Food for Thought: Alternative Accounts also known as Alts – Ccoursey Reporting…

            Have you ever approached an avatar on Second Life and they already knew you, talked as if they were your best friend, yet you’d never even heard the name mentioned before and/or they were really young compared to the people you are usually around? 

Then they tell you they are the alternative avatar or another, an alt.  We’ve all met one, some don’t even own up to being alts.  When is it time to call your Second Life quits and began anew?   Is there a time?  Why do people make alts?  I’m only four months old and I had an alt for all of a week.  Yes, I was ready to disappear from current radar and drop off the current road I was taking.  A friend made a comment that really stuck with me though:  People who are alts are too cowardly to face the paths they have carved.  True or False?

            Out of the alts I’ve met they usually have their own reason for doing so, but they usually, (not always), fit into one of five categories.  I’m not saying you have to fit one, but usually they can fit in one of these once simplified.

1)    The Bank.  Business owners have sploders, contests boards, rent, etc. to pay out and all those lindens get hard to keep track of, especially when you are buying and selling constantly.  They can also be useful in bloodlines for a supply of blood, extra souls, or just another body to add to clan.  I call these bank, because they aren’t an avatar someone jumps on often, they are just for storage.  The bank can also be the ones to make the money or earn the gifts.  Someone would perhaps chose to leave this alt in a store modeling or in a camping chair for hours at a time.

   2)    The Playboy/Playgirl.   We all know that happy couple that makes you want to gag whenever you are around them they are discussing how much they love each other.  Then you are in a club and you start talking to someone and they were using the same love lines you heard from the gag me couple.  For some reason you will see a person in a relationship then catch them out and about with others in another avatar…  Of course if you call them on it you hear the same old thing: I didn’t want to hurt them, I felt smothered, or we have an open relationship, it’s other people that don’t understand.  *Shakes my head*  It’s a way of playing the field while not having to hurt someone’s feelings, and it’s shady in my opinion. 

3)    The Business Owner.  This was the category I fit whenever I had my alt.  As a club owner I was constantly getting im’s, paged, and generally had no ‘me’ time.  I would be doing something and of course, a dire emergency would come up that would force me to stop doing my own thing and prance off into Second Life to take care of the situation.  After going through this, I completely understand why one chooses to have an alt, but as was pointed out to me, that is the downside of having an SL business.  Then again I would straight up tell people in my profile and in im’s that I was an alt, very honest about it.

4)    TroubleMaker.  This person might have something like ‘this isn’t my first avi’ or ‘I’m older than what you think’ written in the profile of the avatar you are looking at.  Sometimes they won’t even discuss it, but there will be some reason or another they will tell you they had to get another avatar.  People in this category, in my opinion, are going to be the ones to stir the drama.  They don’t want to discuss the last issue since they are either hiding from someone or done something stupid to have the first avi taken away.  There’s absolutely no reason a person should have to hide who they are.  This is one that usually just screams ‘trouble follows me’, then there are times they will lie about it, but it is no less true.  They could have fifteen alts and all they are doing is stirring it up then dropping down the extra avatars to try to intimidate someone or even harass them since they keep getting blocked.

   5)    The Wizzer.  The wizzer never fails to amaze me.  As a vampire in my old clan I hunted noobs.  The wizzer was the one that would become unhappy with their avi and suddenly drop another down.  They might be shy, not able to find friends, or they might just get tired of looking at that body and don’t feel like changing the whole thing, choosing to drop another.  Yes, I’ve seen a noob chose to drop alts like crazy for the simple fact they wanted a little change.  I find it scary no matter what, because they drop them so quick and generally don’t hesitate to recreate another.

Everyone has their own reasons for having an alt, but the more that simple sentence was stuck in my head the more it made sense to me.  Why would I give up everything on my avatar, all the work I’d put in, all the friends I have made just to do it again?  There isn’t a good reason, and I found even when I was trying to be out enjoying myself I’d worry about my friends and club anyway.  It is easier just to hit the busy response and ignore the calls for attention.

Do you have an alt?  Does it fit into one of these categories?  Or are you one of the ones that will not even talk to alts and blocking them as soon as you find out.  I’ve been accused of being an alt dozens of times, usually it comes out like an insult, but not at this point. I am not an alt, nor do I have one.  It makes you wonder the kind of alts people have had to deal with when they automatically block you after the accusations fly…  Yet is there a point when enough is enough and an alt is the only way to go?

What are your thoughts on Alts? Use the comment box below to share your thoughts.