Internet Identity vs. Real Life Identity.

Recently in class we have been talking about people's online identity on social networking websites versus their identity in the real world. Today during our discussion, Joe mentioned that a person's online identity is only a fragment of their real life identity since it is impossible to fully represent yourself as a person over the internet. I stumbled upon an interesting article about a web service called rep.licants.org, which is used to enhance your virtual self. People can use this website to install a bot onto their facebook or twitter account. The bot recognizes the user's activity on other websites such as youtube and combines that with a set of keywords that the user enters in to simulate the user's activity on their facebook or twitter page. The bot posts frequent updates, adds people to the list of contacts, and even interacts with facebook friends. Here is a quote taken from the article.

"The bot does not provide a fictitious identity, but will be added to the real identity of the user to modify it at his convenience. Thus, this bot can be seen as a virtual prosthesis added to an user's account. With the aim to help him to forge a digital identity of what he would really like to be and by trying to build a 

greater social reputation for the user."

So far, feedback suggests that users are happy with the results. One user commented that the bot chose to re-connect with an old friend which the user would have never thought of doing. This lead the user to have a real conversation with the friend. Another person stated that he could not remember if some of the postings were done by him or if they were done by the bot. 

An interactive twitter post by bot,  in grey.

I find it very interesting that it is possible to install a bot to your social networking website which essentially knows your interests and acts as a prosthetic of your virtual identity. The bot interacting with humans over these social networking websites further blends together the world of humans and the world of machines. Some people do not even realize that they are in fact talking to robots.