OT Poll How much are you like your forum persona?

[TurinTurambar]

...perish the thought!!

[Arkcon]

Back in the days of pre-internet dial-up, an online service called PC-Link (it was dedicated to Tandy computers) took my given name and suggested the handle Rcon.

I thought, "thats a little lame, and need something with more style, right? Like Arcon, or Arkcon, or maybe Arkcon the All-powerful, ruler of the galaxy, supreme ...

"Beep", says online service, "You still there?"

"Umm...yeah, 'Arkcon', will work fine."

I'm actually pretty shy in a large group of people I don't know. Hard to make eye-contact, start a conversation, that sort of thing. But inside, I'm pretty much the same as my online personality.

[Puke]

Imperator Fyron said:
"forum persona?" Interesting...

from the snippets of Fyron's real life that show through on #SpaceEmpires from time to time, i'd have to say that his online personality is a strong affectation - and that this is him trying to play coy.

I answered 50/50. but i dont try to hide my real personality - i have a strange relationship with my online persona. i try to type in a casual fashion, the same way i talk. i espouse the same opinions that i have in real life, and leverage sarcasm just as often. sometimes its hard to pick up on, online. sometimes im just not as funny as i think i am.

i certainly dont speak in monologues, but the format of a web forum encourages that kind of typing. im not always as loud or as obnoxious as my internet persona. i tend to use characterizations to poke fun at people, and to poke fun at myself. hopefully no one takes it too seriously.

i dont make up nicknames for myself; as with all real nicknames, theyre given to you by other people. this one was stuck on me about 20 years ago by some people making fun of my real name. some of my friends still call me "puke" in real life. it's embossed on a piece of my luggage.

online, i present something of a characterization. but i present similar characterizations in real life. the vast majority of people i have met in the world model themselves into some sort of image. some character they present to the world and themselves. they sculpt the way they talk, dress, and act.

sure, you could say "thats just who we are, youre not fakeing it if thats the real you." and maybe thats so. but how much of the real us is just an affectation?

I think this is a really insightfull poll, and deserves to be thought about. or maybe im just an overly analytical drunk. or the characterization of one.

[Atrocities]

I really am a depressed overweight single white male who lives in isolation, in "compound" filled with computers, guns, quads, and the occational horse, cat, dog, and unidentified varment!

[Puke]

aren't the guns supposed to trump the varments? i mean, thats what a varmint rifle is FOR, right?

[David E. Gervais]

What you see is what you get, I have no cellar to hide in or curtain to hide behind. I have no gun, I do have a mug which is almost similar in a dislexic kind of way. I like to drink tea and often eat, hmm, another dislexic paradox?

Oh well, Cheers!

[Thermodyne]

Atrocities said:
I really am a depressed overweight single white male who lives in isolation, in "compound" filled with computers, guns, quads, and the occational horse, cat, dog, and unidentified varment!

Cool

Can I come and visit? I�ll leave the wife behind and bring my own firearms, ammo, and computer.

[Starhawk]

Well in RL I'm pretty quiet and calm which helps me a lot since I like screwing with people's heads during debates (keeping someone off balance in a debate is so much easier when you can keep your VOICE calm level and emotionless)>

Some of my RL personality comes in obviously, like my sense of humor (which is actually a bit more sublime and wry I know, at least when I'm not being an all out smart alec or quoting monty python ).

I am NO good with women (they think I'm charming and sweet and blah blah blah but they tend to think of my like a brother or I don't pick up on their signals till it's too late and then I kick myself lol) so that ackward point of my personality chimes through on these forums too. Kicker there is I'm a very empathetic person by my nature so I fit the "sensative tough guy" quality quite well. But I'm not enough of an *** for teenage girls aparently lol all the ones I know tend to date "Bad boys" which are really milk sops who would cry if you mussed their $200 clothes lol (don't ask me how I know that )

I have a rather deep reflective personality in private which none of you get to see , sometimes this part of my personality does lend its self to depression or antagonistic moods but meh.

I read people VERY well and can tell you in five minutes of meeting someone if I am going to like them or not (and often if they are a good person or not) and am more then ninety percent right.
Best example is one of those "bad boys" a girl I wanted was dating I told her "He'll be in jail before the year is out I bet yah." Four months later he's in the pokey (probobly getting pok-ed by the real bad boys muahahahaha cough).

Oh yeah and did I mention I'm a bit cruel towards people I don't like

Let's see hmmmmmmm.....what else about my personality is not something any of you see......oh yeah I get FREAKIN STIR CRAZY EASILY! I mean very easily. if I don't get to go to kung fu or get out of the house for a whole week you'll usually find me pinging off the walls and not sleeping at all.

That's about it

[Kevin Arisa]

I'm mostly an observer and usually have to force myself to make comments. When I do post, I tend to carefully phrase things to avoid misunderstandings. I do the same thing when I talk to people. Without even noticing, it can take me 15 minutes to settle on the wording of a single post. I avoid posting altogether when I'm down because I sometimes act like a totally different person and end up regretting my words later. So in general, what you read is all me, but I unwittingly censor myself.

[AgentZero]

Well, I put in 50/50, which isn't really accurate, since I'm pretty much me on these forums, but I do tend to shave off the more extreme aspects of my personality. Hmmmm.... That didn't sound quite right. Sounds like I have an Xtreme!(TM) personality. Not quite what I meant. But I am a bit rough round the edges in real life and for people who don't know me too well I can come off as well... an angry, hate-filled, racist, sexist, chauvenistic, arrogant, self-centred, cocky son-of-a-b***.

Which I'm not.

I'm a really friendly, easy-going, empathetic sorta guy, I just have an screwed up way of expressing my empathetic, easy-going friendliness. And it's not one of those "don't know how to express myself" thing, I just don't express myself in a typical sort of way.

Like if one of my female flatmates is crying over one thing or another, I'd say something like, "Ah, would ya shut the f*** up, ya big eejit", or "Jasus, f*** off would ya? I'm not in the humour." OK, so not exactly the nicest thing to say, but since they know me & know I care, it makes them laugh, and then they can talk about it properly.

Oh, and I curse a LOT. But every profanity is carefully considered to have the proper effect, and is used for colour, rather to offend, or to use them simply to use them. When I left my last job, there were a load of people who said they were really going to miss calling me for the way I used to curse over the phone.

And when I get riled in real life I tend to shoot first and shoot more later, while the medium of the forum allows me to cool off and consider my response. Otherwise I'd probably have been banned from the forum for language alone by now.

So yeah. Who I am on the forum is more or less me but with the rough (read: offensive) edges filled off for public consumption.