Last revised on June 8th, 2010.
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Before beginning, I will define some terms for the purpose of universal comprehension.

Meatspace - The world of "the real". Anything tangible. You might have 50MB of text in your e-books, but it has no physical value here. Most call it "real life".

Cyberspace - The world of computers, digital things. 50MB can be anything here. It's a game, it's an archive, it's a discography. You type to someone and you call it talking; you are not physically talking, but at the same time you are, just merely in cyberspace.
Does not mean "only" the Internet.

I'm going to be using basic computer-speak here, so if you seriously don't know what 50MB is, I would tell you to just bookmark this page and return to it in three months. Also, I say 'net instead of Internet because Internet looks nerdy if I keep saying it.

something that gives comfort, consolation, or relief

The year is 1995. In a suburban, middle-class home, a teenage girl is scribbling away in her journal about [x] teacher or [y] person. If she's not doing that, she's being consoled by her friend - perhaps over the phone.

The year is 2010. The journals have turned to status updates, and the phones to chat boxes. Her meatspace friends are connected, but her friends, in some cases, may also be "internet friends" who are commenting on her rants and raves. These are people, behind terminals, who have never met her. What we feared when the Internet was in its infancy: people you couldn't see! Strangers.

"You've never met these people, they could be dangerous!" would say the 6 o' clock news. The reality of it is that these are the safest people to dump your life story upon. Every mainstream journal software has extensive privacy features, and what you want to be shown to the world will be shown. You can take comfort in that what you want to tell people, will only be read and remarked upon by who you want to read it. Solace.

What makes the 'net such a good medium for solace is that there is no inherent consequence for your actions. No matter how angry you make someone in cyberspace, there is little they can do to hurt you. The opportunity to hurt you increases, however, when you start bringing meatspace into it - via your name on Facebook, which could include your city and town. If they have your address, you've given them a means to hurt you - whether through license plates, your real name, or simply telling it to them. You thus open yourself to consequence via malicious pizza deliveries, stalkers, or even, at its worst, death.

The more you root yourself here, just as we are inherently rooted in meatspace, the more you open yourself to consequence. 99.9% of Facebook's users use their real name. That's not weird, right? It's just how the 'net has evolved. Anyone who wanted to cause harm to them could easily find them through Facebook, but how likely is that? Being a web developer, I root myself quite firmly into the soil of the Internet. The websites I run could easily be attacked or spammed. It's as much a risk as it is to go outside of your home - you could get crushed by a bus or murdered, but the odds of that are unlikely, making the risk definitely worth the reward.

A troll is someone who annoys another person, in hope of an amusing reaction, for their own entertainment.

Due to the lack of consequence, people are much less hesitant to speak their mind than they would be in meatspace. In a world where people now text each other to break off their relationships, and have status wars on Facebook to get back at each other, it is obvious that many people prefer the faceless advantage that cyberspace gives. In a cyberspace argument between people who do not know each others' personal information, the harshest consequence you can expect is someone to get their feelings hurt, or have the participants banned from the medium they're arguing upon. In meatspace, a couple arguing in the apartment next to you may very well be throwing lamps at their loved one and threatening to harm them. It is no wonder why people readily accept the facelessness.

The two examples above help explain why it's so fun for trolls to do what they do best. They reason that there's no problem with hurting people as long as nothing will happen to you. I won't pretend I haven't felt it: Hurricane Katrina. Hell for those involved, but if I stepped outside that day, the air was calm. Not a single sign that a hurricane was happening anywhere. I felt nothing for those people. I said, well, that does suck, and I watched some footage, it was just awful. I'd hate to be there, but there's simply no way I could care enough to connect with those people. So, I do not find it hard to believe that irritating people you don't even know, for your own entertainment, is common in an environment where we are anonymous and free of consequence.

