Categories: uncategorized
Date: 07 January 2007 19:38:08
I was just catching up on some WibLogs and some bits of The Ship, which I don't read as much any more. And there were all these things happening.
Jack and TME are getting married. Smudgie's father has died peacefully. The Cadbury Meet looks to have a date. I received a funky pressie from a Kiwi Secret Santa. Just to name a few things.
Ok, so that sounds like trivial stuff in one sense, but it just got me thinking. I live in a couple of virtual worlds. The wibworld and the shipworld are similar in that there are lots of 'common' people between the two. But they're just so 'real'. (The other virtual world is an American Mommies site that I post on occasionally).
The whole 'virtual' world thing never ceases to amaze me. There are people, like Smudgie (hope you don't mind getting a personal mention Smudgie!!) who I've never actually met IRL (she's avoiding it! ;) ), but I feel like I 'know' her in some way, probably even more so than I know some of my friends IRL. Reading her blog and 'sharing' her family ups and downs, crying and laughing at things she writes about, all seems so 'intimate'.
Seeing that Jack and TME were engaged was just soooo exciting, even though I've only talked to Jack briefly both IRL and on msn. I remember her (and Holly) coming to sleep on my living room floor the night before Greenbelt.
Emma (ok, she's not here, but everyone knows her!) is one of my best friends, and that all started through random chats in the cafe. The first time we met was in a library somewhere randomly half way between Winchester and Cheltenham. We went into the Ship cafe together to freak everyone out that we had actually met IRL, and then went on to a RL cafe and talked non-stop until the cafe closed and we were kicked out. Sooooooo much has happened in my life since then, and she's 'been there' through it. And now she's getting married too.
The virtual world seems to be more honest and open in so many ways than the 'real' world, which I guess is why it is so much 'easier' to become so involved in it. When talking to people IRL and mentioning 'virtual' people, it always seems so weird cos I talk with such passion about 'virtual' people. People who don't know about virtual communities don't understand and just find it strange.
I feel I'm beginning to witter now, but that's cos I'm trying to justify what I'm saying. Hopefully, you'll get what I'm on about though.
The virtual world is a powerful one.