Monday, May 21, 2012

OMG Lets Lay Down Some Ground Rules


Lets talk about a subject that affects us all in today's age of modern technology. No i'm not talking about homosexuality; I was actually referring to texting and its closely related friend instant messaging. These two are more or less the same thing with subtle differences but both fall under a set of rules that I like to refer to as textiquette. As time trudges on and technology becomes more and more advanced we have seen a steady improvement in our communication methods over the years. From painting in caves, to smoke signals, to telegraphs, to telephones, to emails, to instant messaging we see one improvement after the other. We have managed to reach the heights of communication that we never thought were possible; alas with great power comes great responsibility (classic Spiderman quote that is so profoundly applicable to life). As such we must try to observe a certain protocol and decorum as far as certain aspects of this wonderful thing goes so that it can blossom into something even more wonderful than it already is.

Lets go over some situations:

1. We have all been there; one word responses are a bitch. You are there messaging away, feeling like you are having a great conversation explaining something in detail and them BLAM; you get back a 'k' in response. This is a big no no as far as observing proper textiquette goes; granted there is some leeway where it is an appropriate response there should never be a section of a conversation where you have 3 consecutive one word responses as it more or less gives off the vibe that you either don't want to talk or really aren't that interested in the conversation in the first place and are trying to end it without being obvious.  Remember people a conversation takes more than one person so you should probably be using more than one word; unless your a crazy person that talks to yourself for whatever reason.

2. You are having a conversation about something and then you get a random out of the blue message which has nothing to do with the topic at hand. I'm sure many of us have both done it and had it happened to them at some point or another. The awkward wrong message moment. Now i'm not trying to say you can't multitask or carry on multiple conversations as such but it really messes up the flow of a conversation trying to either figure out what the meaning behind the random message is or if you are the person that did it trying to cover it up and play it off. Not to mention you don't wanna be a dick and make the person feel as if they are not that important that you weren't paying proper attention to them. Not cool dude; not cool at all...


3. Now we all know that dependent on varying circumstances you may or may not get a speedy reply. Let's take the case of two random people; texting rapidly back and forth and then all of a sudden one of them sits waiting on a reply for an hour. No one likes to be left hanging, but that still doesn't dictate that the person should be readily offended as sometimes extenuating circumstances can affect the course of the conversation and you should be considerate of that just as the other person should be as well and take the time to either say brb or gimme a sec as soon as the chance arises. 

4. Using random abbreviations. Now I know that its texting and for things like twitter or using a phone to text message you have a certain character limit that you must try to get your message across with but for the love of God don't just go making up random shit on the spot and expect that the other person will know what you mean. Certain abbreviations are acceptable and well know i.e. lol, brb, ttyl, lmao, etc.; but then you have the not so known abbreviations or ambiguous ones like NM (nothing much/nevermind), FML (for my loss/fuck my life), WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get), etc. Please do exercise caution/patience where needed as your message may not be conveyed properly or the person may have to text you back to ask what the abbreviation means. A bit of advice as well, when texting be sure to use emoticons where applicable as it better helps to convey the message you are trying to get across. Plus everyone knows bitches love smiley faces.


5. Lastly I want to make mention of a practice that seemingly becomes the norm more and more for people everywhere. Appearing offline. I just don't see why you are going to hide your presence because you don't feel like talking to anyone or a certain someone in particular. If you don't want to talk to someone you have two obvious options; you can either not have them on your contact list or if they initiate a conversation with you you can just say your busy and cant talk or tell them you don't feel like talking much right now so you will talk to them some other time. Whats so hard in that? No instead you act as if you are some super secret important spy that has to hide and act all secretive because your a secretly secret person that has secrets. Then you have those people who up and go offline because they see someone sign in to Facebook chat that they want to avoid or they tell someone they want to stop talking to that they are going to bed but yet still post status updates and all sorts of stuff. C'mon now; can't you be mature about things like this?

Anywhore that's just some of the major things I wanted to touch on regarding our current state of fast paced communication.  Granted that I know there will be those people out there that are against trying/doing any of these suggestions; there isn't much reason for you not to. These are all pretty basic tips to help improve your communication skills via texting/instant messaging; what do you have to lose..? Feel free to share your comments below or say any other situations that bother you about texting on a whole. A word to the wise is sufficient...



4 comments

May 22, 2012 at 8:27 AM

And thts the way its done

May 22, 2012 at 11:41 AM

indeed. now if only more people would do it the way it was meant to be done

Anonymous
May 23, 2012 at 2:10 AM

I disagree with #2, first of all dude who have you been talking to ? why would anyone try to " cover it up and play off" making a sending error, obviously you have a strange list of friends I simply just say "oops my bad that message wasnt for you" multiple convos are inevitable thats why you can switch chat on bbm or have multiple chats open on any social site its not rude its just the way it is .

May 23, 2012 at 2:17 AM

well i did say "Now i'm not trying to say you can't multitask or carry on multiple conversations as such". just saying that for the people who it happens to frequently that its kinda inconsiderate a bit and displays a lack of interest to an extent.

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