I agree completely - i tell people if they want to get a message to me to email to me because i will get it and will most likely remember to respond. If i need to take care of something at while at home i call my wife to send me an email reminder because after a long day at work i will forget it.

cell phone have changed the way we do things as well, just a few months back we were in our bed room reading and winding down from a hetic day and my wife's phone rang, when she answered it, it was our teen age daughter calling from her room to ask a question - we have laughed about it ever since and it has become a family joke to call one another when they are on the other side of the house. LOL

I have found the biggest problem with online forms of communication and other forms such as texting is the actual interpretation of the other persons words. I can't remember now how many times fights have been caused by miss understanding what the other person was saying. It can be quite horrible and stressful for no reason.

I do think that technology isolates us from each other. Communication through email, IMs, and text messaging loses the intimacy. To talk to someone face to face is very personal and technology robs us of that. The girl I recently broke up with communicated probably 80% of the time through email and text messages. With everyone. She didn't want to use up the minutes on her phone, not even with me. It was very frustrating but I will admit that I am better at expressing myself through writing than talking.

But there is so much room for misunderstanding with emails and especially text messages. I know several times she would get angry with me because she thought I was saying something that I wasn't. That's what really frustrated me. Instead of calling me and clarifying she would just get angry. When we tried to make it work again, our counselor recommended that we talk more face to face than email and text to avoid the misunderstandings. That worked for a while but then she was right back to emailing and texting. She would ask questions via tex that would take me longer to text back an answer than just talk about it. Again, frustration. She claimed that she was just too busy to call and talk to people and email and texting saves time. I guess that applied to me as well.

Social networking sites like FaceBook and MySpace are a double edged sword. We can reconnect with people we haven't seen in years but what about the people who are in our lives on a daily basis? Since we can see everything they've been doing maybe we don't feel the need to reach out and connect with them on a personal level.

Technology does save us time but at what cost?

I agree and disagree.
The internet has given me a way to communicate with people I'd never have the chance to (like with some of the people here on Thoughts).
In the same sense, I think that sometimes we rely on the internet too much. I think that sometimes we should just pick up the phone and call someone to say we're thinking about them - but the internet free's us up from making contact that way.
Thankfully - no, at home I don't get on the computer very much - if at all.

thank you all for your points of you! once i sat with my girlfriend in one room and we chatted via ICQ .lol! it took in about 3 minutes for us to begin laughing. lol!

I have had a personal experience in this. I think it does, but there are many ways we can do this. I think I can delve in deep to explain. Ok my husband is addicted to the phone. I sorta delt with that for a super long time and then I gave up on communication with him. Then I started writing here and I stopped waiting on him to communicate with me. Then when he got done with the phone he realised I was waiting no more and I was in silence. He saw what his addiction with the phone did and begged me to get off of the computer.

Now I ask him if he wants me off of it, but I explain to him that I can not deal with football and him staying on the phone, so you must decide really want to talk but in order to you must find a movie together. Comunication can not be a one way street if you know what I mean, so I give my husband the option, but he did not give me that at one time, but I cannot pay him back because he did not see the era in his way. You must stop in your tracks to communicate or it can cause problems in all ways. What I am saying is that all objects can become an addiction, but the computer can be more powerful than some. Just my opinion:) You made a good point and now you have a novel comment LOL> Thanks for sharing.

i am not against of novel comments! thank you for sharing your thoughts at my blog!

let me look into your eyes , and see your soul and then we can communicate ...puck

Very cool answer, Puck...wowza... (turning off the computer....)

I don't usually read blogs but for some reason I'm surfing through them today and this caught my interest.
Communicating by internet is great to a point but it has its limitations.
I can't really relate to someone thoroughly unless I can make eye contact and read the body language. There's so much more to communicating than words alone.
I fear that those who depend on the internet for meaningful relationships are very apt to be disappointed in the long run. It is very easy to project a false image when you can't be seen.
Just my personal opinion. But I would never commit myself to a relationship with someone I met through the internet.

thank you for sharing your mind with us! i am glad you liked my post enough to leave your comment here! all the best!

it is indeed a two edged sword.. and it is creating a generation gap. one stiking example to me was during the first of the financial crisis. Mclain flew to Washington... Obama did not. different generations.. to McLain.. anything too serious for the phone had to be dealt with face to face. he was used to only those options. Obama was comfortable with realtime updates, pertinant websites, e-mails, texting.. he felt he could get what he needed electronically. I find I'm okay if i use it to expand,not replace..

It is a technology. What matters is how it is used. I would not be surprized if when writing was invented, people moaned that it was destroying real communication.

interesting point of view! i mean about writing! thanks!

I agree and disagree. I work with the public in courts and the law, and what I'm seeing with the younger generation is that they learn text messaging before English grammar and spelling. (Did I spell "grammar" correctly?) LOL

It bothers me when people prepare legal pleadings as though it's a text message -- and it bothers the judges also. They already have to liberally construe pleadings prepared by non-attorneys. Now, they have to interpret text message acronyms.

That's not all. It is very frustrating waiting on people when they decide to check their cell phone to see who is calling or texting while others waiting in line and signs that say, "Please turn cell phones off." They interpret that to mean "put on vibrate" rather than off. There have been times I've asked people to step aside so I can wait on the next person because it doesn't make sense that I have to repeat myself because their attention is on a text message or caller ID.

Email is a fantastic form of communication -- but I do cringe when receiving forwarded emails -- the impersonal type that contains a threat if you don't pass it on and send it back to the person who sent it. I delete them without responding.

there was a study i heard about this past year, proving that texting has brought couples together.. hmm.. not too sure about that but i guess it keeps the communication alive, i say if writing helps people get out their emotions then why not. but i think we shouldn't rely solely on the internet thats for sure. :)

certainly, we'll not be able to refuse from using Internet completely now. It is our great helper already! thank you all for your opinions and sharing them with us here! I do appreciate this! all the best for you, my friends!

Just passing through and I must say that to depend on e-mail and texting for most of communicating is a relationship death wish. So many conversations can get misunderstood. For anything in-depth and really meaning full then I suggest face-to-face conversation or the least on the phone.
Proper communication has tone, tension, and pauses for thoughts, sight, and rapport and so much more than words on a screen can do.
Good topic :-)

Thank you! Have a wonderful week and thanks for passing through!