I figured it's best to start precedences as early as possible and thought I'd end my first week with a somewhat off topic post. Do you keep separate accounts for your "real" self and your gaming self? I'll admit right here, right now that I do. I would hope nobody's mother would name them Maruka, heheh. But why? I do so for several reasons. Allow me to explain.
For one reason, I do my very best to keep my kids' online identities private. I'm careful about where I post their pictures and mention their names. I don't like it when other people post their pictures or mention their names online. There are too many predators out there. I want to make connections with other gamers and bloggers, but if I've never met you in person and in real life, then you don't get to know who my kids are.
Secondly, professionally, it's best to keep those two parts of my life separate because so many people are judgmental about gamers. Do they have the right to be? No. But that's the case and there isn't much I can do to change it. I don't want to lose potential income because of a leisurely pastime.
Thirdly, and this goes with secondly, I don't like dealing with the stigma that comes with being a gamer. My husband and I don't tell too many people that we play WoW. It's really nobody's business what we do with our free time as long as it's legal and we aren't neglecting our kids. But still. There it is.
This has resulted in my having multiple Twitter accounts, e-mail accounts, and G+ accounts. I've debated setting up a Facebook for Maruka but have yet to do so. I don't know if I can manage all that and actually make use of it. Does it bug me? Not all that much. It's kinda nice keeping things organized in that way. It really irritates me when I accidentally tweet something to the wrong account though.
What's your take? Am I too obsessive about this or am I not alone with juggling multiple personalities??
Oh yes, there are definitely more than one of me. Three gmail accounts for personal me, professional me and gaming me. Two active twitters with a third one dying. Plus three times facebook, one of them owned by my cat. I am not planning on interacting on facebook around gaming. That's what we have our blogs for. I may have to use it eventually, since some games almost require a facebook account (The Secret World)
ReplyDeleteFeliz,
DeleteYou sound like me. Thank goodness for things like Tweetdeck and Hootsuite, right? Your cat has a Facebook??? I guess if your cat is anything like mine, they run the house. Why not have a Facebook account to brag about it, lol.
I have multiple too, simply because in my professional and personal lives, gaming is something negative, something you never admit to doing in polite company.
ReplyDeleteMy mother thinks that only wastrels and serial killers play computer games and my boss thinks that I spend every hour either working or dreaming about work :p
Whilst people are so negative about gaming in general, I think keeping everything separate is the way to go. Plus I never ever want a scenario where my mother can do things like post baby pictures in a place where all my friends and colleagues can see them (happened to co-worker a few weeks ago).
It's been my experience that people, and especially mothers, believe that if you play computer games at all that you MUST be addicted to them. My husband and I both believe that there are much worse ways that we could be spending our time. Ya know?
DeleteHonestly when I first started blogging, I tried really hard to obfuscate Belghast from "Me". Mostly this was due to some bad experiences early on Facebook. Lately however, I really don't try and hide it too much. I am ultimately the same person, whether I am wearing the "Belghast" persona, or if I am meeting you face to face. I just do my best to keep my full name from being publicly searchable. I abbreviate my last name on Google+ for example, so that I can follow their real names only rule, but still keep a little privacy.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't necessarily say that I'm different when I'm blogging/Tweeting as Maruka vs my real self. I hear my "voice" in both scenarios. I think it's smart to keep your full name from being public as much as possible online. I tend to get lax about it myself. ;)
DeleteI definitely keep a separate gaming persona, including a separate blog address and email.
ReplyDeleteYup. As a gaming blogger, I have my own email, Twitter account, and blog address.
DeleteI'm the same as you - multiple online IDs to keep RL & non-RL apart. Hell, even the RL stuff isn't entirely tied to me as I don't use my RL name.
ReplyDeleteI've tried blending the two but it never feels right for me. I game to allow a part of me to live a life the real me can never live and to then tie that back to the the real me seems somehow self-defeating.
Yeah. There was a time when I was had multiple work clients and I was dealing with their email, email that I got because of them, my own personal email, and my separate work email. I had a Blackberry at the time that just..wouldn't...shut...the eff up with incoming message alerts.
DeleteGaming is def a way to take a step back from all that weekly bull.
God yes! I have dropped my work email onto my phone too - it's a real mixed blessing and one I haven't quite made my mind up about yet.
DeleteI am always saddened to hear that people are still forced to hide their gaming passion - nobody should have to fear social or professional backlash for their hobbies and interests. alas, there still exist many social bias against gamers, depending where you live or what you work....I hope one day soon this can be a thing of the past for us all.
ReplyDeletealso, a warm welcome to the blogosphere from me :) /wave
Thanks for the welcome Syl.
DeleteI've been "in the closet" so to speak about gaming for years. I actually *do* tell people that I play video games but I never specify which ones. I think they mostly believe I play Pogo online or something similar. It is sad that there is such a stigma attached to video games. People can play sports until their heads blow up and have millions of fans and millions of dollars doing it, but sitting down for a couple of hours to play video games means you're a lifeless nerd. It isn't fair but I'm not out to change the world, ya know? Just trying to find ways to live within it. ;)
I'm a hermit IRL and in my games. Though the main reason I use a separate email for my gaming accounts is to easily weed out phishing mails (since they end up in my 'used for everything else' email which makes them obvious).
ReplyDeleteMy husband blabs real life stuff to his ingame friends all the time (and tends to get lots of real life stuff shared by other people in return), but I like to keep my game lives in the game and keep my real life out of them.
My husband and I are both of the same mind when it comes to keeping game vs real life separate. He works with lots of people that play MMOs and he still doesn't talk about it himself at work.
DeleteI actually don't hide my gaming or nerd things. I guess because I can't. It sticks out like a sore thumb, and I don't really mind so much because I think people know me for being a bit quirky like that. I can understand though, if others don't want to share it. I think for me, my brain is too small to be able to cope with too many personas... hence why I only have one toon that I play etc. It's too hard to wear different hats.
ReplyDeleteOne toon?!?!! I can't imagine. ;)
DeleteHm, maybe my comment got eaten.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the blogosphere! This was a great post so I linked it. I too keep my private life out of my wow blog but my real life I talk all about wow! LOL! I don't have any pics of myself on my blog and I don't have Facebook so you can see I don't like pics of myself on the net either.
It didn't get eaten. It just got lost in my moderation folder. Not sure why I don't get email notifications about those comments. I also neglected this blog for months, lol. I kinda ran out of ideas. :(
DeleteThanks so much for stopping by and for both comments though.