Online a Lot of the Time
Hillis analyzes forms of ritual and fetishism made possible through second-generation virtual environments such as Second Life and the popular practice of using webcams to “lifecast” one’s life online twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Discussing how people create and identify with their electronic avatars, he shows how the customs of virtual-world chat reinforce modern consumer-based subjectivities, allowing individuals to both identify with and distance themselves from their characters. His consideration of web-cam cultures links the ritual of exposing one’s life online to a politics of visibility. Hillis argues that these new “rituals of transmission” are compelling because they provide a seemingly material trace of the actual person on the other side of the interface.
Ken Hillis is Associate Professor of Media Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He is the author of Digital Sensations: Space, Identity, and Embodiment in Virtual Reality and a co-editor of Everyday eBay: Culture, Collecting, and Desire.