Enhanced Reality: If we choose to look as distant and objective as we can, wearing the uniform of the historian of the future, the era and the society in which we live - in the broadest sense and without geographical restrictions - I think we will agree that we will be the subject of study for the next generations 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
Θεωρώ πως η μεγάλη διαφορά συγκριτικά με τους άλλους σταθμούς στον ιστορικό χάρτη του διπόλου Ανθρωπος-Μέσα, είναι πως τώρα είναι η πρώτη φορά που ο κόσμος των Μέσων δεν συμβαδίζει παράλληλα με την πραγματικότητα αλλά έχει γίνει η ίδια η πραγματικότητα μας. Πια δεν ζούμε two ζωές: μια offline και μια online. Ζούμε ένα κράμα των 2 όπου οι ταυτότητες μας, τα επαγγέλματα μας, οι φιλίες μας, η ενημέρωση, η ίδια η πραγματικότητα κινούνται πάνω σε μια και μόνο γραμμή. Μια γραμμή φτιαγμένη τόσο απο φυσικά όσο και απο ψηφιακά στοιχεία. Θα την ονομάσω, αυθαίρετα, 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 in live time comments for the show on twitter or shopping at the supermarket and scanning the code of a product 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
Κατά τη διάρκεια της ραγδαίας ανάπτυξης του ίντερνετ και των κοινωνικών δικτύων, επικράτησε η άποψη ότι είναι η πρώτη που φορά που λαμβάνει χώρα ένας τόσο φανερός εκδημοκρατισμός στα μέσα έκφρασης για το μέσο χρήστη. Το λάθος έγκειται στο ότι μπερδέψαμε την δυνατότητα έκφρασης με την δυνατότητα δημοσιοποίησης της. Θεωρήσαμε ότι επειδή τα γραπτά μας και οι φωτογραφίες μας μπορούσαν δυνητικά να φτάσουν στις displays hundreds of thousands of people, 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, that is, what we create and how we communicate it, the material and the general context pre-exist by defining and limiting to a great extent what we will share with other users. Algorithms have created a newsfeed based on their own parameters, photo filters have been selected based on their impact, trending topics lead you to comment, emoticons push you to give a psychological background to your writing and of course The social media themselves know before you who you should address, reminding you "do you want to tag your friend 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 went to the stage of self brand where each of us managed his digital self as a business by choosing the space that will be "active" eg sports, politics, arts (strategy), what to communicate (marketing) and how to communicate with them 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 a reinforced reality was something inevitable since technology became an integral part of our everyday life. Even if today, some are reluctant or unconvinced about the existence of this reinforced reality, the only certainty is that in the coming years this will be uncontested but perhaps outdated in the face of the development of new phenomena even stronger in terms of creating personal confusion. The development of virtual reality applications is certainly such a phenomenon.
Related links: Marginal Utility Blog
Huffington Post
