The very basis of virtual identity builds skepticism into enthusiastic prototyping. Like the society at a masquerade ball, the virtual community masks real-world identities in order to engage fantasy possibilities. You give your identity online to an avatar but that virtual identity simultaneously withdraws the real self. Privacy remains inherent in virtual identities and gives them the power of fantastic freedom. Virtual identities withhold the full commitment typical of traditional utopians.
Suspension of disbelief is both the price and the prize for entering cyberspace.
Traditional utopias, whether spiritual or technological, require purgation, elimination, and abstraction. Virtual worlds, by contrast, amplify, augment, and proliferate. Cyberspace is infinite space. It is a nurturing emptiness that evokes continuous creativity. Like software, cyberspace is never finished.