Talk:Mara Varady

Hi Mara,

I think you did a really nice job exploring your use of Facebook and how it relates to your offline self. I particularly enjoyed when you were talking about using the Timeline Review to tailor the pictures that you allowed when you are riding. The use of the images with the light editing to make the visuals more noticeable for non-equestrian riders was appreciated as well. The last line in that section, where you talk about being ‘the best version of myself’ which you equate to being ‘the best rider that I can be’, highlighted how curation was important to the way that you develop your separate representations. I wish, however, that you had talked a bit more about what else was important to you. Earlier in that paragraph, you mention that while riding was an important part of you, it was only one part. If riding is only one part, but it takes up so much of your profile, what does a regular user end up missing out on? Is it something you find important to your sense of self, or just something that is a part of your life and which you want to participate in a lot?

Regarding your sections, Quiet Around Strangers and Loud Around Friends, I think that the ideas presented work well to describe how you behave in offline contexts and the complexity of your self-presentation. The point about the public, semi-public, and private portions of Facebook was interesting, I wish you had had the opportunity to further explore the way that you present your self online through these three different contexts!

Lastly, I enjoyed the tone of the work, though sometimes it took a re-reading of a sentence to understand who you were referencing when the sentence involved yourself, Mara, and someone else, due to keeping track of you and Mara as separate entities though all background information was about yourself, so any references to that were referring to you though sometimes it referred to Mara’s past. Adding in an additional subject just added to the slight confusion sometimes. I might recommend better distinguishing yourself from your online persona or slight restructuring to sentences so that it flows a bit smoother.

- Lauren