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| Marrajjj |
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| jamesssxD |
This dialogue soon evolved into a fun, joking relationship. They humorously refer to each other as "barb" – one of Nicki Minaj's catch phrases (see video at bottom). They often make candid or flirty comments to one another. For instance, Marrajjj pokes fun at jamesssxD bad habits, alleging "lmaooo barb! you is always stashin them coke cans in ya gucci bag. A MESS." JamesssxD jokingly responds saying, "cola? nigga there best be vodka in dat cola or #imdone #bye #ontothenextone." At another time, jamesssxD posts this animation declaring, "my gewdies my gewdies i know u want ma gewdies!!" Marrajjj provokingly answers him, claiming "i bet you can gimme somethin waay better than dem goodies." The two users also frequently comment on new music from their favorite artists. JamesssxD, for example, asserts that the "whole sasha feirce album bored me but this single is back to old Bey, it's so different to such an anthem!! i wanna put on some 9 inch heels n wallk down the street strutting," to which Marrajjj responds encouragingly "get you[r] grind on girl." Eventually, the pair shared photos of themselves. JamesssxD explains, "i got reddish/brown hair n freckles deaaad im a total scottish steroetype barb... [link to photo] a mess, black on the inside though." Marrajjj reciprocates with a link to his photo and writes, "omggg is scottland the same as ireland? XD lmaoo and im from massachusetts... im like from a little country farm town lmao.... :X." This comes to jamesssxD's surprise who "thot [Marrajjj would be] a black ghetto boy ," but flatteringly admits "[Marrajjj looks] real barbalicious tho xD." Marrajjj assures jamesssxD that he's "black on the inside like [him] of course" and "very barbaliciouss and ghetto!" Regardless of their sexual orientation, clearly both jamesssxD and Marrajjj are very comfortable expressing themselves on Last.fm with no reservations about cultural or social reprisal.
Last.fm, what at first appears to be a Pandora wannabe (just another music recommending service), is in reality a playground for manifesting identity. Some users employ their profiles to outright announce their individuality front and center, such as jordi_89 who initially used "The queerest of the queer" on his profile in place of a real website URL (now he lists his Facebook). This speaks volumes about the kind of community Last.fm represents. As described in my last post, people can illustrate their identities to varying degrees, and there is no agreed-upon limit for how seriously individuals get involved. They can represent themselves with only the music they like – by scrobbling their listening history or adding photos of favorite artists to their profile pages, for example – or go further and fill in details about personal identity – by including more personal information, choosing emblematic avatars, participating in forums, posting shouts around the site, connecting or friending musical neighbors and more. Whether the aforementioned accounts are true expressions of sexuality or merely playful gender-bending experiments, Last.fm is a nonetheless a uniting force for these users and many others. Many of the self-identified male users with feminine Last.fm personas that I encountered are friends with each other. Similarly, I have come across other social circles that have connected based on different traits.
Last.fm's community guidelines concretize this value of tolerance and acceptance:
Be respectful to each other. Do not vent your frustrations at other members, whether through your comments or material you post on the site. There is zero tolerance for predatory behaviour, disparaging or defamatory comments, threats, harassment, illegal activities, invading privacy, propaganda, racial hatred, offensive cultural behaviour, vulgar or obscene content, or other inappropriate behaviour or the revealing of other members' personal information.Though users are not forced to encounter the "other," or people different from themselves, there is an implicit, uncontroversial expectation within the community that this will probably happen. In other words, if you're not welcoming of the "other," you're not welcome on Last.fm (at least its social networking aspects).
Nicki Minaj explains the phrase "Harajuku Barbie"
This phenomenon is not restricted to Last.fm alone. I think that in this modern age when men and women are both being told that they are no longer beholden to their classic gender roles, but men who act in feminine gender roles are mercilessly mocked and looked down upon anyway, we see more male/female gender bending online than vice versa simply because it's socially unacceptable to do it in public.
ReplyDeleteI think there's certainly a concept here that bears investigation, but Last.fm's users are just the tip of the iceberg.
I thought that the interaction between Marajjj and Jamessdxx was quite hilarious. I don't mean that in a disparaging way, just that seeing their pictures came as quite a shock to me. It's interesting the way that people act in a seemingly freer manner online even when people put some personal details or have an online identity that is presented as referring to their actual identity. Conceiving the Internet as "a playground for manifesting identity" has some interesting conclusions that you point to. It seems quite odd that the users requested photos from each other. It's as if when people begin making such absurd statements there is a natural desire to try to ground their discourse in a physical referent. It's almost as if both of the people knew that the other person saying these things couldn't really be the stereotypical person they had in mind, in this case a "black ghetto boy."
ReplyDeleteThe ways that they were interacting were so fantastic in relation to how they would probably act in the real world, made each person question the likely validity that the other person is doing the same thing. It's as if this situation of cyber identity switches some of the dynamics of the life & death struggle for the self. While both people only reveal what is mutually or reciprocally shown in terms of identity, there is not an attempt to eradicate that difference under one's own projects or worldview but rather account for it and try to make sense of it in relation to the self.
While, this interaction maybe born out of an interaction between likeminded people, it does not simply reinforce already existing views, rather it forces each of the people to be self-reflexive about the fact that their prediction of what the other person is like in real life is shattered. The pictures, and the ways that they are taken, both seem to be representative of more shy or peripheral people when it comes to mainstream ideas of sociality. Last.fm shows people that they are not the only people coming from that position, but that there is actually a multitude of people feeling similarly.
@Nemo: Definitely. Last.fm is a great example of this phenomenon in action, but this is certainly springing up in other parts of the web.
ReplyDelete@JP: Great points (and awesome comment, haha). I actually saw things a bit differently though. I agree that these individuals divulge characteristics they perceive as mutual, and that their dialogue seems/is fantastic. When they begin to share real life details about themselves, however, I don't view it as a sign of incredulity. To me, it seemed as though the fact that they were both so exuberant (you know what I mean) represented an "ok, go" signal for jamesssxD and Marrajjj to open up even more to each other. Neither person requested a picture of the other, rather jamesssxD put his foot forward and – by exposing something very personal about himself (his appearance) to scrutiny – offered a deeper level of friendship to Marrajjj. To put it another way, I see this as a sped-up, online version of pen pals becoming better buddies. Nonetheless, I really like your point that this forces people to change their expectations of others and of themselves. Last.fm – seems hard to believe, but don't forget it's mainly a music recommendation site!! – definitely represents an unexpected online community that brings people together on the initial basis of music.
You're a cunt :)
ReplyDeleteomg bb thanks for putting me in it!!!! i feel famous now thx!!!
ReplyDeleteoh and next time use smaller words cause they were too hard for marrajjj to understand omg :(
ReplyDeletelmaooooooooooooo get a life you lame ass bitch! you got too much time on your hands. Go outside, make friends, ride a bike, shit jump off a cliff, DO SOMETHING instead of sit your ass on a computer all day and stalk people =) bye
ReplyDeleteDid you even ask if you could write about them?
ReplyDelete