Avatars - Virtual vs. Synthetic World

Many of us have some sort of virtual persona whether it is in the form of an avatar using Facebook or some sort of synthetic game world.  The profile that we construct of ourselves, the pictures we upload, the friends that we accept, the types of games we play, the text we put out for the world to read - these are all tools we are using to construct a virtual identity for ourselves.

As Watkins explains, "Maintaining a virtual self in Facebook, for instance, is very different than maintaining a virtual self in WoW.  Whereas users of Facebook engage in identity management and self representation, users of synthetic worlds engage in identity play and self experimentation."  He argues that the person being represented in the world of Facebook is most closely related to the individual that you are in the physical world.  Most people try to construct their pages to the person that most people know them as.  On the other hand, the person that is represented in the role playing gaming world scene does not expect that you match the person that you are in the physical world.  Building an avatar in the gaming world is more imaginary and for the sake of experimenting.  Many people take this new avatar to be something that represents their being as an "alternative, imagined, or second self."

I find this all to be very interesting because I agree with it all 100%.  People on Facebook do try to construct their page to closely resemble themselves (aside from the pedophiles of course).  Now with businesses and organizations having the ability to look through people's Facebook's, some people are tying to make it truly represent the type of person they want their potential future employer to see.  I can argue with that though that you are not fully representing yourself completely because you may be holding yourself back from fully expressing yourself in an effort to keep your page "clean."  Nonetheless, people making avatars for a synthetic world don't have to try to make it resemble their physical self for two reasons:
1.  No one knows if that truly looks like you or not, so who cares?
2.  Many people go to a synthetic world to escape from the real world, so why try to do anything that reminds you of the world you are trying to escape from for a short period of time?

I think having a new avatar that resembles nothing of yourself is both a positive and negative thing.  I believe it to be positive because people are able to play around and use their imagination to create this avatar that they want to use while enjoying their gaming experience.  I get it; it brings a sense of joy to the game play.  However, I also believe this to be a negative thing because it could be reinforcing ideas of things people do not like about themselves.  By constructing an avatar that does not resemble themself, it could potentially be resembling the person they wish they could be, and that can start to reinforce negative emotions on one's self esteem and confidence.

Do you think that creating new avatars is a positive or negative thing?  Do you think it creates too much of a disconnect from themselves to the real world, and if so could there be any potential consequences to this?