In what ways do you communicate online?
How do I communicate online? Like this. Like what I’m doing now. I type what I want to say. I’m guessing this question can have a deeper meaning in terms of do we communicate for business, for social reasons, etc. Obviously I have to do a lot of communicating online through email and Zoom conferences and Teams meetings and all that “work stuff” when I’m at work.
When I’m at home (and to be honest, when I’m taking a break at work), I do a lot of communicating through social media. I’ve mentioned before about my “online knitting friends” and they are probably the best example of how the internet can take a group of strangers and turn them into life-long friends. Seriously. Life-long. Some of the older members of my knitting group have plans with other members for what they should do with their yarn stash when they die. It’s a logical thing to do. When I grow up I’m going to do the same. I’m going to pick someone to take my yarn stash and do what is proper with it—give it or sell it to other knitters. I love my husband but I don’t trust him to not sell my good yarn for a dollar a skein. But I digress.
This online group of knitters/crocheters are such good friends because the internet has allowed us to communicate in a way that is a lot less pressure than an in-person conversation. Granted, we do meet up with each other in “real life” each year for our knitting “camp” and we often do Zoom sessions where we log on and chat while we knit, each from our own homes, which are scattered all throughout the world by the way. One day I’ll get to meet the members from New Zealand. I’ve already met one of the Canadians, who really does have the stereotypical Canadian accent. She vehemently denies that she has one. But for the most part, our group communicates via a message board. You can take your time replying so you can think of exactly what you want to say. Or you can do like I do and get so comfortable that you post over 40,000 messages. Obviously not all at once. I have been a member of the group for about 15 years now.
Online communication is a blessing for the introverts among us (myself included) who want to socialize but have a hard time with real-time conversation. I can communicate in-person, but I don’t always want to.
Also, I would be remiss if I didn’t include the fact that I met my husband online. Back in the early days of AOL when you could post a personal ad for free on their Love@AOL section. He responded to my personal ad with an email, as was the way back then. That was back in 2000. I still have that first email. I printed out the first few months of emails from him. I made sure to do that before deleting my AOL account. I’ll keep the first line (i.e. his pick up line) of his email to myself. I thought it was adorable, though I think he would think it’s cringey (even though he wrote it).
With all of that said, thank you Al Gore, or whoever is now claiming responsibility for the invention of the Internet. You have opened up an entire world of friendship and love simply by giving us all a way to communicate with one another at our own pace, in our own way, and in our own time.
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