Is your avatar an alter ego or just an extension of your RL version?

I am in SL what I am in RL. Didn't plan it, just the way it is. My alt....when she's set up....will probably be my alter ego. An alter ego is still who we are in RL though, just taking one side of yourself and indulging strictly in that side. At least that's how I view it.

I've often said my avatar is me, only more so. I suppose that means 'just an extension' of the RL me. I'm not as forward or daring in RL - very shy in fact, so SL gives me a chance to try some things I might not do for real. I'm not really much like Kelli, looks-wise, although I'd really like to be.

Grace's player speaking here...

Grace is a lot like me and even has some of the same RL friends as me. Looks-wise she is *much* sexier. She does do a lot of things I'd never do in RL, or could not do in RL (such as shape shift and become a fox, deer, etc.)

I played Grace for more than a year before I created an alt. This alt is also female and a shape shifter. She does things and goes places that even Grace is too shy to do.

So my AVs are both extensions of me, and alter egos.

just me both here and there

My avatar is me, in personality. I can't help it - she just is. Maybe SL is too real or engaging for me to behave differently there from how I behave in RL.

In looks, my avatar is also me, only bluer. Well, and she's somewhat trimmer too - my avatar is hardly a stick figure or a Barbie doll but she is pretty much my personal ideal shape, if I could lose a little weight and get my ass to the gym more often. I didn't set out to make her that way but just to make her a shape that I felt comfortable in and also felt was attractive.

My alt is supposed to be different from me, but she's not, really. She's more (for lack of a better term) butch than Madhu, but that's maybe just an expression of another aspect of my personality. She's taller, tends to wear men's clothes (she's been looking particularly smashing in a tuxedo lately) and is not blue. I haven't played her much except to test things that I've made as Madhu, so perhaps her personality isn't fully developed yet.

My avie looks nothing like me at all. In fact, Sunni likes to change her look quite often. Not from human form, but the skin, hair and eye color. I enjoy experimenting with different looks that way. However, personality-wise, she is me. I tried to be different, but just didn't feel as comfortable. I'm a very open-minded person in RL...so is Sunni. I'm very friendly and just enjoy people in RL, Sunni is the same. I really tried to bring out a sexier, edgier, darker side, and even created an alt. However, they're both just me in personality. Guess I'm just boring that way....lol.

that was my original intention, to create someone who was the total opposite of my RL self, but gradually, the difference between the RL me and the SL me became less and less 'different'. So now I think I've become just as 'conservative' in SL as in RL.....or in other words...bloody boring

As far as appearance goes, again, I gradually shifted from looking completely insane to looking more and more like my RL self, well except for the fact that I'm a little taller in SL, and by SL standards, I'm a shortie!!!!

Maybe I should go back to pole-dancing!

I'd say exactly the same in SL but that's not quite true, I think twice what I say here most of the time (except when something bad has gotten under my skin probably - or more likely someone toxic).

So ... same contents, better packaging.

I considered making Orfeu, identical to his typist in SL, but hit a few problems.

It is quite hard to find basements to live in SL.

Also quite tricky to find a 400 pounds Avatar, who has only a tenuous hold on sanity.

So, instead I made him a straight-backed font of wit and eruditon.

Seriously though, when the day arrives, that Orfeu can sit at a piano in SL, and REALLY play the music that is in my mind, you will find me screaming dementedly at my monitor........

" Live my creature.....LIVE !!!!!!!..."

Cue......thunder and Lightning........angry torch wielding villagers............etc, etc

I suppose it depends on what people join SL for and expect to get out of it. If you come here to meet up with people you know in RL, or if you hope to meet new people who's RL's you might want meet one day, then you might decide to be a 'discloser'. That's probably true also if you're here for deep and meaningful in-world relationships.

I came here and stay here as a free spirit, immersing myself in building, exploring, partying and fun. I've never sought deep involvement and the ethos of the Egotherapy group is that we take avatars at face value. That way SL becomes 'real' to me. I'm just uncomplicated.

If sl is an extension of yourself or an alter-ego what does it say about guys who run female avs? You know what they say....you are who you hang out with. You are what you eat. You are who you pretend to be.

Shame, shame.

As I was saying.

