Similar to OurStory, which I wrote about yesterday, is Dandelife, which describes itself as a social biography network, a “social network built around the telling of your life’s stories.” The Dandelife folks coined the term “lifecasting,” which is apparently what you do at Dandelife.
I am fascinating by this concept of socially constructing our identities in the virtual world. How do we portray our identities, our stories, ourselves online differently from the way we do in other venues? No need to ask which one is real; they are all real. I believe there is no objective reality; reality is socially constructed through language, stories, conversations, etc.
Both Our Story and Dandelife veer toward constructing reality visually – with lots of photos and video. As a words gal, I’m not quite on board with this approach, although I recognize its value.
For a very fleshed-out example of a social biography on the Dandelife network, see this one by founder http://www.dandelife.com/kga245 Kelly Abbott.