internet diaries and screennames
Bear blog reminds me so much of diaryland.com back in the early, early 2000s. I think there's more people trying to advertise themselves here, but we live in post-Facebook/LinkedIn hell so real names and entangling your resume with your daily thoughts is never gonna leave us in peace. BUT, a lot of the blogs I've read have been so real, it's like going back in time.
It's not just the ads and all the tracking being shoved up your computer's ass that piss me off, but the molds people have willingly shoved themselves into. I've missed people having space to just experiment with their own existence online. People are so, so polished and trying their hardest to sell themselves. Distilling themselves into brands, then just dumping half their CV in a post about their dog, or trying to conjure the hottest most stretch armstrong reach take for engagement and the rage machine feedback. It's embarrassing. I've missed reading random souls simply speaking their minds or idly chatting in a textbox to themselves, no expectations, no dick swinging, no lead-in engagement bait questions (btw sign up for this thing I made).
There's this messy art within somewhat-anonymous blogs, it's like a special kind of poetry to just read someone smash their thoughts into a keyboard. I don't want to see the best or the carefully curated worst of people, I think that its pretty unhealthy to only record and share your life like that. Just... talk some absolute bullshit. Just once. It's freeing and fun.
Anyway, point is diaryland hit this niche in the early 2000s, and I hope bear blog can introduce that to people who weren't terminally online back then (fair, you have to be terminally online to find bear blog BUT REGARDLESS). Yeah. I hope that the private-yet-public/choose-your-own-level-of-anonymous diary is something there will always be space for -- something that will always be permitted and encouraged somewhere online.
I've felt like an absolute freak since myspace, because I just don't want to put my picture up, or tell everyone about where I live and work. Recently I was watching a video and the topic of online interactions came up, and people were saying that you HAVE to video chat or how do you know who you're talking to???? And I just... maybe it's the neurodivergence but I can't imagine needing to stare into a laggy webcam image to NEED to know someone. I don't need you to doxx yourself to see you as a human being worthy of taking up some space on this Earth or this internet. Anyone who does, honestly, is a fucking freak.
Obviously disclaimers like stalkers and people shouldn't interact with minors and such, but like. Google 'drama' and people are doing all that and worse just fine with their whole faces and lives online so why the fuck do we pretend using a screenname makes you liability. Zuck really fucked people up in the head, there. The only reason some rando on the internet wants to know EXACTLY WHO YOU ARE is to get your money or try to fuck you, so, you know. If you wanna keep your time/money and not be pursued by grinning-into-the-camera-beind-sunglasses-pretending-to-be-on-a-hike-probably-just-in-a-carpark Jake, drop the real name/picture and become feral.
So yeah. TL;DR: Screen names are fuckin cool, don't post pictures of yourself to strangers, protect your privacy but go apeshit as you like expressing the human existence. Peace.