Talk to me

When I was about 12 years old I began using the computer and surfing the internet, I discovered chat engines such as ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, and MSN Messenger, these engines became my portal of communicating with friends whom I knew and also a place to meet new people. I divided my friends by the chat engines which I used, for instance;

• ICQ was used to meet new people and talk to friends overseas
• Yahoo Messenger was used to talk to my family members or far relatives
• MSN Messenger was used to talk to my friends specifically

Thinking back, I do not know why I divided those whom I talk to via the internet into 3 specific groups, the only logic I could draw from this division is that I trusted certain chat engines more than others. For example, the level of security and privacy that MSN provides is much higher than ICQ, much more personal information is reveled through ICQ.

In regards to talking to people I know, I try to keep my conversation as formal as possible, I dislike using emoticons (Smiley, Frown, Cry) I recon that whatever that needs to be said can be said through the use of words. I also find it rather offensive to use short hands (TTYL-talk to you later, BRB – be right back, LMAO- laugh my ass off), from my experience I realize that not many people understand these short hands, trust me I found out the hard way. Using terms such as the above may save time and so forth, however if I were to talk to my parents back home over MSN they wouldn’t have a clue what TTYL meant.

Giving out personal information over the internet is a silly thing to do, there have been multiple cases of teenage girls/boys getting robbed, raped, and harmed by these so called internet stalkers whom pose as sincere guys/girls looking for an honest relationship, these vulnerable victims end up being lured into giving out their personal information (Phone numbers, Address, Account numbers).

Being an international student, using chat engines to communicate may seem like the easiest and most cost effective way to communicate with my family and friends from around the world, however I still prefer talking to them over the phone or face to face.