My research paper

Research paper of Visual Culture and Digital Media (VIS201)
Topic: Online communication Choi Yuen Ling (1093535)
Introduction
Nowadays, virtually every family in developed cities in the world has one or even more than one computer. There is a trend that many families tend to own more and more computers at their homes. Personally, there are three computers at my home. The popularity of using computers more or less shows that people rely much on computers in their lives. They use computers not only for clerical or website browsing purpose, but also for communicating with others on the Internet.

The Internet as a means of communication
Internet, as stated by a NASA astronaut, Janice Voss, is ‘a means of communicating with other people. It can be more formal than a telephone call because it leaves a written record, more convenient than face-to-face because it doesn’t require the other person’s physical presence, and more efficient than writing because you can enclose electronically generated information.’[1] People can communicate with their friends or some unknown people on the Internet via different modes such as online forum, MSN messenger, ICQ, Xanga, Facebook, email, etc.
Why online communication?
Recently, there is a pressure on youngsters in Hong Kong to set up a MSN messenger account and use it to communicate with their friends. They are also addicted to use Xanga or Facebook to have connection with their friends. It seems that these modes of online communication have a magic to attract people to use it. As online communicating is getting hitter and hitter all over the world, I am interested in using online communication as the topic of my paper.

Focus of the paper
I want to focus on the communication network of instant online chatting on the Internet as well as weblogs that include no instant online connection with others. For instant online chatting, I choose MSN messenger and ICQ as the samples to deeply research them. For weblogs, I choose Xanga and Facebook. I choose these four because they are the hottest modes of communicating with others on the Internet nowadays. Also, I will discuss mainly on three aspects—the reason for the magic of online communication, the dark or negative side of it and the things this fever of online communication imply about the contemporary society.

Characteristics of MSN messenger and ICQ
Both ICQ and MSN messenger are good example of IRC clients. IRC, Internet Relay Chat, is ‘an Internet service that enables users to converse in cyberspace via their keyboards.’[2] One uses ICQ or MSN messenger to join an online channel and then chat with a specific individual or with the whole group of people in a side conversation. The two modes are more or less of some similar characteristics or have a similar way of using it.
Regarding the areas in common of the two, both of them are used to communicate with others on the Internet. People can chat with others, maybe their friends or even someone who don’t know, via the two. An online identification is used on these channels. One can use a nickname or even declares a different gender if they want to hide his or her real identity. Also, both of them can be used to send files to others or play mini online games with friends.
Concerning the differences, MSN messenger is of much more advanced functions such as many interesting games that ICQ does not have. One can also use some personalized icons to replace some commonly used words such as ‘hi’ or ‘bye bye’ in MSN messenger but ICQ doesn’t support such functions.
Then who are the users of ICQ and MSN messenger? Not only youngsters love to use these two to chat with their friends, but also many staffs who work in offices in companies. Nowadays, it is very common to see staffs log on their MSN accounts and show ‘online’ mode. They may chat with their friends or net friends when they feel bored assuming that their bosses are not staring at them. However, there is a trend that MSN messenger is getting more and more popular than ICQ because of its wider range of functions. So, number of ICQ user decreases in these few years.

Reasons for the magic of using MSN messenger and ICQ
Why so many people are addicted to use MSN messenger and ICQ to chat or to communicate with others, but not to have a face-to-face connection? I think it is because these two modes of communication have five advantages that attract people to do so.
1/ First of all, it is much more convenient and inexpensive for people to chat with friends in other countries, say the USA. If we chat with them by phone, the cost is really very expensive and it is not convenient to mail them a poster or photo. However, if they chat via MSN messenger or ICQ on the Internet, it can save them a lot of money. Also, they can send digital photos to each other easily and efficiently.
2/ Viewing from a different angle, some people may feel embarrassed when they communicate with some unknown people or someone they think they are not so friend with him or her. So, though online communication via ICQ or MSN messenger, this kind of embarrassment can be relieved because no direct face-to-face communication is involved. Thus, many people love to chat with this kind of people via ICQ or MSN messenger instead of face-to-face connection.
3/ Also, anonymity plays a very important role of making new friends in the communities of online communication. As people can use a nickname to communicate with someone they don’t know, they will feel that they are meeting in the safe and neutral zone of cyberspace. Thus, they are likely to have more courage to talk and make new friends compared to the situation in the reality. Besides, ‘the anonymity and emotional safety of the IRC medium may allow you to cross social barriers.’[3] For example, the example quoted in the book Person to Person on the Internet on page 93 that a girl called MaryAnn in Michigan falls in love with her net friend who is of a different religion and political views from her.
4/ In spite of making new friends, some IRC users want to find their love on the Internet. Maybe they are eager to have fantasy or wonder in their lives which the actual contemporary society cannot fulfill their wants. Or maybe the anonymity and mystery involved in meeting new friends on the Internet encourage romance to blossom. Some people, who want to find their love on the Internet, usually fail to do so in the reality. Maybe they are of low self-esteem, or they want to use their personality instead of their face to attract people. Meeting others on the Internet provides a chance for them to do so. Thus, these people like using MSN messenger or ICQ to find their love. On the other hand, according to a research conducted by the Department of Social Work and Social Administration of the University of Hong Kong in 2000 about using ICQ to find lovers, the percentage of dating the opposite sex and meeting a boyfriend or girlfriend via ICQ on the Internet is higher than that in the reality. (Refer to Appendix 1 for the details about the survey) Because of the higher percentage of dating the opposite sex that people normally expect, they love to chat with others via ICQ or MSN messenger in order to find their love.
5/ Last but not the least, using ICQ and MSN messenger to chat with others can help one to kill time and relieve his or her boredom, no matter who one is chatting with. If one is bored at home or in office, he or she can log on the ICQ or MSN messenger account to chat with others. One can share hobbies and interests with others or keep in touch with friends on the Internet so that his or her boredom can be relieved.
The five main advantages mentioned above can be used to justify the popularity or magic of using ICQ and MSN messenger to communicate with others on the Internet. However, there are not merely five reasons that contribute to the popularity, but still there are several minor reasons. Because of the board range, I only discuss the top five reasons shown above that I think they are important.

