of reality, they are a way to explore outside of our physical constraints. This alone is a reason for transparency.
There may be reasons for you to want to hide your identity, some valid, but most not. Anonymity is seen as a way to do bad things without being caught. If it wasn’t, the death penalty in the US would be administered by one person, not an anonymous collection of test tubes.
People need to realise that there is no ‘Second Life’, it is all ‘life’ and the pixelated ‘selves’ will soon be called to account.
This is likely to occur for the most base of reasons, financial accountability. Some companies working in these worlds are registered, private individuals do not have to account for money they acquire through these means and are therefore tax-free income. Governments are usually stimulated into action when fiscal issues raise their heads. This will be the catalyst for verified identity cards on the Internet, prompted by virtual worlds.
Therefore, transparency will be forced upon us, if we do not put our hands up to be identified first. I encourage everyone to play fair and identify who you are, before there is a rush of ‘outing’.
This of course raises issues of security, bit that is a debate about just ‘how much’ information do you make public. Obviously you don’t want to share your daily ablutions.
