We discussed some reasons of obsession with online communities, for example, playing online games and finding new friends on the internet after the presentation. We believe that everyone has one or more than one ideal image of ourselves and our fantasies can also be achieved by establishing a virtual identity. These fantasies can be accomplished by those characters in online games, for instance, you could be a magician, dealing with evil by witchcraft; or became a king who fought for honor and territories, which is unable to achieve in the reality but it is a supplement to our dream and illusion. The options of meeting some new friends on the internet and telling them about your secrets are also understandable. Sometimes, you may feel safe and relief by sharing your secrets with strangers as they have no reasons to expose your thoughts and they won’t judge you like what your real friends may do. Therefore, we think online communities are attractive, and even addictive because of the reasons above as well as the theories of scholars which we had illustrated during the presentation.
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From Gigi and Joanne's presentation on the issue of online community, it is interesting to see that they use a series of case studies such as cyber dating and net friends to illustrate the notion of virtual identities on cyberspace. Cyberspace not only provides a platform to people for people meeting new friends but also constructs a fantasy by using virtual reality, which leads to the popularity of cyber love. However, as virtual identities can be constructed according to people's favor in cyberspace, alarms me that 'Is virtual community really purely virtual practice as in cyberspace?' For instance, a middle aged paedophile pretend to be a little young girl so as to meet other teenagers, or even the cases about sexual harassment among net friends, which is also an obstacle for people developing realtionship with others in cyberspace.
Recalling my memory of firstly having my own ICQ account proudly is during my Secondary One. At that time, I just left my primary life and miss a lot of my old schoolmates who have been in the same classroom for 6 years. I thought ICQ is really interesting at that time, and of course it helps me a lot to keep in touch with my mates. I seldom search for friendship through ICQ randomly using the search engine unless we have a little connection, e.g. we are both the members of athletic federation or Youth Center. After the ICQ century, I am rarely open my laptop without connecting my MSN Messenger.
No doubt, this kind of instant online communication really keeps everybody closer, and especially when we intend to transfer some files or images. Yet I am with your point of view is, no matter online communication or online entertainment, there are risks as it is a virtual world instead of reality. There is a hindered between one person to another person. I very much agree that this virtual sphere is full of dangerous, risks, lie and many horrible possibilities. It makes you addicted to it easily, but you may also led you on a single-way road unconsciously.
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