Lists are a good idea after all
April 3, 2009 3 Comments
ArminasX has revamped his list of Second Life blogs, and this time we have made it on, at a rather remarkable #108.
If Second Life Shrink was a player on the WTA tour we’d be Virginia Ruano Pascual – perhaps not the best-known or most glamorous personality on the circuit, but a solid performer who has quietly racked up nine grand-slam titles in a seventeen-year career.
Second Life Shrink 
On reflection, I too agree that lists are good. This, of course, has NOTHING to do with the fact that “SL on SL” is now listed at number 82, and SLentrepreneur Magazine (where I am News Editor) hits the 51 slot. My spurious and hopelessly warped mathematics lets me argue that cumulatively, I can credit being, on average, maybe at the number 40 slot. That’s totally unsupportable but making the claim has some value to my ego.
What is far more interesting is the whole psychology of how much people want to see lists and be in them. Being on a list seems to represent “being” at the psychological level. It’s as if this gives some legitimacy to an individual. And of course, it IS an affirmation of impact – you have done something to be noticed and now folks can notice that you have been noticed.
Methinks you could start your own list of “Most Psychologically Revealing Blogs,” which would offer credit for deep introspective analysis (“The underlying Id-Superego struggle is represented by the need for the individual to create an avatar that makes manifest the latent Oedipal struggle…” versus the superficially trivial (“Redgrave’s new super duper heels are scrumdiddlyumptious and my bestest friend Britney says she’s going to get the red ones because her hunky boyfriend, Machoman Humongous, loves her red lingerie…”
I made ArminasX’s list at the 65th level in spite of offering nothing of redeeming social significance other than occasionally pointing people to read stuff on OTHER people’s blogs.
Me thinks Sigmund has it right.. the universal theme of Second Life blogs (one could almost call it a meme post) is one about the nature of identity and the writers reflection on who they are and who they project themselves to be.
Technorati would probably give this blog the #1 spot on such a list.
JC
Thanks, I think. I’m not sure if you’re congratulating us on our penetrating psychological insight or suggesting that we are solipsistically self-obsessed. I tend to think that the latter is nearer the truth.