Sometimes the phrase, "Internet is serious business." is thrown around, usually by people that don't understand the meanings I am about to impress on you. It's funny to me that the phrase is tossed around in a joking manner because "Internet" is the closest platform we have to your core as a person. Since we have established that people fear no consequence on the 'net, it is acceptable to assume that someone is their truest form here:

* they are as anonymous as they let themselves be
* they thus act how they would if no one were watching
* they share in the ease of writing something out vs. speaking it

So how, then, do you suppose Internet is not serious business? People are their most real here. Troll me, you antagonist. Block me, conceited person, as I prove you wrong. Ban me, wannabe dictator, for showing an admin the error of their ways. In the case of the sad teenager: who better to give advice than someone with no consequence, or bias? Who better to criticize than someone who will not hit you in the face or make your life miserable?

It comes with the territory - as it's easier to write something out than to speak it. I had three love notes to me in high school, because it's easier to write a long paragraph explaining how you feel rather than getting choked up physically. (I also prefer debating on the 'net, because it's more organized) So, due to this effect, you get rather important discussions that probably deserve to be spoken in real life, through text.

I read about a someone - not a gentleman, for sure - who thought it was reasonable to break up with a girl via Facebook. Pathetic enough, but not even in a wordy paragraph, not a single IM. No. He set his relationship from "taken" to "single" and that was it. That's how the girl found out. If you must engage or disengage something important, be it a relationship, job, or contract, then you should see someone physically, with your voice, look them right in the eye, and tell them your feelings towards the situation. There was once a day where honor and pride were considered important. These were the days you had men rushing into battle knowing they'd die, knowing they had to defend their homes no matter what the cost. Now in our modernized lifestyles, we find it hard to have the guts to talk to people directly. A web full of people, your friends all in the same spot, and we can't even handle the privilege like a respectable person.

I'm a big gamer. Design 'em, play 'em, even watch 'em. What I like about gaming is that it takes the physical aspect of meatspace and sort of smushes it as best it can for entertainment purposes, with the 'net. Take any game you've played with a friend in - be it MMORPG, first-person-shooter, (FPS) even cute little Flash games. You now see your friend in this cyber world, but it's not like you're entering some random server and playing with other 'net monkeys - no, there is a small sense of familiarity, isn't there? FPS, his character looks like everyone else's, but there's a click, a little bit of acknowledgment knowing this person is your buddy. In an MMO, things get even more personal. You're now dealing with what race this person prefers, their style of play via the class, down to the build that class is using, even down to how they carry themselves strategically.

As an example, I will use the most widely-known MMO there will be for some time to come: World of Warcraft. My main character is an undead - a living skeleton - fire mage. Why? I like dead things. I'm a dark fellow. Of course I'm going to choose a character whose ribs are sticking through their clothing. You know what I love? Blowing shit up. If I can't raise the dead in the game, I'm going to be blowing shit up. Most WoW players are known for the typical grinding stereotype: get your gear, raid raid raid, forget why you were even having fun in the first place. While other guys are raiding, I'm going back to the newbie areas of WoW and turning mobs into penguins to /dance with. Maybe I'm going to go scare alliance just with my mere existence. That is the character I play - that is me. My self-image in World of Warcraft is a living skeleton dancing with penguins in front of newbies.

This sense of physical familiarity is not in games only, it's just prominent in them. I recall one time I went over my friend's house to code some stuff for him and I looked on his giant 54-inch monitor, which was over twice the size of my normal computer monitor. I sat down at his desk that was not in front of the monitor, as I'm used to. I typed on a keyboard I was unfamiliar with and his mouse had no mouse pad. That was just the hardware.

So I finally settle myself into the meatspace part of computing, and we log into the computer. I looked at his giant monitor, and saw his desktop littered with icons. Tons of them. Icons. Everywhere. The song I gave him three weeks ago? It was there. The worst part is he had so many available pixels on his screen due to the 54 inches, that where a cluttered desktop for me would be 64 icons, it was more like 200 for him. Ignoring the mess like I would ignore a bothersome person poking my ribs every 5 seconds, I go to his folder of sites. Oddly... it was all organized. It was such a physical relief just to see that I would not have to code in a big mess, that it was a practical mood boost.

