Enhanced Reality: If we choose to look as distantly and objectively as we can, wearing the costume of the history of the future, the age and the society in which we live - in the broadest sense and without geographical constraints - I think we will agree that we will be studying for the next generation in terms of the relationship we have developed with social media.
As we are now studying the relationship between Human and TV and the way our Internet has changed before 15-20 years, we will be the subject of our study of how we have incorporated social media into our everyday life.
(In case anyone doubts the importance of social media, they can take a look at this research which shows how many hours we spend every day using them, their impact on all countries, their growth rate and many other elements)
The Theory of Enhanced Reality
I think the big difference compared to the other stations in the historical map of the man-mesa is that it is now the first time the media world does not go along with reality but has become our own reality. We no longer live two lives: one offline and one online. We live an alloy of 2 where our identities, our professions, our friendships, the information, the reality itself move on a single line. A line made from both natural and digital elements. I will name it, arbitrarily, strengthened reality (enhanced reality).
As this brilliantly worded comment on Reddit shows, we don't surf the internet anymore. We are in it all day, every day in one way or another. We may be walking down the street but have the geolocation of a dating app turned on, be in the theater and read live comments about the show on twitter, or shop at the supermarket and scan a product code with our mobile phone to see how much it costs online.
This new, reinforced reality in which we operate brings about hundreds of changes that cover a wide range of our daily lives from our personal relationships to building our own character. In the following paragraphs, I will try to focus on the part of our personal identity and how it is shaped in the context of the enhanced reality.
The Theory of Two Self
If one looks at academic publications that analyze the average user of digital social networks on an anthropological and psychological level, one will come across references to the "struggle" of the two selves, the analog and the digital, the difference in expression of the two, the usually diametrically opposite character and of course the reasonable question of what is the true character of the user. The one in the "normal" world or in the digital? The most recent studies even talked about the term digital divinity (digital dualism) that interpreted the confusion of the boundaries of these two identities, which many times entered one into the fields of the other. A typical example is the habit of twitter users being recommended using their twitter name in specific social situations while in others with their real name.
The Transition to a Psychedelic Identity
So, human nature, in combination with the evolution of technology, has turned into the above-mentioned theories as the rules changed. In the reinforced reality we do not have 2 ourselves but one based on an identity, pulp (an equally arbitrary term derived from the word phygital). Pulsed identity gathers features and elements that are, for the time being, strange and foreign as we have not met them again in the past.
I will categorize the elements of our new self in 3 larger teams. The Area, Data and Identity. That is, what material we share, how we process and interpret and who really belongs to it.
The Preparation of the Content for Us Without Us
During the rapid development of the Internet and social networks, it is believed that this is the first time that such an overt democratization of media for the average user has taken place. The mistake lies in the fact that we confused the possibility of expression with the possibility of making it public. We felt that because our writings and the photos we could potentially reach the screens of hundreds of thousands of people, while we also had hundreds of thousands of ways to express ourselves. Which of course is not the case.
So in the part of the content, i.e. what we create and how we communicate it, the material and the general context pre-exist defining and limiting to a very large extent what we will share with other users. Algorithms have created a newsfeed based on their own parameters, filters on photos have been selected based on their appeal, trending topics σε οδηγούν στο τι να σχολιάσεις, τα emoticons σε σπρώχνουν στο να δώσεις ενα ψυχολογικό υπόβαθρο στα γραπτά σου και φυσικά τα ίδια τα κοινωνικά μέσα ξέρουν πριν από σένα σε ποιον πρέπει να απευθυνθείς θυμίζοντας σου “do you want to tag your courier here?” or “why dont you congratulate your friend for his new job?”
Our Identity is Measurable
The next important feature we encounter in mapping our new selves is the role of numerical data in everyone's attempt to create an identity. All social media "characterize" their users based on quantitative rather than qualitative data. In the new era, you are defined based on the number of followers you have, the likes that your photos collect and your klout. Only by maximizing this data do you grow as a person.
In recent decades, the way man defined himself came mainly from the purchase of products through which he acquired a specific identity. Then it passed to the stage of the self brand where each of us managed his digital self like a business by choosing the area to be "active" e.g. sports, politics, arts (strategy), what to communicate (marketing) and the way to communicate with the others (customer service).
Now, the average user of social networks has gone to a next stage. From a brand switches to an easy-to-digest (meme generator). In reinforced reality, it is important how many times the material you postulate is relayed, which rarely has almost never been produced by you. We act as hunting dogs looking for interesting secondary material that will bring us very high numbers through which we will gain social recognition.
Typically, Stanford University recently published one research which studies the role of each user in spreading information until it reaches the level to be considered viral.
Lack of Ownership
Finally, our new self is not defined in terms of ownership and personal possession. Our new self does not belong to us anymore. All our personal information, from the most insignificant to the most important, is registered in this impersonal network called the Internet. The most interesting element in the topic of privacy on the Internet is the desire of the user himself to make public even information that he is not even asked for.
Now, our memory and our experiences have much less power than the storage capabilities of social networks. When we want to look back, we consult the profilefefe of our profile rather than our own memory or a possible conversation with a friend. It is no coincidence that at the end of each year all social media offers us the opportunity to "remember our actions" through short videos.
Impersonal algorithms know ourselves better than us. Once we've been handed over to them all of our personal information, they're the ones who suggest us who should be our next facebook friend, which book to buy and what music to listen to.
The next step
The mixing of these 2 worlds and the logical creation of an augmented reality was something inevitable from the moment technology became an integral part of our everyday life. Even if today, some are hesitant or are not convinced of the existence of this enhanced reality, the only thing that is certain is that in the coming years something like this will be indisputable but perhaps obsolete in the face of the development of new phenomena even more powerful in terms of creating personal of confusion. The development of virtual reality applications (Interactive reality) is definitely such a phenomenon.
Related links: Marginal Utility Blog
Huffington Post
