The Age of Anonymity in Mobile
LinkedIn › Dil-Domine Jacobe Leonares
We’re seeing a point where digital identity is important to people, businesses and the way we transact with each other online. But is it hurting or helping us? When the social web started, we had handles and we were identified not by our real names. I remember a couple of handles I use to go by when I was young; BuckleyKid67, citizenglish and B3LHE1R.
We use to sit in chat rooms and talk to people not based on how they looked but just by sharing a common interest at that point in time.
Remember A/S/L? We’d jump in a chat room asking for age, sex and location — now we can go online see the person by their photos, know their full name and even see where they have been in the last hour.
While social identity based profiles are great, we’re starting to see a negative effect on our society and culture. We’re curating how we look in front of the whole world. Instead of just being real, the words we say, the actions we do — our thoughts are curated to make us sound like gods on Olympus. We’re in the spotlight 24/7 and the world needs to see how important we are, how much life is so great (or not) and the fact that we’re living life to the fullest.