After I got home, I reflected on why his clutter bothered me so much. I decided ultimately it's what he is comfortable with, how could I criticize him? I hate when people come into my room and think it's a mess just because there's books and musical/computer equipment everywhere. It may look like a mess, but it's my mess, it's my organization. So what I realized is this: back to the cluttered desktop. All that mess, peering into the bottomless desktop, full of files everywhere, was equivalent to peering into his mind! [mad scientist laugh] It all made sense. Would he feel as uncomfortable in my place? Sitting on a futon with no back support, having a glowing-red keyboard underneath his fingers as he typed away...

Looking back to all my friends' computers I've worked on, I believe that yes, there was a sense of dissociation. That desktop wallpaper, why is it so complicated? How can you see the icons?! And they would come right to my computer and tell me how boring my wallpaper was. "You still use Limewire?" "Yeah, my favorite music is on the radio!" -- "What the hell, why haven't you pirated photoshop if you're an art student?" "Because I'm an art student and I respect the authors' work." -- "Damn that's a lot of bookmarks you have." "Well I might want to go back to them some day." - the conversations I've had with people merely represent fragments of their personalities in one little box, one little cyberspace, and people have the nerve to tell me this all isn't serious business. Come now.

Philosophy mode: turn on.

My eyes hurt. If I didn't work out, I'd be physically weak. My back took a lot of work to be fixed because I had improper posture when I was on the computer as a teen. At times it feels like I have to sacrifice a bit of myself, to be so active in cyberspace. I wonder if I'm missing out on life. I wonder, what if I was into clubbing? What if I liked people, what if I wanted romance like everyone else? If I could feel the power of a kiss... rather than kissing and feeling nothing. I wonder if I'd be so active in the 'net.

I wonder too, about people who take hallucinogens [too much, for fun] with their friends. Are they truly alive? I had a group of friends who weren't very connected at all, and I'd spend time with them even though I didn't really like them, for the sake of doing something in meatspace. Was that being alive? Is that what life is?

A friend from my group, probably the worst case, I'd say... we were talking on the 'net. He signed on specifically for me. Just talking away and I said something about "real life" and he said something along the lines of, "oh, you mean, reality?" and I was upset. He could not wrap his head around the fact that there is space behind the monitor. He said LAN parties weren't really parties. I understand from many people's perspectives that they aren't parties. That's fine, I just remark that some people do not understand the space behind the monitor. Finally, he once said to me, "Yeah. I'm trying to unplug. :)" with a decent smile on his face. I smiled back. What a fool. Your friends are going to go away, they're going to get lives of their own. I couldn't imagine coming home from a hard day's work and just watching TV. Making supper. Having a wife. He is content with that. That is my piece on him.

It would appear to that friend group that I've grown more reclusive now. I work completely on the Internet. The most I'd have to leave this apartment for is groceries, I wouldn't even need a car. I don't know why I can get my fill of sociality by just IMing people. Now, realistically, I do see friends in meatspace. We make events to do. That's how I like to operate, I'm not much of a "let's hang out and ask each other what to do for an hour" kinda guy.

When I think of cyberspace, I imagine many possibilities. Wikipedia is such a perfect example of how the 'net should work. Anyone can add to a giant sum of knowledge. Type in what you want to learn about, and you get a pretty hefty summary, then read more on other sites if you want to. Voila, welcome to evolution. Those books in the libraries are outdated - you cannot link to them, you have to physically hand over a book to someone. Then you don't have a copy for yourself! Yet my friend smiled about unplugging... this is evolution. Our bodies are done evolving. The 'net - this very article, even - can serve to serialize someone. How could that not appeal to everyone? Society will pin five different disorders on me for why I hate people, but I feel no disorder at all, yet all I feel is claustrophobic in a train-station crowd of ignorance.

