Digital Identifications and It's Place Digital Rhetoric

In response to James P. Zappen's article "Digital Rhetoric: Toward an Integrated Theory", rhetoric is an ongoing construction of little truths rather than an exact big "T", which basically means (or so I believe) that rhetoric has been a theory and therefore, will continue to evolve into a changed theory and with it will be integration of new methods and in today's world the digital rhetoric.

I went online to find the digital meaning of the word rhetoric and the result that popped up on the first page of google as the second meaning was this: language designed to have a persuasive or impressive effect on its audience, but often regarded as lacking in sincerity or meaningful content.  I find this interesting, when considering the digital personas that are created either to subside an identification to become more neutralized of a voice so that the speaker is not judged upon their gender, race, age, class, etc.  Zappen says, "Anonymity encourages experiments in self and gender identities, but it also problematizes notions of authorship and ownership and encourages “flaming”—the hostile expression of strong emotions". This matters to those who wish to trust the authorship and who have certain ideas on what that means: Does a person lying about their "identification" mean that they are somebody that shouldn't be trusted, otherwise?

I know of many Facebook personas that are represented by friends and in real life an outsider would never expect that they were the same person: real life person and Facebook persona?  What does this say about authorship online, does it matter, when and how?

I think that it comes down to the separation that Zappen makes from classical rhetoric and digital rhetoric: 

"Studies of the new digital media also explore some of the purposes and outcomes of communication in digital spaces: not only persuasion for the purpose of moving audiences to action or belief, but also self-expression for the purpose of exploring individual and group identities and participation and creative collaboration for the purpose of building communities of shared interest". 

My question: Does this added element of the digital media represent digital rhetoric or should it be considered under a different theory?