More Than Words...

I am a dork. I am aware of this, will acknowledge it, and - while I wouldn't go so far as to say that I embrace the fact - I don't try to hide my penultimate oddness from others. Not often, at least.

Anyway, the whole reason I even thought of that was because of recent thoughts about human communication. More than once I've heard people griping about how they hate communicating via any sort of on-line medium because "it is so impersonal" and "it just doesn't communicate the same way as face-to-face, or even talking on the phone!"

I understand that holding a conversation in any sort of traditional sense is...difficult at best on a computer, but it's not as difficult as some would make it seem, in my opinion. Whether it's effective or not, I've devised my own system to deal with the difficulties of conversational nuance on-line. It's by no means perfect, but I like to think that I manage to communicate myself more expressively because of it. And also, that it's straight-forward enough to understand.

italics - this is a given that should be practiced by everyone. To italicise a bit of text is to emphasize it, but not generally in an aggressive or confrontational way. Most often, it can be used to emphasize already-extended words ("maaayyybbbeeeee..."), to denote excitement ("Oh man, that's awesome!"), or denote sarcasm ("yeah, that's a good idea"). Italicising is also a useful thing to do if you're using words, expressions, or quips from non-native languages ("szia!", "Hey, how's it going amigo", "c'est la vie.").

Limited use of emoticons - this is both a real sticking point and a slipperly slope, as far as I'm concerned. On the one hand, I dispise emoticons and "smileys" with a passion. On the other, they're useful tools when used similarly to punctuation. Especially when saying something that could be otherwise misconstrued a properly-used emoticon can indicate that a phrase has a specific shade of meaning (usually one of friendly teasing) when a message could be easily mistaken for a disparaging or downright mean thing to say. For example, if communicating with someone who is not tall, typing "you're short" could be considered a rude and unfriendly thing to say. However, if you were to type "you're short. :-)", your comment is more likely to be considered an expression of endearment, rather than an expresison of derision. My personal favorites are the "happy face" smiley: ( :, the "sad face" smiley: ) :, the "estatic" or "anime" smiley: ^_^ (which is especially versatile, as it can be expanded to denote even more extreme levels of pleasure (ex.: ^___^)), and the "laugh out loud" smiley: XD
As long as your use is limited and tasteful, any combination of emoticons should suffice, I suppose.

Don't abbreviate! - there are few things that bother me more than people saying things like "lol" or "brb" sincerely. In my particular circle of friends, a few people have perfected the use of of expressions like these in an ironic manner, being able to use them in a way that makes it clear that the speaker/typer is aware of the absurdity of what he or she is typing. Except when such usage would be proper, please don't use this kind of "IM-speak". The same goes for "1337-speak". I'll acknowledge that there are certain instances in which using these ciphers might be appropriate, but unless you actually talk this way, you're just hurting you're ability to communicate expressively. Although it will take a few more keystrokes to type out, use comparable expressions that you'd actually say. If, in spoken conversation, you'd say something like "hold on a second", then why type "brb"? Why not say "I think" instead of "IMO"? Why not "later" or "bye" instead of "cya"? In some instances where time is of the essence, it might be neccesary to revert to the "IM-speak" abbreviations, but on-line communication can be far more expressive if you get comfortable typing the same way you talk.

Verbs - conversation is rarely strictly verbal. Even when two people can't see each other (like when talking on the phone), there are lots of non-verbal cues that are used, such as pauses, sighs, laughs, and many others. Non-verbal communication becomes even more apparent in personal conversations, when people can actually see each other. Nonverbal actions can be distinguished from "spoken" text in a number of ways. My personal preference is to place it within asterisks. (*laugh*) I've talked with others who use colons or double colons (::scratches head::) or sometimes brackets ([yawn]). When using brackets, sometimes a backslash is used to denote the end of a long action. ([holding breath], [/holding breath]). Part of the brilliance of using nonverbal actions is that is allows you to communicate a great deal more expression without having to use a lot more words. Sometimes even a complex state can be described quite simply. If, for example, you're deep in thought about a significant topic, simply typing the verb expression "*pensive*" can give as much information about your state of mind as a paragraph-long explanation. Personally, I prefer the verb expression "*laugh*" to the ubiquitous "lol" because, to me, it seems more human and natural, and also because it can be adjusted to fit a broader range of laughing states. One could, for example, simply *laugh* or, if you said something that was only vaguely funny you might *laugh softly* or *laugh to self*. A pun might only garner a *chuckle*, while a bad pun nets a *groan* or might not earn a verb expresison at all and only get a ">_<" (which I've always thought of as the emoticon equivalent of Homer Simpson's "D'oh!").

More "shortcuts" of personal states - sometimes punctuation itself can be used to indicate the state you're in. For example, "!!!" is generally understood to represent a state of shock or suprise. "???" is a state of non-understanding, or a way to indicate that you've got questions, but don't even know where to begin asking them. "..." usually indicates a significant (sometimes "dramatic") pause, used both in and between sentences. Sometimes repeated use of "..." is used to represent a sort of longsuffering state, especially in response to something that, in real life, would probably make you roll your eyes and sigh. To the best of my knowledge, there's no additional meaning that's been ascribed to the use of commas, colons, semicolons, or any other form of punctuation.
(example conversation:
A - Guess what!
B - What?
A - Me and my girlfriend eloped!
B - !!!
A - I know!
B - ...
A - ???
B - It's just that you and Jennie are the last people I ever would've expected to get married.
A - ... ... ...

CAPS - this is a good way to empahsize something that, in conversation, you'd say with a lot of emphasis, significantly changing the tone and/or volume of your voice. ENTIRE SENTENCES THAT ARE WRITTEN IN CAPS TYPICALLY SIMULATE YELLING OR TALKING LOUDLY.

There's more, I know there is. I've just forgotten it, because I forgot to take notes before I started this post. I hope that my ramblings didn't come off too preachy. Like I said, I was just thinking about these things, and it struck me that there were plenty of ways, pretty easy ways, to get around the "the internet is impersonal" cliché. I meant for this to be more of a public analysis of my own on-line communication style rather than any sort of instrution manual or primer, but if you see some suggestions and would like to incorporate them into your own lexicon, don't hesitate! Also, if you've got any other ideas or suggestions ('cause, like I said, I know I missed some), feel free to post 'em. I think it'd be interesting to come back every once in a while and update this post.

Well, until next time...

PLUR!