The Curious Case of Chatroulette, I: Enter the Roulette
By now you've probably heard of Chatroulette, and if not, well, get out from under that rock and let's have a quick talk.Chatroulette connects you and random other users of the site through your webcams. You click play and it pairs you up, and once you see the other person, you have the option of "nexting" them to start the process again. You can wave, you can have a conversation, you can yell at the other person - the magic and virtue of the whole thing is that you can press "Next" and chances are the person is gone from your life forever.Which means you see a lot of weird and creepy stuff on the Chatroulette. Namely, male genitalia. Lots of them.Once you get past the gross stuff, though, it really is an Internet phenomenon and just "feels important" for some kind of zeitgeist-y reason. Not to mention it's amazing to watch your friends develop their Chatroulette skills, from feeling awkward about seeing random people, to chatting with them eventually, to then mustering up the courage to shout or bark at them or just generally be as goofy as possible on the thing.And doing it from Princeton, well, adds an interesting dimension.Because so much of the experience hinges on knee-jerk reactions to someone's face/other bodily parts, first impressions matter. In fact, they're the only thing that matter. If you manage to get in a word without a person nexting you, congratulations - you're not offensively ugly.But mention you're from Princeton, and man, their eyes kind of widen a little and they immediately start badgering you with questions."Are you really smart!?" "You're full of shit." "Yeah man I'm at Yale!!!" (Okay, guy with OU banner.) "OHHHH DAMN!" "Oh my god!!! Why aren't you studying!?!?" "What's that? That like Harvard?" "Yo why you on this thing???"Because, guy wearing a fake moustache, we're really just like you. Chatroulette punctures the Orange Bubble, albeit really weakly and superficially, and lets us look at the outside world - and the outside world looks in, messy dorm room, sweats, and all. In the strangely, disturbingly intimate world of Chatroulette, Princetonians seem like normal people, contrary to popular belief.Check back soon for some Princetonians' own encounters on Chatroulette.