What I have learned from my Avatars (so far)

I figure the first avatar I ever had – if it can be called that – was a tiny white rectangle of light. Granted I had limited control over what I could make this little thing do – mainly move up and down on the screen and alter the speed at which it moved in a futile attempt to bounce the tinier dot of light back across the screen. But – it responded to my commands and represented me inside the TV screen. I would inhabit a host of other similarly benign images from tanks to spaceships, missile towers, aliens, and race cars – but it wasn’t until Mario that I would have a fully 2 dimensional humanoid shape to jostle around the cybersphere. Even here though, there was little choice as to look or action, but it was great leap from the tiny bar of light.

My first “fleshed” out avatar came with Dungeons and Dragons. A group of us would play once or twice a year from the early to mid 80s. Like any well-oiled orc killing machine each of us had different roles to play. My character was a thief - largely distrusted by my companions and mainly into the adventure for personal gain. I had a few secrets worked out with the dungeon master if I ever needed to double cross anyone. I skulked in the shadows as part of a larger group, but was also separate. Although we “travelled” together, I pretty much kept to myself.

My next major avi was an un-named character in the Myst franchise. This was really the first digital body that would respond to my commands to walk or run, stop, and investigate. Like most people, I assume, I made the image look quite a bit like me, only perhaps a bit more rugged – a bit more of an adventurer. But the thing with Myst is that you explore the worlds alone – combing through the ruins of a once proud civilization. This means that – like my Thief – I was really the only one who saw my avatar since there is no socialization in an abandoned culture.

Recently – in preparation for the class on Virtual Worlds – I went into World of Warcraft to get a sense of the game. Looking over all of the character choices I opted for a Female Rogue Night Elf – something about the loner quality of this character appealed to me. Plus – it came with the added bonus of invisibility. Employing the stealth feature I could creep around largely unnoticed. I played the game for about 30 hours or so – long enough that I reached quests that were becoming harder and harder to complete on my own. Once the necessity of companions arose – I was out.

Derridada was my next avatar – a work in progress that continues to slowly evolve. It is also with this character that I think I am beginning to understand the nature of digital representation. When I first entered SL I decided that I really didn’t want to have a “human” skin tone – so I opted for green – which seemed to satisfy me for a while. Then came the steampunk wardrobe, tattoos, glasses, painted nails and many of the other elements that I use to define this character. A more recent addition was the gold metallic skin – which – as I understand – reads sometimes yellow, sometimes green – depending on who is looking and what kind of monitor they have. While I see avatars that have any number of unique and complex looks, I rarely see another one that looks like mine. I like that – it sets me apart. (I discuss this in more detail in Stinalina Dreamscape’s wonderful blog on “Endless Possibilities” http://stinalinadreamscape.wordpress.com/page/3/).

And it is this idea of being set apart that caused me to review my avatar choices. Setting aside the bars of light, spaceships, cars and aliens along with the Myst critter I realize that the Thief, the Night Elf and Derridada all share two major traits – they are loners – they are outsiders. The first two deliberately creeping around the edges of their environments, and the third, Derridada – a social creature that slinks to the edge of any dance club he wanders into. He is not a “joiner,” and I find that I do not change his clothes for “theme” nights at the clubs, nor do I tend to partake of the group dances but prefer to modify my dances based on each song. So – I think it is safe to say that – with my avatars at least - I like the margins and not the center.

Hmmmm (this is the sound of me wondering about stuff) I’m concerned that without consciously thinking about these choices these avatars reveal a great deal about who I am in RL. I do not like to be the center of attention and feel much more comfortable in the shadows. This sounds even odder when I reveal that I have spent a great deal of time on stage as a performer and even in my current profession (teacher) I find that I am often in front of a crowd. But – I do have a number of techniques to deflect this position and minimize my centeredness. I must admit though, that I am surprised by this avatar revelation. I mean - they are just avatar’s right – just fictional beings put together often in haste to get on with the game at hand.

But I can see that there is more to them – quite a bit more. They are – as I have said before – highly charged semiotic images in which every little detail speaks volumes. But not just things like clothes and accessories, but the animations we choose or the way we drive these critters says something – consciously or not – about who we are. For example, I have found that in SL I really like falling and I do it every chance I get. I like the flailing, the out of control feeling and the final thud as I hit the virtual earth. This is something that I really can't experience in RL and so I am drawn to it in SL. I’m sure some shrink somewhere could sort all of this out and tell me about the need for margins and the desire to be out of control– but in the meantime I remain fascinated that these representations we build in cyberspace can actually tell us a great deal about ourselves. I can only imagine what will happen when we can fully enter these spaces with our nervous systems plugged in.