In face to face communications we can not lie about our biological sex or our height, but with technology everything is possible. You can say that you are a woman if you are a man, or you can say that you are 26 and be and underage or , even, you can be someone famous that you do not even know. It is so easy to steal someone´s else personality through the Internet or be a new person, whoever you want to be.
A girl in my university, has 2 facebook profiles. One is the real one and there are a lot of people who do not want to be friends with her. And the other one is a cartoon related with the University and with the university name as the name of the facebook profile (something like here with Rider Bronc), and she is friend with everyone and got invited to all the events and parties going on in the University. People was always complaining about she knows about every party although she was not invited until someone realized what was her strategy.
Assumption #2: Online discussions often prompt introspection
In face to face communications we do not have time to think about the other´s message deeply and we answer without really thinking about it. We are supposed to think about it once the conversation is over and we regret about a word said or maybe we think that we misunderstood something,but in the technology world we have plenty of time to think about it and our answers reflects out thinkings, feelings and fears.
Imagine that you receive an e-mail from your boss saying that you both are going to have a private meeting after the weekend. So can figure out that he is going to fire you, or that you are going to have a better place within the company or that he wants to move you out of the country. So, our answer is going to be biased by our thinkings and he is going to feel something wrong if you did not interpret the same thing he was trying to say.
Assumption #3: Online discussions promote self-orientation.
In face to face communication the receiver of the information is really important part in the communication,because if you are talking to something, he is supposed to be listening to you and you will have an answer immediately. Moreover, if someone do not answer you back, that is a big deal, and you will be really mad at him/her. But, in the other hand, in the technology information, we are not as concerned about if the other is going to answer us. How many times did you post something in your friend´s wall and they did not post something back to you? How many times did it happen with an inbox? And with an e-mail? And also, with call and texts. It´s not a big deal for you and either is for them.
Assumption #4: Self-disclosure occurs online.
It is known by everyone that is not that difficult to express things (such emotions, feelings, impressions, opinions,...) by the Internet than in communications face to face. In face to face communications you have to deal with the other one´s facial expressions and reactions personally meanwhile in the electronic communications you not that shy and you can,also, hide your emotions.
For instance, my very best girlfriend, she rarely tell me that she loves me personally, but she does a lot by the Internet. And it is weird, because it is not just through the Internet, she does not express it when we are in the same province or we are going to see each other really soon; it only happens when we really miss each other and we are not going to face the expression of our emotions in the short run.
OTHER CONCEPTS-
Screen names- Our real name is was given to us in our birth and we had no choice about making any decision or change on it. But, in our screen name, we are the ones who decide about it, we create our own personality and we can be creative during making it. Also, we can express our interests (if your nickname is Yankeessss or LaDyGaGa), we can express our date of birth ( Isabella84 or Mark96) and other different things, as for example, where are you from (Russianfriend or Colombian). Also, this is much more easier to change than a real name, because all you have to do is to change your e-mail address or to ask for a name change to the provider.
Privacy Sacrificed- We are choosing everyday communication and information over personal privacy. So, in order to get an instant quote on an insurance car, we must give all our information (name, address, phone, e-mail, social security number, income, driving license number, ...) to the insurance company. Through the insurance company, a lot of other companies with agreements with the insurance company, can access to your information and bother you offering some products or services. Also, whenever we are writing to someone an e-mail, we are trusting in that person than if you have a face to face communication because now, that person has a record of what you were saying.
Widening your social network- Is that really what we are doing? Well, it is true that we have 300, 500, 1000 or 2000 friends of facebook, but how many of them are really our friends? How many of them do you feel comfortable sending an inbox to them? Or how many of them do you have their cell phones? I do not think that it makes you have a wider social network, because that people are not even going to say you "hi" in the street or on campus. Your social network is wider is you want to stalk people´s profiles or if you want to know about more events going on on campus but that is not widening your actual social network.
Personal Home Pages- The information is presented exactly how you want it to be presented. You are not going to upload your worst picture to be your profile picture; you are going to use one of your best ones or one of the ones that makes you more interesting or attractive to the people you want to pay attention to you. You can modified all your information in many different ways and make people think that is your actual trustful information.
Write literally- You can not even imagine how different can be a sentence interpreted by different people or by the same people in different situations. Imagine that you are really mad to someone and this person is being ironic to you, you are not going to get the joke, and you are going to be even more mad than before. And remember a corollary of Murphy´s law: " If nothing can go wrong. It will anyway!". When the receiver is in a good mood it could also happen some misunderstandings . For avoiding any misunderstanding we should write as much literally as we could.
To sum up, we have to be very conscious about our "other" life online and we should have on mind that everything on the Internet is affecting our real life and it will be there in the future, even if you do not want to.
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