With such leaps and bounds in technology over the last decade, I feel that all aspects of the media and social networking are a double edge sword. I do believe that email and text messaging have allowed society to become very impersonal, yet more efficient at the same time.
I have to wonder if this ability has hinder our basic face to face communication skills to a certain extent. I am sure that we have all ran into the email tough guy who is much more bold than if it were a conversation in person. I have personally vigorously typed an email out of anger, but more often than not don't hit send. I instead ponder/ review the content and make sure that it is being communicated in a constructive manner.
I am assuming that I am not the only person that holds the term "friend" a little closer to the heart than a mere number of facebook friends. I will more than likely refer to them as acquaintance. I have found that our development in technology allows many friends and family to stay connected when away on business to other countries. So it defiantly has a stronger set of pros than cons in my opinion, as long as people are able to stay connected with core communication skills.
I have to wonder if this ability has hinder our basic face to face communication skills to a certain extent. I am sure that we have all ran into the email tough guy who is much more bold than if it were a conversation in person. I have personally vigorously typed an email out of anger, but more often than not don't hit send. I instead ponder/ review the content and make sure that it is being communicated in a constructive manner.
Your post has made me think about my friends and my FB friends. Many of my FB friends are people I have known, but lost touch with because of moving, so we use FB. But it cannot compare with getting together with a real friend, that I can call and invite over or out. It does make me hold them a little closer to my heart.
ReplyDeleteAs for the angry email. I remember when my mother did not understand that using all caps was an expression of anger and she sent all of her emails in all caps. Funny! I usually won't say something in an email that I won't say to someone's face. It is so much more difficult to mend fences if the damage is done through email or worse - on FB.