**READERS BEWARE: the following post contains a spoiler alert for documentary Catfish...
This week's food for thought... "Online performative space is a deliberately playful space... [it] allows individuals and networks of users to play with aspect of their presentations of self, and the relationship of those online selves to others" [Pearson 2009]. But has Facebook's lax security setting allowed the play to go too far?
Regardless of the debate over the true "documentary" status of CATFISH, the story opens viewer's eyes to the very real threat of identity fraud. The story follows New York photographer Niv and his Facebook relationships with 9 year-old "prodigy" artist Abby, her mother Angela, and sister Megan. Interaction is purely virtual for the better half of the film, but when things start to smell fishy to Niv, a surprise face-to-face meeting reveals reality's profile is far different from those constructed online.
As Pearson further elaborates, online interaction fosters freedom... "Like actors playing a role, [users] can deliberately choose to put forth identity cues or claims of self that can closely or wildly differ from reality". In the case of Catfish, "Megan" was a construct of several identities, using the face of a model whose photos were copied from a public profile. This avatar, and many other online "friends" that verified Megan's online identity, were created by Angela as a way to "act out" her ideal version of self.
As Donath and Boyd [2004] explore in their article Public displays of connection, "the determined deceiver can create a series of false profiles and have them link to each other, creating the illusion of a network of well-connected participants". The authors recommend tighter security settings, but is regulation the right solution? Or is an attitude shift needed to change our online moral compass?
References:
Pearson, E. 2009. All the world wide web's a stage: the performance of identity in online social networks. Accessed online March 13, 2011
Donath, J. and Boyd D. 2004. Public displays of connection. In BT Technology Journal, Vol 22, No.4. Accessed online March 13, 2011
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