The Search for Definition Continues -- Fractal Identities Become Fractured Identities (?)

Order and Chaos by Cory Ench

This past week has been my research/bibliography-building time. I attempted searches in media, computer science, and technology databases – ACM Digital Library, IEEE Xplore, and Mass Media databases:

• “multiple ident*” AND (online OR “social media” OR digital)

• virtual identities AND (online OR “social media” OR digital)

Note: the “*” truncates terms in order to account for work variations, e.g., ident* for identity, identities, identify, identifiers, etc.

The above searches were mainly netting me articles on avatars in video games or virtual reality and occasionally gathering reference to alternate identities in social media (i.e., not fully or truthfully representing oneself in social media space). While the idea of playing different social roles or exploring different personalities through gaming or online avatars is a fascinating one, it wasn’t hitting the mark with regard to what I was envisioning with fractal identities.

Additionally, I don’t regard fractal identities as alternate identities in the way of a deliberately deceptive practice (i.e., false identities for the sake of hiding, achieving total anonymity, or committing crimes), although I suppose they could take that form. Rather, fractal identities can be either a conscious or unconscious phenomena of the multiple (collective?) identities that digital denizens juggle every day, that is, our various e-mail accounts, blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, IM, Twitter, and texting accounts into which we devote and divide our time and attention. In this sense, perhaps fractal identities should more appropriately be labeled fractured identities (?), and in turn the concept could be tied to digiphrenia more easily and directly.

I then moved on to search the same sources on the following phrases and terms:

• (“digital media” OR “social media”) AND (“time management” OR (temporal disconnect*))

The idea on this search was to find materials that aligned themselves more with the theme of digiphrenia, that is, articles that address the ramifications of extensive digital or online media engagement and the consequences of divided time and attention. This search led me to articles on the stress of multitasking in digital environments (the success and/or failure of), divided attention, distraction, and even the issues of self-regulation and internet addiction. On these latter two issues, while important, they are definitely one can of worms I do not wish to open. Self-regulation and addiction are subjects worthy of book-length treatments to be sure, but they are at best tangential to the project of multiple/fractal identities.

At this point, I considered one more search that would incorporate false identities (to tie it in, perhaps, to the form letter bots story from back in January) or extra identities (?), but I’m fairly confident those will lead me to dead ends or the wrong paths. Rather, I think that something along the lines of multitasking AND identities AND ((digital OR social) AND media) or some permutation thereof will land me closer to the mark I desire. I’ve already gathered a substantial number of articles through which I need to sort. I confess that there hasn’t been a single standout article I’ve encountered that really meshes with what I had in mind with fractal identities. It may be at this point that I’ve been spinning a topic out of thin air, one that has little foundation, little substance, but I don’t want to come to that conclusion quite yet. Good research can take days if not weeks, and I've got plenty to process and interpret as it is. I'd like just a few more articles or sources and then I'll be happy ...