It feels like "version one" of existence. We were cave people, and then we evolved. Cave-man Bob had to scream his words to be heard in far away places. Millenia later, we get the post office. The telegraph, the phone. The train, the automobile. Every advance we've received has made the other extinct. Beepers and payphones worked well together until evolution came in form of cell phones. Why would I "snail mail" a letter when I can email it? I lost a friend when she moved because I just couldn't keep up with sending wordy letters about how I've accomplished nothing in life. I look back at it, how primitive. Fixing the tracking on VHS players, really? And such low quality...

So you see the evolution exists in technology. Man has gone from screaming loudly across far distances, to typing in front of a computer and hitting the send button. Wireless technology like the cell phone has given us a hive-like connection to each other now. To talk to someone, I merely dial their number, invisible connections are made in roughly two seconds, and, "hello!" I say calmly. We have evolved.

In some ways, I dub meatspace empty. I was very socially active when I was a teenager, around my junior year in high school. I was what you would call a "mall rat", spending much time with the fauna of the local shopping mall. I look back at it, dealing with characters ranging from the pseudo-goths, to otaku, to self-proclaimed RANDOM teenage girls, to outright thieves. What was it about meatspace that was so incredible? The answer I have is tangibility. Technology will be only more impressive as I grow older, but it will never replace the touch of a woman. I could look into webcams at 30 million megapixels resolution, but I could not touch their face.

It is this tangibility that can make what most people call the "real world" actually even more virtual than the 'net. The tangibility of the physical world can, at times, cloud judgment: loving based on appearance, or physical intimacy; peer pressure and the difficulty to say no when surrounded by peers; even leaving a party when you're officially tired of being there. This clouded judgment is equivalent to constantly committing "little white lies" - realistically, you don't want to do this stupid thing your friends are going to do, but having them stare at you, expecting to perform what they have all just performed, can be incredibly intimidating, and so you lie: "I'll do it." Some people unknowingly build the core of their romantic relationships around the fact their mate is physically appealing to them. While being attracted to your significant other is definitely a factor, it will not sustain a healthy relationship.

To be fair, the little-white-lying can produce greater personal extroversion and enjoyment. Once while spending time with some friends, it was getting pretty late, and I'd much rather have gone home, made a snack, worked out and slept. Yet, at 11:30 PM, they said they all wanted to go to the beach. Feeling peer pressure and a bit of potential guilt were I to seriously request that we didn't, I decided to go. The beach is absolutely wonderful at night during Spring. Just me and some friends goofing around on a beach, relaxing and looking at the stars. There's no way I would have traded that to just go home and sleep. I returned at 1:30 AM, did no working out and ate no snacks, but just went right to sleep. So you can see that, while the sense of tangibility could have you potentially creating many white lies in a single social session, like an actual white lie they are not always bad things. That being said, there's been a few times when I've made a similar decision, only to find whatever they wanted to do ended up just costing me more money and time to be bored by what they suggested.

The lines between reality and virtuality are - as usual - being blurred by technological advances daily. The 'net will only get more real, closer to what most call "reality", with its fancy graphics and improved connectivity. Meatspace will only get more virtual, with our invisible lines making connections to each other. Ultimately, meat has intrinsic worth for what it is. At no point is it accurate to say refer to meatspace as "real life" - if you must, or if you slip up, understand it colloquially. There is no point where anything becomes unreal, only virtual. Everything is real life. What cyberspace isn't, is tangible life. You cannot touch someone physically unless you are on the same level as them: for instance, in a game world.

Do not lose touch with meatspace and keep in touch with cyberspace, no matter how close they get to each other. Reality cannot be so easily defined, as my friend thought. To think you are living in the "real world" by being shoved into an apartment, staring at a monitor for 16 hours and acting like an agoraphobe is simply false. To think you are experiencing life completely when you are chocking your time full of the same people, to fill your boredom, is equally false. A balance is necessary and I hope I never see the day where I rule it logical to forget about meatspace, because each aspect of life is important. Live your life in the meat; stay healthy, look good, experience what it has to offer. Embrace the evolution, solace and joy provided by cyberspace. The unioning of such creates an impenetrable balance that has been available to humanity for only twenty years now.

Love always?
Vael Victus