Facebook is my avatar

In what way does ready player one relate to class discussion/ blog posts….

After reading 'Ready Player One' it has become obvious that our class discussions and blog posts have related

to the reading in more than one way. Ready Player one addresses a variety of different topics as well as our class

discussion. Ready player one relates based in the future touches many issues we have in 2016.

For starters todays gamer gate, i don't mean just the issues of sexism in video games causing controversy, in

the case of Anita Sarkeesian. The type of harassment and fear Anita faces is equivalent to the players in RPO and

the sixers. Both are facing threats, they know where Anita lives as the sixers do the players. Anita is facing death

threats like the RPO players and the threats are directly related to a game. The gamers threatening Anita are so

involved and infatuated with the games they play Anita criticizing it pushes them to put her in fear. The sixes are so

obsessed with winning that they too use threats and even president on them when blowing up Wades home and

killing Daito.

Instagram, facebook, snap chat and other social networks is another way our class discussions relate to RPO.

Wade and the other people of oasis are so obsessed with their online life that they neglect their real lives. They can

be whomever they want on oasis, they can make their icon appear to look nothing like them. My group had

considered the idea that we too do this, we only post the part of our lives and of course pictures that make us look

good, happy, pretty, skinny, rich and other ideas along these lines. If you sign on my Facebook you'll never see

images of me in sweat pants eating chocolate cake watching Greys reruns. Instead are photos of me dressed up, at

fancy dinners, cruise ships, vacationing in mexico and pictures that make my boyfriend and i seem like the perfect

pair. Like Wades avatar and the other avatars in oasis, through social networking i am able to create the image

of my life that i wish for others to see. Instagram is probably a better example, my instagram makes me seem like

one of those girls who don't have a job and blog about fitness, make up, fashion and the latest trends. And as

you can see on Mondays its difficult to think thats the same person.

Not only do we create a false reality through our social networking but like Wade we live through technology

(another topic discussed in early semester). Thinking back to before everyone had a cell phone (cell phones

weren't popular when i was in high school) The halls in school were loud, I'd actually have to call my friends houses

and you never knew what anyone was doing, there was no where to post on your wall that you were at the mall,

or at the movies etc. Now most of our contact with friends is posting on each others walls, sending text messages,

i didn't even need to talk with friends about my trip because it was all up on my media pages for everyone to see.

We are in an oasis, most of our school work is online, a majority of our communication is online or via text message

and now you can even take all your classes online, we are in Oasis and we don't even recognize it.

The biggest similarity i find between our lives and RPO (class discussions) is how much we live are lives

through technology and create a false picture for peers through our "avatars". All though we don't have an avatar

like Wade we create an avatar through the pictures we post and articles and create the version of ourselves we

want others to view.

Staci Marsden