Characteristics of Xanga and Facebook
Regarding the way of using Xanga and Facebook, I will not discuss it in detail here. But the only thing I want to point out is that, Xanga and Facebook are a kind of weblogs that is different from ICQ and MSN messenger—those IRC clients. Weblogs is ‘a web page containing brief, chronologically arranged items of information.’[4] Or weblogs are ‘personal websites, usually maintained by an individual, constantly updated with new information, personal experiences, analysis, hyperlinks and commentary.’[5]
Concerning the differences, ICQ and MSN messenger are modes of online communication that users can have instant online connection with others, while users of Xanga and Facebook don’t have such connection with others. Also, users of Xanga can write weblog that resembles dairy and tell others what things he or she did in a day. However, Facebook doesn’t support such function. What Facebook support is placing comments or messages on others’ sites and other funny types of applications such as sending a gift to others, but users cannot write things like dairy on their own sites. Facebook can also help users to search for their old friends via the function of community. On the other hand, users of Xanga cannot send a gift to their friends.
For similarities of the two, both Xanga and Facebook are free online communication modes those users can use them to keep contact or be familiar with the recent situation of their friends. Also, both of them have a function that connects users with some similar characteristics into a group or a community. That function in the platform of Xanga is called ‘blogrings’, while that in Facebook is called ‘community’.

Reasons for the magic of using Xanga and Facebook
Using Xanga and Facebook to communicate with others have three main advantages that contribute to the popularity of using them.
1/ First of all, people can easily find some old friends, primary or secondary school’s classmates in these weblogs. So, they can have connection with them or know about their recent lives. It is a good method for people to meet these ‘old’ people and create a virtual community around the weblogs.
2/ Besides, since Xanga and Facebook require no instant communication with others, readers of one’s blog can leave a message to the blog owner when they are free. So, if you are using MSN messenger to chat with your friend, but suddenly your boss come out and you need to stop chatting with the friend. Then, the sudden stop may raise embarrassment. But, both Xanga and Facebook can prevent this embarrassment because of the lack of a third party that has instant connection with you.
3/ Furthermore, we can freely write things we like in our blog, assuming the things we want to express are not illegal. So, one can freely express himself in his blog that he cannot do or afraid to do so in the reality. Also, he can share his views with readers of his blog. Thus, communication of thoughts and knowledge can be facilitated.

Psychological reasons of using these modes of online communication
Despite the direct advantages of using Xanga, Facebook, ICQ and MSN messenger to communicate with others, there are still some psychological reasons those can be used to explain why people like using these kind of online communication so much. For example, youngsters will be affected by their peers. In other words, peer’s pressure can affect one to use these modes of online communication rather than direct face-to-face connection with others. It is because if everyone around you use these methods to communicate, but you do not do so, then your friends around you may think you are outdated. Thus, because of this pressure, youngsters are likely to start or try using these modes of online communication even though they may not realize the advantages of using them.

