Talk:Online identity

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Dtross165.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 05:42, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

To Do
-- Bryan 21:34, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
 * References
 * External links


 * References are complete, External links are there, but there isn't that many. Formerly Codename Colorado | The Earwig (User 17:46, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

General Cleanup
This page needs a general cleanup of references style, grammar and typos, and soforth. I'll try to do some work on it in the near future if I can find some more free time. I also think some of the information presented here could be moved to other pages.

--Jonas 21:02, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Added reorganize and tone tags, and working on the copy-edit of the long-backdated sexuality section now.--Samy85 (talk) 08:44, 25 June 2008 (UTC)


 * More work on cleanup, combined Internal links, External links, and Further reading into one section called "See also", as each section was taking up so much space in the article. Honestly, this article is a huge disaster: it's large, and it has so many problems. Any ideas on how we can combine the Further reading into the References? Formerly Codename Colorado | The Earwig (User 17:46, 4 July 2008 (UTC)


 * The part about identity on MySpace and Facebook really needs help. For one, I'm confused as to why they're under the section on blogs.  MySpace and Facebook are not blogs, they're social networking sites.  Also, I was looking for the section to mention the article by danah boyd about the class divisions on Facebook and MySpace, or about how concealing one's identity is different on the two sites (much easier to do on MySpace).  But instead, it just looked like a teenager's rant about how they felt about the sites.  I'm not sure how to clean up the section, but it obviously needs it desperately.  Beggarsbanquet (talk) 06:35, 14 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Cleaned up a few references. I cannot find some of the referenced books/papers in the sexuality section, so I have contacted the claimed authors to help determine if the citations are real or not. --Ace Jon (talk) 10:07, 15 March 2012 (UTC)


 * I have started a first round of reorganizations of the content, and added a little bit of content and references. However, I believe that some parts are too long, and should be moved in a separate page. --Nabeth (talk) 19:28, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

U.S. National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace
The U.S. government is starting to look into ways of allowing people to verify their real-life identities on the internet in various ways, with a White House announcement 25 June 2010. Looks like this page hasn't been updated to reflect this... I'll try to get around to it but I'm not up on this issue... II | (t - c) 01:57, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

The Other Side of Predation?
Is it possible to include, as well as predators posing as youngsters, youngsters who present themselves as much older than they are? This can cause problems for quite innocent people when they discover that the 'adult' with whom they have been flirting online turns out to be a youngster, particularly if they arrange to meet (ThatPeskyCommoner (talk) 07:57, 18 February 2011 (UTC))

Online/Internet/Digital Identity Articles
I have noticed, that there is an article called Internet Identity. I think that the terms internet and online identity are pretty much the same, and they both are a form of Digital Identity. Could these pages perhaps somehow be more closely linked/ related? There is also a suggestion to merge Online Identity with Digital Identity on the Internet Identity page. Seems a bit confusing to me. Bettinusz (talk) 19:49, 14 March 2012 (UTC)


 * It seems Digital Identity refers to users in a technical/security sense, whereas Online Identity refers to the sociology of the Internet. Should this be explained on each page? --Ace Jon (talk) 09:20, 15 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Yes, it seems so, but I haven't found any sources to support that separation of terms, they both refer to a wider range of notions and studies and can be looked at from sociological, philosophical etc points of view. The online identity page seems to cover that, but the digital identity page is quite narrow on the subject. Also it has been suggested to make the relationship between the two more clear in the introduction of the article. Bettinusz (talk) 10:22, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Sexuality and online identity
The claims in this paragraph are not cited, having been not cited for over two years. The paragraph shows original research and seems biased. The paragraph states that "Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games) as typified by games such as Final Fantasy XI, World of Warcraft or Second Life where there is abundant opportunity to redefine sexual and gender identity and where a large portion of interaction is dedicated to the building of relationships." I have played World of Warcraft and the topic of "sexual and gender identity" never comes up, and those who try to use the site as a way to create sexual relationships are frowned upon and stand a good chance of getting banned from the network. I have deleted this paragraph and until a reliable source is introduced do not revert it.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by TMBTC (talk • contribs) 01:58, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Connections to William Gibson
Much of the language in this article appears verbatim in the "Gender-baiting" section (pg 149) of this Google "book" titled William Gibson. Reviewers say the book was copied from Wikipedia (and other) pages, and that may be true. The PDF appears to have been generated in Jan. 2011. It's incomplete, but does give some citations that may help to add (return?) citations to the article that are missing. What a mess. It's interesting to me, but not enough to keep chasing down its origins. (I am an intermediate-level WP editor, and I ended up on this page while looking into something else.)

