Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (49764)	6/9/2002 12:36:31 AM
From: The Philosopher	Respond to of 82486

I enjoy it- SI is seriously there for me but it's like a book That's a very interesting way of putting it. Yes, while I'm reading a book the characters are quite real, but when I close the book, I don't keep thinking about the people. I mean, I can bring them up when I want to, but they aren't actively with me the way my family or people I know in 3-D can be. In some ways, I wish books WERE like SI -- there are a lot of questions I would love to ask the characters about why they did this or that, or what they were thinking about when they did such and such.

To: epicure who wrote (49764)	6/9/2002 9:17:35 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Dithers brought this up a while ago about how some people are a lot more invested in the realness of it all then other people I like SI I enjoy it- SI is seriously there for me but it's like a book most of the "people" here are just characters, they are not seriously there It bothered me when Dithers brought it up and it still bothers me that people have such different ideas about the reality of this place. It reminds me a bit of the earlier discussion in the context of porn and TV violence on what is pretend and what is real. When people have different views on whether what they do is real or not and how seriously they should take it, someone is bound to get hurt. I like SI. It's nice to have the opportunity to visit with people I've come to know without a lot of hassle. I don't have to schedule a time to meet. I don't even have to comb my hair or get out of my PJs. And if I get bored, I don't need to pretend to be enjoying myself or make any awkward excuses. I can just go do something else. The availability of SI really suits me. I am quite real. I'm the same on SI as I am anywhere else. I assume that you are all quite real, too, although perhaps not quite the same as you are elsewhere. I do not know how to be anybody but me. I think that it would be nice to have that gift, but I don't have it. I do not get the feeling that anyone is treating me as other than real, even those who say that I am just a character in a book. In any event, I shall continue to relate to all of you as real people whether that is reciprocated or not.

To: epicure who wrote (49764)	6/9/2002 11:27:27 AM
From: J. C. Dithers	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

I've been preoccupied playing with a cd-rewriter.... We got an external Backpack drive, mainly to backup 1,000s of Napster songs that otherwise would be lost forever if our computers ever crashed (they are getting old and creaky). As computer doofuses, it took us a long time to learn how to do it right. Now, though, we have all the music we wanted converted to ordinary CD's that play anywhere. We will now backup all our hard drive stuff, which is an easier task. "Why are you telling me this?" you ask. Well ... just to account for my non-presence. And because you so thoughtfully mentioned my name, which I love to see in print. <gg> I did pop in here as a lurker now and then these last few days ... and decided I had made a serendipitous choice not be taking part in these recent discussions, to which I could have made no constructive contributions. On this "reality" stuff ... I think I overstated the case in the post you referred to. I do think most all the people I have met here are very real persons, just as I am. While some fictitious personas were created and sustained here back in the stock trading days, it would be difficult and pointless to do the same on ordinary chatting threads like this one. So I think what we say here is pretty much who we really are, and reflects what we really believe ... perhaps even more so that in 3-D life, where we are more conscious of the social accountability we bear for what we say. Yet it remains true that some people are (appear to be) much more vested in their membership in the SI community than others. Perhaps this is just a reflection of different personality types in real life. We all differ a lot in the degree to which we are inner-directed or outer-directed; the degree to which social approval or opprobrium matters a great deal to us ... in any venue that we are a part of. Some people are very influenced by what their extended families think or have to say about their choices or actions, while others of us could not care less. Some of us lean over backwards to be polite and considerate, while others are more inclined to speak their minds and let the chips fall as they may. Possibly we just show our stripes here, for better or worse. I guess what I'm saying is that the SI community is no different from any of the many other groups I've been involved in ... some take their membership more seriously than others, some are more sensitive than others, some are more considerate than others, etc., etc. Every group (or family) is subject to disharmony from time to time, and some can just laugh it off while others internalize it and easily get hurt. That's just people. In my humble opinion, it is not healthy for any person to become too vested in their membership or participation in any group, even big families. It is not just a matter of how one spends their time, but even more a matter of not tying your emotional well-being too much to how others feel about you. We are not islands, and we have obligations to others. Self-sacrifice, at times, is noble and uplifting. But one does not feel good about themselves if they allow their lives to be too directed by others, and if they become too dependent on approval from others. I know this needs more work. But somehow it relates to SI. I'm going to back up my hard disk. Have a nice Sunday.