>My point is this - how different are you online compared to out there in The Real World™? How does the relative anonymity and security of realtime chat affect you?

Not greatly, I think. I am probably more open and less reserved than "the real me," but that is probably true of a lot of people. For the most part, when I chat online, I act like...me. Of course, a lot of it is play-acting, after all, I'm not really a big green orc who wears a monocle and sips tea. But it's still me; it's a person having fun pretending to be something he's not, will never be, and something he probably wouldn't even really want to be for real. I guess I just have a zany personality once you get to know me...

>Do you strike up conversations in chat easier than you do in real social situations?

I would say yes, but only because I am much more likely to meet complete strangers and feel perfectly safe talking to them, since they're not actually in my computer room with a crowbar ready to brain me if I somehow offend them. But other than the talking to strangers thing, I interact in the chat room pretty much the same as I would at a real-life social gathering...mill around, talk and joke mostly with the people I already know, and occasionally strike up a conversation with someone I don't.

>Obviously, people who are in chat rooms are (normally) there to chat with other complete strangers, so you're more inclined to chat.

I suppose, if you look at your fellow chatters as complete strangers. I don't. I feel like I know these people, even though I've never met the vast majority of them face to face. I'm more inclined to chat because that's the reason the chat room is there! If I don't feel like chatting, I don't log into the room.

>How about think time? When writing things on message boards you can spend hours perfecting the text before posting it, and still have a conversation. You can't do that in a physical conversation. Also, when in chat rooms you're in more of a rush to get your point across. How do these sort of conversations compare to real ones? Maybe you research things before posting opinions.

I feel like the "think time," as you refer to it, is greater in an online chat room than in a face to face conversation. Because you're separated from the people you're conversing with by miles and miles of distance, and all you see are their words on the screen, you don't feel the pressure of the person sitting across from you waiting for you to answer them. But maybe that's just the way I personally speak with others. When I'm thinking about something in the chat room, I often get a "You still there, Grishny?" from the others, which is similar to what happens when I stop to think in a FTF conversation. But in a FTF conversation, I feel more pressure to hurry up and respond, because the other person is right there and I can see their facial expressions; body language; etc.

>How does the anonymity affect you? Do you get angry? Even violent? (Anyone who's ever been in RinkChat will know that scenes of gratuitous violence are commonplace)

I've never gotten seriously angry or violent in a chat room. I have gotten extremely annoyed before, but I try to keep in mind that I have been extremely annoying to others in the past. I believe my personality "makes the transition" well from "real life" to the chat room. I think most of the "gratuitous violence" found in RinkChat is all in good fun, just another example of play-acting. When /me smacks Tubba in the stomach with a 2x4, /me is doing so in the same manner that Bugs Bunny does it to Elmer Fudd or Yosemite Sam. In the chat room we're all toons; we can't really be killed or injured in any way.

>So, you may be Nigel Thorneberry (I'm not, and if you are then I don't know you, so this isn't personal) during the day, but who are you when you log on as MrFloppy? Could this lead to some split personality thing? Even in a mild sense.

I really doubt it.

Gri"pping reality isn't any fun! I'm going to hit you with a fi"sh(ny)