Dark side of them
MSN messenger, ICQ, Xanga and Facebook have different advantages and good points to attract people to use them. Although there are undoubtedly many advantages of using them, however, using them may derive some others negative problems.
First of all, if people concentrate on using these modes of online communication all the time, they may have lesser time to have face-to-face communication with their friends and family members. In time, the relationship among them may be worsened. On the other hand, in an extreme extent, users of these online communication methods may have a bad face-to-face communication skill. So, their relationship with others in the reality may be worsened too.
Also, addiction of using these modes to communicate with others will hinder one’s actual life and leads to low productivity for the whole society. If some people are addicted to log on to these communication methods and chat with others, called IRC addiction, they may waste a lot of time on chatting and have a negative impact on their works or studies. If they chat with their net friends till very late at night, they may have no energy to do their works on the next day. So, over-using these to communicate with others will hinder one’s actual life.
Besides, receiving wrong information may be resulted if people believe so much on the information provided in some blogs of others. Or if one believes so much on others’ words in ICQ or MSN messenger, he or she may be faked.
Moreover, people who are addicted to chat or browse others’ Xanga or Facebook accounts will easily have autism. According to the organization called Autism Hong Kong, autism is ‘qualitative impairment in social interaction and communication’ and ‘restricted repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behavior, interests and activities’[6] These people may well adapted to communicate in the virtual society on the internet. And when some of them go back to the reality, they may feel uneasy to communicate with others by a face-to-face mode. As they rely much on an illusional or virtual world, they may talk less to others in the real world and autism will be resulted.
Furthermore, online sex problem may be resulted if people get used to date the net friend of opposite sex via these online communication modes, especially ICQ and MSN messenger on the Internet. However, sex activities engaged on the Internet are not totally bad or but still have some good impacts on youngsters if they are managed in a proper way. Cooper, Scherer, and Marcus (2002) have stated that ‘the Internet can equally threaten or aid a healthy, sex-positive, emotionally satisfying sex life.’[7] If people use online communications as a means to fake one and have sex with her, then, it is undoubtedly a problem rather than a good impact towards the girl.
Clearly, online communication has both negative and positive side, depending on the degree of using it. Generally, if one uses these modes of online communication not so frequently and properly, they are more likely to receive the positive impacts. However, if one uses them not only to communicate with others, but also want to have some other functions such as having sex with other people or thinking of deception, then he or she must pose some negative impacts to other users of these modes of online communication.

The things this fever of online communication imply about the contemporary society
In November 2005, The Chinese Teenagers Internet Association issued a report of teenagers online addicts that claimed to be the newest authoritative report about online addicts. 13.2% of the total teenage netizens are online addicts.[8] It reflects that there are quite large numbers of teenagers who are addicted to go online. And for many teenagers, they go online to chat with their friends and browse others’ blogs. They have a fever of online communication. Thus, there is a raising concern about the virtual society versus the real world. Will the former replace the latter in the future? Some researchers think positive about the real world. For example, Anthony Fung says that, ‘real-life communities have not faded away, and there is no sign that online communities are about to replace them.’[9] Also, ‘cyberlife has evolved into a vital part of the real life to the extent that real social relationships have become inseparable with cyberlife.’[10] For me, I also think the virtual society will not replace the real world in the sense that the former will only facilitate the relationship among people in the reality. For some minority, those online addicts, facilitation of relationship may not apply to them, but again, they are the minor part of the whole society. I guess most of the users of ICQ, MSN messenger, Xanga and Facebook can self-controlled themselves and so they can benefit the positive impact brought by these modes of online communication.
Despite the wonder of virtual world replacing the real world, the fever of online communication also imply an opener attitude towards sex by teenagers in the contemporary society. This phenomenon is resulted by easy access to blue materials on the Internet. Regarding to US News & World Report (2000), ‘there are at least 40,000 pornographic Web sites available on the Internet. In the same report, it stated Web surfers spent $970 million in 1998 in online pornography content and expected to raise to $3 billion by 2003. These figures imply there will be an astounding increase in pornographic Web sites that makes surfing much more easily.’[11] As teenagers can have easy access to pornographic materials on the Internet, or they may receive different sex knowledge from net friends or others’ blogs, they will have an opener attitude towards sex.
Besides, the fever of online communication implies that the demand of independence of teenagers, especially those in Hong Kong, is not satisfied because of the hinder of their parents. In Hong Kong, parents always emphasize that children should do what parents want them to do. So, ‘teenagers always follow the way their parents taught and their independence is hindered in such a way.’[12] On the other hand, as chatting with others on the Internet provide a chance for them to talk and express themselves freely, and they will not ‘controlled’ by their parents when they are online, their wants of independence are fulfilled. Thus, the fever of online communication implies the needs of teenagers to be independent are not satisfied well in the real contemporary world.