Anyway, the term "genderbait" was used in the 2003 Gibson sci-fi novel Pattern Recognition. There was an article titled Gender-bait created here on WP in Aug. 2005, but it was redirected into this (Online identity) article in Feb. 2010.

I'm adding this talk section to document the little info I uncovered while here.

--Lightbreather (talk) 19:39, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Identity & masks
The section on 'Online identity and the concept of the mask' contains four paragraphs summarizing work from a single pair of authors written in one book chapter. Their concepts of a mask are not scientific concensus. For example, many scholars would not agree with the claim that "The kind of mask one chooses reveals at least something of the subject behind the mask." This section would be improved by citing more than a single reference. Robertekraut (talk) 22:36, 26 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Seconded, Robertekraut. I came here to say exactly what you've said. :-) Does anyone mind if I refactor that section? -wʃʃʍ-  02:03, 12 December 2015 (UTC)

In the last paragraph the obeject turns to "students", this is confusing. If student is the particular research object of this scholar it should be pointed out clearly, since the context considers all the netizens. — Preceding unsigned comment added by YunzhiWU TPT (talk • contribs) 20:11, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

Online business on social networks
I added a part of information about online identity in the context of online business.Because online identities on social network are very different from the identities in real life. On social networks, how to get trust of others users for an online identity becomes a big problem, especially for online business on social network. On some social networks, like Sina Weibo, Wechat, there exist official accounts. These official accounts are well known, and gain users' trust. But when it talks about online business, if someone you don't know in real work wants to sell something to you via social network, what is your first reaction? I think most people will not  accept it. And on WeChat, there are users called wei-businessmen who sell products to other users. Welcome any discussion on this subject. — Preceding unsigned comment added by LieqiangGUO TPT (talk • contribs) 14:46, 13 June 2017 (UTC)


 * On the case of Wei Businuess, this depends on the frequency they post the advertisement. A large part of the Wei-businessmen are contemporary, for exmpample, they come back from a tour and want to sell some local products to earn money. While some of them take Wei-bussiness as a long-term job and main income, many of those friends choose to shield such frequent advertisements. This also depends on the online relationship, we are more likely to shield a forwarded message from another groupe by the "bridge" than those sent directly by our friends. --YunzhiWU TPT (talk)YUNZHI

Thanks for your discussion. I share the same opinions. Indeed, in my personal experience, when there are some of my friends advertising in WeChat, I will shield their moments. For example, one of my friend works in real estate and he posts many advertisements. And that drives me crazy, so I have no choice but shield his moment forever.--LieqiangGUO TPT (talk) 21:42, 1 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I think that Wei-businessmen should do some researches before they post their advertisements. — Preceding unsigned comment added by YunzhiWU TPT (talk • contribs) 21:34, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

That is right. Different people have different demands, when Wei-businessmen can do some researches about the users' demands on WeChat, that will help them to find potential customers.--LieqiangGUO TPT (talk) 21:42, 1 July 2017 (UTC)


 * From the online identities of users on WeChat, is it possible to infer some information?--YunzhiWU TPT (talk) 22:50, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

I think so. Because different generations have their own preferences, and that could reflect on their online identities.--LieqiangGUO TPT (talk) 22:57, 1 July 2017 (UTC)