Blog: You know, in a strange way we have almost fulfilled our own futuristic, sci-fi predictions on the progression of the human race, writes Emma Suddaby.

We have very nearly become the body-less head in a big bell-jar straight out of old-school Doctor Who episodes. The detached head, with its massive, over-developed brain that kept me hiding behind the sofa on many a school night..

A bit left-field maybe, but just hear me out on this one before you completely write me off …

You see, we almost have two separate personas these days, our everyday self and our online self. The everyday self is made up of all you are. What you look like, sound like, your tastes and opinions. But the online self becomes a caricature of your real personality, your disembodied brain out there in cyberspace, living a virtual life within the World Wide Web. And because we consciously create our online persona, we tend to strip away all the dull, boring bits of who we really are, creating a stronger, braver version ourselves, our own avatar, to represent us in cyberspace.

Just look at Ryan Cleary – spotty Essex teenager currently accused of masterminding the international computer hacking group Lulzsec. What a disappointing master criminal!

As he now knows only too well, it’s easy to get so involved in our “avatar life” that we start to detach it from who we are in the real world. And from there it’s a short stop to forgetting that what we get up to online can, and often will, come back to haunt us on some wet and windy morning in the real world when we are least expecting it.

Poor Carolyn Bourne is a case in point – labelled as the mother in law from hell, she will now forever be remembered for sending out an ill-advised email to her prospective daughter in law, listing the poor girl’s faults and faux pas during her first (and perhaps last!) stay at the Bourne family home.

OK, Heidi Withers sounds an irritating house guest but Carolyn Bourne – if she truly lives up to the standards she mourns the lack of in her daughter-in-law-to-be – should never have sent that email. Write it by all means, and savour each poisonous, damning sentence, but never, ever, send it.

Oh the luxury of hindsight, Mrs Bourne…

But on a more serious note, this sort of online nastiness is on the increase with businesses forced to introduce new guidelines reminding staff of the importance of discretion whilst using the web.

It seems folk just get carried away from within the apparent safety of a seemingly anonymous screen name, forgetting the restraints of polite society.

So just in case you’re about to forget the traceability of your online persona and commit an embarrassing internet indiscretion, stop and think.

And remember that just because you’re surfing a virtual world, forgetting your manners won’t just make you virtually rude…