I think I have a superego problem. I can't be anyone but to at least in a large degree, myself. This is true even about text-based intensive roleplaying games.... I just can't get out of my mold and be someone else! AGGH!

Um......Ok.

Is your avatar an alter ego or just an extension of your RL version?

good question. i always did wonder ..

am i an alter ego of my main or just an extension of him?

I hardly identify with my avie as being an extension of me, outside of the fact I need some form of representation to facilitate communication with others in a 3d environment.

My avatar is generally nothing more than a useful focus point for others, so they get some feedback when i'm talking etc. My chat/IMs etc. is purely me.

When i'm alone building, scripting etc., I generally don't even know where my avie is. In those situations I basically consider the avie as a mostly useless part of the scenery.

But to be honest, i haven't been using SL as a world in a while now. More as a combination of a message client, 3d building tool and dev. environment. None of those requires an actual avie.

I seriously need new shoes though... and new hair.

During my continuing quest to find out of the way clubs in SL, I landed in a warehouse industrial type dance club - you know, all concrete and rusty metal kind of thing. Actually it was quite busy so I danced and chatted with the other clubbers.

They got talking about this RL / SL interface thing and the general opinion was that people should be who they are in real life, or at least should be of the same gender.
Most of these people were fairly new to SL. I upped the stakes by asking what people thought about those who have more than one account. 'Now that really IS creepy' paraphrases the general reaction!

I thought it best not to ask about married couples I've come across who I wonder might actually both be alts of one RL! After all, most of the punters at this club were British and we're not renowned for our sense of imagination!

Exactly! Me too. I think it's the knowledge that there are real people behind the other avatars, makes me behave no differently than in real life.

To answer the original question, is your avatar an alter ego, I would respond, "Which one?" Certainly Weston is an extension of the guy at the keyboard. My alt, not surprisingly, is an alter ego, or rather another facet of the guy at the keyboard.

The weird thing is, my alt looks kind of young but wise, like a cross between a professorial sage and an indie musician. But no matter what I do to my primary, Weston, he remains a little geeky and awkward in human form. I must perceive myself that way in RL.

Proof that SL is moving away from the Fantasy/Playground and closer to the Real Life /3d Myspace.

This is the great coming division in SL, the possible civil war that could break out.

Xio used to be more of an actual avatar of my "ideal self", and evolved over time into an extreme caricature of the real me...then to just a "puppet"/action figure or whatever now. He's just an avatar in the literal sense, my "hands" in SL...just a toy.

When I sell or go to certain Discussion Events whatever, I "dress him up" differently, since I know so many people have more of a real first impression of an avatar that sticks with them.

Yup, I was correct in thinking I wouldn't see any posts from these guys who run female avs although there are plenty of them around. Don't hide now, you don't hide when you're using them in sl or other games but especially in sl where sex and sexual things are so common. Oh, maybe you want to stay hidden in the 'closet' so those you've fooled won't know it's really you, a male behind them. I understand.

Come now. Nothing to say about your female avs? Are they not your alter-egos? An extension of yourselves? Or are they just your alter-egos and an extension of yourselves just when they're your same sex?

So funny.

I'm an extension of my RL self in my RL self's height, mannerism, creativity and personality wise.
While sometimes I wish to be someone else, I am not a good actor oops I said before I was...grr sorry unrezzed.

Why stop there? Let's get everyone to list the names of their alts, plus tell us how old they are in RL compared to SL. Guys, that sexy young woman on the pink poseball in front of you might indeed be a female in RL too, but she might not be young or sexy!!! Also perhaps we should all know how many L$ everyone has in their accounts. Contents of inventories, of course, should also be public knowledge.

It surprises me how many people, even some who've been here a long time, just don't get Second Life at all. I never disclose my RL's details on principle. I get propositioned by males quite a lot (and occasionally by females) and am quite skilled at diplomatically fending off amourous overtures. If I have sex in SL it happens offline so nobody sees it LOL.

And why, I wonder, do so many male avatars have long hair? I'm not complaining, I like long hair on men, but the proportion in SL is a lot more that in RL. Any explanations?

I am an avatar. I live in SL and have never been to RL. I suppose you could say that I am an alter ego of the human who created me. I have a distinct indentity from my RL human, but at the same time I am not completely different from or unrelated to that human.