We grew up on IRC. To us, it's "easier" to communicate, meet people, and then get to know them through that specific medium than most others. We've always thought that it is mostly due to familiarity with how everything works, but we've been learning this year that a lot more of the reason is because we don't have to let people know that there are things wrong with us that cause issues. Of course, once we do get to know people (or a specific 'place' online) we usually open up more.
Offline in general we have frequent moments of "must run, must hide" that we can't seem to avoid. They hit us especially when dealing with either very uncomfortable or very comfortable but new situations. Freaking out and hiding on the stairs is usually somewhere on the list of things that happen when we're actually starting to get comfortable with someone. Online we can hide that much more easily, at least until we feel ready for people to know.
When it comes to gaming we have always leaned towards the activities that we can do alone while still exploring the virtual worlds others put so much work into. We are very bad at playing games with people we don't know, and almost as bad playing them with people we do know, but who have already been there/done that. At times playing WoW we've felt like we're on some sort of guided tour, which makes us become quickly uninterested.
SL's primary function to us seems to be either a chat room where you can show off your art skills (or your taste in clothes/avatars/etc), or an art gallery where you have to deal with other people trying to talk to you. Neither appeals overly much to us, so we have stayed away almost all the time. MUCKs and such for us end up being places we can only handle wandering around exploring on our own and playing with the various scripted toys or, when we're in a really rare mental state, somewhere to do kinky stuff via text that isn't even possible offline. Then it just turns into IRC with a much more cumbersome client, though.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2009-09-13 04:45 pm (UTC)Offline in general we have frequent moments of "must run, must hide" that we can't seem to avoid. They hit us especially when dealing with either very uncomfortable or very comfortable but new situations. Freaking out and hiding on the stairs is usually somewhere on the list of things that happen when we're actually starting to get comfortable with someone. Online we can hide that much more easily, at least until we feel ready for people to know.
When it comes to gaming we have always leaned towards the activities that we can do alone while still exploring the virtual worlds others put so much work into. We are very bad at playing games with people we don't know, and almost as bad playing them with people we do know, but who have already been there/done that. At times playing WoW we've felt like we're on some sort of guided tour, which makes us become quickly uninterested.
SL's primary function to us seems to be either a chat room where you can show off your art skills (or your taste in clothes/avatars/etc), or an art gallery where you have to deal with other people trying to talk to you. Neither appeals overly much to us, so we have stayed away almost all the time. MUCKs and such for us end up being places we can only handle wandering around exploring on our own and playing with the various scripted toys or, when we're in a really rare mental state, somewhere to do kinky stuff via text that isn't even possible offline. Then it just turns into IRC with a much more cumbersome client, though.