Saturday, Apr. 03, 2010 1:20 p.m.

chatroulette and more

K introduced me to chatroulette last night. Basically, what it is is a website that sets you up with a random video chat of someone else out there in the world who is also signed up to chatroulette at the moment. You have the power to disconnect from whoever you got and get a new person whenever you'd like...or if someone disconnects from you, you automatically get a new person too.

K had told me about it before and that every other person was a guy jerking off. I of course don't doubt that some people choose to do this, but I also know that K often exaggerates, so after a couple drinks late last night, we decided to try it out. K changed his mind though, and said the ratio of normal people:guys jerking off was really more like 1:7. So I told him we do 14 people, and 2 of them better be guys masturbating, or else he'd lose our pretend bet.

The first 5 or 6 people were just normal people, some creepy old guys, some likely stoned teenagers. We didn't speak to anyone, just saw them for a second or two. The 8th or 9th person was a girl who looked an AWFUL lot like Jessica Alba, and K swore that it was her, as she's apparently one of the celebrities that first brought this thing out into the public...and a quick google search just now just confirmed this.

At first, I was feeling pretty confident that I'd win our bet and not see two penises, but Person #10, sure enough, was a guy jerking off. We quickly passed to #11, but since I was already a little tipsy, I just cracked up laughing! Granted, I was kind of appalled, but I was also kind of shocked.

Persons #11, #12, and #13 were all normal, but sure enough, #14 was not. Technically, I still won K and I's bet, as this was not a guy jerking off, but instead actually having sex! Our very unfortunate angle was the back of the guy as he was thrusting into the girl. We again quickly changed to #15, (thankfully) another normal, boring person.

We played chatroulette for a bit longer, actually stopping and "head-bob dancing" with two guys who were wearing 80s neon shades and briefly conversing with some guy who had a Texas flag on the wall behind him.

Overall it was a great 15 min. of 2am, tipsy fun. But today, I can't stop thinking about it.

The images from #10 and #14 are stuck in my head. And of course, their shock values will make them stick for much longer than I'd like them to. Part of me thinks, well, it's just sexual acts. It's natural and though perhaps somewhat inappropriate for public viewing, why should I be squeamish about it seeing it? Afterall, I went into chatroulette knowing that was possible. But another part of me is disgusted and worried, not about the display of "lewd" acts, but about the lack of moderation that exists within that world.

I suppose you can take quick screen shots before either you or the other person pass by, but other than that, there is NO accountability, no login names, no way of finding a person you previously spoke with or viewed. As was the case of #10 and #14 and a couple other chats, no faces were shown and there was no way to identify anyone or anything seen. Each chat was a weird portal into anonymous homes and lives. Though chatroulette says that you have to be 16+ and that you should remain fully clothed, there is NOTHING to enforce this. And this scares me.

I asked K earlier what if someone committed a murder or rape or something equally as horrid while on chatroulette? Dozens of people would go in and out of video chat observing this gruesome video. How would they notify authorities? No one knows where it it taking place.

I just did a google search and on wikipedia found that apparently if 3 users in 5 minutes click the "report user" button, that the offending user will be banned...for 40 minutes. Ok, so let's say a murder (without faces being shown) could take place on chatroulette - and let's say that 3 people in 5 minutes find the images to be too graphing (imagine that - an actual murder being "too graphic"?) and the video goes offline for 40 minutes. So now NO ONE knows what a possible murderer could be doing. What's worse - someone having evidence of a murder taking place but not being able to prove or place the location or person? Or random people matched with their chat, unable to help, get the user banned for a whole 40 minutes so now no one could help?

I don't know, and this is just one situation, and I feel that they must be working on a way to prevent something like this from happening. But overall, it's just a weird realization of whee our world is going to.

I tried mentioning my thoughts on all this to K as we were driving to the coffee shop we're now at, on our separate laptops (macs, of course, aren't we just so "cool"? ugh.), and we briefly talked, but as soon as he got here, he said he didn't care and just wanted to focus on writing and this was why he originally didn't even want me to come along. I told him I knew, and that he never really cared what I wanted to talk about. We forgave each other about 10 min. later, but it doesn't change the fact that both things we said we pretty much true.

I worry about the life K and I are getting into. He's just starting to get successful, and I've been standing by him for years, patiently waiting and putting up with his crazy long hours and his extreme focus on his work even when he is home. I've supported him in all of this, thinking that all this hard work will pay off and soon we'll be able to relax some and enjoy life. All the camping trips and just normal married couple life stuff I'd like to and have been putting off will come later. I hope. I no longer know. Maybe this is how it always will be.

It's strange, but as K works more and more and our money slowly starts coming in larger chunks from this entertainment industry that quietly steers society in a direction I don't like...the more I find myself wanting to go back in time and reject most of the "conveniences" of modern technology.

We're moving in a couple weeks to get our dog back. We'll have a small yard, and I've already planned out my garden. I bought a book a couple months ago on herbal remedies and I plan to grow as extensive of an herb garden that I can manage in the space I have. I like the idea of having the knowledge and independence of being my first line of my own medical defense. It makes me feel just a tiny bit of control in this crazy world that is spiraling too fast into ever-changing modernity.

(as a disclaimer of sorts: I am in no way a "green" individual and I could care less about climate change or eating organic or being anti-capitalist or whatever crap people popularly claim. For me, I'm excited about growing a garden because it makes me feel like I have some control of my life if I can provide some of my own food or basic medical treatment. I only really started to get interested in herbal remedies since my research into fertility-inducing herbs)

As a side note: You know, people say it's lonely being a stay-at-home-mom and that I should be thankful of all the time I have now...but I'm not. I wish I had something to fill my time with. I'm not a stay-at-home-mom, I'm a stay-at-home-NOTHING...not even a stay-at-home-wife, as to be I'd have to have a husband home often enough to be able to fulfill any "wifey" roles. I don't even get to do that. I'd rather spend my time with the responsibility (and sleep-deprivation) of caring for an infant by myself than the loneliness and boredom of spending it with my computer or television.

Neither of us would EVER EVER do this and we trust each other a lot, but because we see and know so little about each other's daily lives, it'd be very easy for either us to be having an affair right now and neither ever know.

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