Brain Dump #3

This braindump will be more 'directed' and edited than the previous ones. Because this time I have chosen a theme I would like to explore. The theme is the difference between an offline and an online social encounter and it has emerged during the past few weeks of observing my own social media use. I have come across the returning question of: What is the difference between e.g. online instant messaging and talking to someone face-to-face?

You can run, but you can't hide?
The first thing I think about when trying to compare offline and online communication is the level of intimacy or 'contact'. It seems that face-to-face communication is more personal, intimate and 'confronting'. When communicating online, you can 'hide', postpone messages, choose not to respond to a post, a message or alike (I find that difficult face-to-face). You can 'hide' behind the technology; you can be anonymous and you can deliberately decide what to write and thus how to come across to other people. It seems that there is a larger deal of control involved in online communication as opposed to offline, face-to-face encounter, where you are communicating in real-time and 'real-face'. Also it seems that you 'give off' more impressions (Goffman) face-to-face than you do online. Online you do not have the possibility of showing body language, facial expressions, gestures or talking in a specific tone of voice. 

More than a thousand facial expressions
On the other hand, it seems that all of the above is somehow (too) simplified. Because communication online can be very much 'real' and in fact not separate itself THAT much from what I would say and do 'IRL'. I still have a lot of emotions connected to the online encounter, I still write WITH people (and not bots) and as Coleman notes in Hello Avatar, the graphical period of the internet has surely made online communication more human-like. I use a wide range of the so-called emoticons and online I re-think and edit a lot more than I do 'IRL'. When speaking out loud, there isn't much time to revise and edit the words. This is actually possible online and I practically never send out a message online without having read it through a least a few times. When people are not able to see the 'human-like' features that are related to face-to-face communication - such as facial expressions - they have a lot less to 'work with' (what was the purpose and wanted outcome of my communication?). My written words are thus representative for a lot of features that are only available face-to-face (if you only think of text-based communication and not for instance video chat, that is). Also, the internet enables us to communicate asynchronously. Although we are communicating more and more synchronously, the possibility of e.g. waiting to respond to an email is still there.

When being able to wait, edit and revise, I have a better chance of organizing what I want to 'give' and 'give off' (Goffman terms, once again). In other words I am able to 'construct', 'perform' and 'represent' as I wish (almost) - and at least to another degree than with offline communication. And this (feeling of) control is compelling, I think.