For years of online gaming the avatar has become a player's online manifestation that outstretched the simple handle. And although I'm not downplaying the rationale for such a creation within a gaming community, there now has become a growing affection for stylized avatars within social networking communities. Whether it was through people disguising their true image on MySpace or not wanting to get "tagged" in Facebook or simply thinking their Twitter icon looks cool as a zombie or anime character, avatars have taken on meme of the month status.
Within a Massively Multiplayer game experience, I can appreciate a need to be distinguished from the hundreds or thousands of other players who are all trying to decide which player to frag or cast a spell on. In fact, being someone who's absolutely useless with names, I can appreciate a unique avatar. When playing online poker, I rarely remember someone by their screen name, but I have a far easier time remembering someone who sucked out a river inside straight draw by their crop circle pic of Futrama's Bender... I hate you ironically-named MadSkillz69. There is also a certain need for privacy with some people who want to use social networking sites and want to avoid a photorealistic representation for one reason or another. I find it hard to justify a constant shuffling of personal avatars on a weekly or daily basis. After all, isn't the purpose of an avatar for someone to be able to identify you when a real picture is unavailable? While I'm not a player/user of Second Life, I would imagine that radically changing one's appearance on a regular basis would not only be counter productive to maintaining intergame relationships, but frustrating to any other players who would not want to persist in figuring out each person every time they logged on. I'm not one of those Twitter users with thousands of people on my list, but even within the short list of people that I do follow, it seems there is constant change. Whether it's a manga, hobbit, alien, superhero or South Park character that you choose to represent you, I crave consistency for at least a short period of time. And, just for the edification of those of you who participate in every avatar meme, allow me to let you in on the "down low" about a couple things. First, your dog, baby, or garden gnome is not you. As much as I appreciate you actually using a real photo as a representation, I'm not buying the miny sorcerer's hat and the rake. Also, yes your baby looks cute in the same way that all babies look cute when you have someone making face and bubbling out gibberish while popping two dozen pics on your Kodak C340, but I'm not social networking with your baby... unless of course they can type, "LOL, I can't believe how drunk we were!" after every picture that you post. At that point, they'll at least be on par with 75% of the rest of Facebook. Next, appreciate the size of your avatar on most social network pages. To place family portrait in the space instead of a simple headshot pretty much just screams "Hey, I'm going to justify the time I spend online with friends as extended family networking time because it's not MY profile, it's a FAMILY profile. If you're going to have a picture that includes you as your avatar, how about JUST you. Also, for all you college guys who use a picture of a bikini model or your favorite emo singer as a pic that represents you, congratulations, you have now become a less than one-dimensional facade of a human being on a platform that only allows a single dimension. I'm all for individualized expression on a medium that has moved from text to images to audio to video. I know that many of you like to express your inner values by changing your pic from laughing you to serious you to Macauley-Culkin-Shockface-in-Home-Alone you, but I beg you, please, stop. I will cop to the fact that my avatars are always photoshopped to remove photorealistic aspects, but, anyone who knows me will always recognize my face and not that of a stuffed animal or a car. Also, I rarely, I repeat RARELY change any of my social network representations. I'm quite ready to admit that, from day to day, my macrolife doesn't change that much and, even though I could create some crazy avatar to pretend that my life is somehow more interesting or exciting than it is, I'm prepared to allow the static, consistent avatar choices I've made to be an indication of someone comfortable with who they are and not seeking trying to keep up with the meme of the month club.