Userpics

[howeird]

Stalker that I am, my usual LJ modus operandi (or for singular should it be operandus?) is when I see a reply which peeks my interest from someone with whom I am not yet familiar, I follow that person's username to his/her journal, do some reading, and also look at his/her userpics for clues.

Lately I am seeing a preponderance of user icons which are not pictures of the owner of the journal, or any pet, car, or other personally identifiable device. This both worries me and makes me slap myself upside the head. Often there are no photos of the person at all.

In the early days of the Internet, there were no images, and fat, bald, toothless old farts like I've become looked just as purty as Miss Teen Oregon, and Miss Teen Oregon was accepted as the rocket scientist she was if her writings justified it.

The first real friend I had in the BBS world turned out to be a short chubby Chinese-American boy of 14 who wore pop-bottle glasses and was legally deaf. I only met him by chance - online I knew him as the developer who sold me my first BBS software, I had no idea (nor did I care) what he looked like, how old he was, whether he was a he or she or undecided, whether he had the full complement of limbs, or whatever. But now that photos are not only available but a routine part of the posting, for some reason I want to see an image of the poster, at least from time to time.

And I really shouldn't.

Comments

[susandennis]

I do the same thing and feel the same way about it. Plus I add in some gender confusion. There are a couple of people on my friends list today that kept me wondering male or female for a long time. It tell myself that it does not matter that it should not matter and yet... it does.

[cinchntouch.livejournal.com]

Ditto. Once upon a time I would communicate with anyone on the net anywhere. In a way the variety of people and lifestyles and what have you was part of the attraction of the internet. Within the past few years I find that more and more of the people I meet online are the same people I would meet in "real time"

This is sort of a bummer. I imagine I am just insecure around people whose lives are more interesting than mine.

I think it is natural to wonder what someone looks like. I always create an image of someone in my mind based on the things they write about and say. I don't think there is anything wrong with that. I suppose the temptation to avoid is to allow that to determine who one communicates with.