Fictional Reality
Description
Michael Mignano:
"Fictional reality is the concept of people living, playing, or working online through fictionalized versions of their identity, relationships, and experiences. While this is not a brand-new behavior, fictional reality is becoming more positive, commonplace, and accepted.
This new wave of fictional reality is different from internet anonymity, or even pseudo-anonymity. People have been pursuing versions of their lives with varying degrees of anonymity since the beginning of the internet. Oftentimes (though not always), the intent behind online anonymity has been for negative, cynical, or nefarious reasons, such as to hide the true intent or impression of one’s actions. “Finstagram” accounts, pseudonymous accounts on Twitter, and burner Reddit profiles are just a few of the many ways people have chosen to conceal their true identities and intentions on the internet.
But fictional reality is something much different; with fictional reality, people are crafting new versions of themselves online for positive reasons, such as to express creativity, gain confidence, or to share a part of their identity or interests that they aren’t able to showcase to the offline world. This may be because the fictionalized version of themselves isn’t socially accepted IRL, or it’s simply not technically possible. Fictional reality can even enable people to seek companionship not found offline or to express an opinion shunned by one’s IRL community."