Conclusion
The four modes of online communication—ICQ, MSN messenger, Xanga and Facebook have different advantages that lead to the fever of using them by netizens. However, dark side of them also applies negative impact towards users. Also, if we view the fever of them from a different angel, other social phenomenon about this contemporary society is realized. Using online communication to realize important issues in the reality is really very interesting and I enjoy this researching approach very much. I hope the Internet will be modified in the future in order to further help facilitating the relationship among people in the reality!Bibliography
Books:
1/ Diane Reiner, Keith Blanton, Person to Person on the Internet. (London: Academic Press, Inc., 1997).
2/ Thomas J. Fallon, The Internet Today. (Ohio: Prentice Hall, Inc., 2001).
3/ Laurel A. Clyde, Weblogs and Libraries. (Britain: Chandos Publishing, 2004).
4/ David Silver, Adrienne Massanari, Critical Cyberculture Studies. (The USA: New York University Press, 2006).
5/ Monica Whitty, Adrian Carr, Cyberspace Romance, The Psychology of Online Relationships. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006).
6/ Edward G. Sampson, Social Psychology and Contemporary Society. (Canada: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1976)
7/ Stuart Harris, The IRC Survival Guide—talk to the world with Internet Relay Chat. (Canada: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1995)
8/ Marc A. Smith, Peter Kollock, Communities in Cyberspace (New York: Routledge, 1999)
9/ 羅新安, 網癮克星—青少年網癮的成因、預防和治療. (中國: 海外僑胞出版社, 2006).

Websites:
http://www.autism.hk/en_def_autism.htm
http://newmedia.cityu.edu.hk/cyberlaw/index22.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25689-2542424,00.html
http://www.singpao.com/20070715/local/925370.html
http://newmedia.cityu.edu.hk/cyberlaw/index12.html
http://www.lts.rmit.edu.au/renewal/onlcomm/why.htm
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdlink?Ver=1&Exp=10-24-2012&FMT=7&DID=725976781&RQT=309&attempt=1&cfc=1
Appendix 1
This survey is conducted by the Department of Social Work and Social Administration of the University of Hong Kong in 2000 about using ICQ to find lovers. The source is from a Chinese book called 「青少年ICQ之戀」調查報告2000.
Degree of easiness
Using ICQ to date opposite sex
Using ICQ to meet a boyfriend or girlfriend
Meeting opposite sex in the reality
Very easy
12%
24%
5%
Easy
73%
51%
44%
Difficult
7%
12%
39%
Very difficult
2%
5%
5%
Number of interviewees who answer the questions
68
67
67

[1] Thomas J. Fallon, The Internet Today. (Ohio: Prentice Hall, Inc., 2001). P. 2
[2] Thomas J. Fallon, The Internet Today. (Ohio: Prentice Hall, Inc., 2001). P. 229
[3] Diane Reiner, Keith Blanton, Person to Person on the Internet. (London: Academic Press, Inc., 1997). P. 93
[4] Laurel A. Clyde, Weblogs and Libraries. (Britain: Chandos Publishing, 2004). P.2
[5] Laurel A. Clyde, Weblogs and Libraries. (Britain: Chandos Publishing, 2004). P.2
[6] Website: http://www.autism.hk/en_def_autism.htm
[7] Monica Whitty, Adrian Carr, Cyberspace Romance, The Psychology of Online Relationships. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). P. 21
[8] 羅新安, 網癮克星—青少年網癮的成因、預防和治療. (中國: 海外僑胞出版社, 2006). P. 2
[9] David Silver, Adrienne Massanari, Critical Cyberculture Studies. (The USA: New York University Press, 2006). P. 129
[10] David Silver, Adrienne Massanari, Critical Cyberculture Studies. (The USA: New York University Press, 2006). P. 131-132
[11] Website: http://newmedia.cityu.edu.hk/cyberlaw/index12.html
[12] 羅新安, 網癮克星—青少年網癮的成因、預防和治療. (中國: 海外僑胞出版社, 2006). P. 101

Key visual materials

It is a tool called 'Talk Net' that help us talk instantly with our friends on the Internet. People who use msn messenger or icq may use it to facilitate their communication with others.


It is downloaded from http://www.goelectronic.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/9/dus0049i.jpg


I include this picture because it helps me explain how people from all around the world can easily connected on the Internet via msn messenger or icq.























It is a visual sample of how a msn messenger looks like. Also, it shows some funny personalized things you can 'play' when using msn messenger.

It is downloaded from http://www.arama.bz/grafikler?gr1=msn


I include this picture because it shows some functions of msn messenger in a visual form.



























It is a picture showing how people can 'see' each other when chatting via msn live messenger.

It is copied from http://www.livemessenger.org.uk/


I include this picture because, again, it shows a function of msn messenger that link ourselves to others.





















This is a picture showing the outlook of a xanga diary. Users can customize their own xanga blog, just like this one. Many people use xanga as a online diary to share what they did to their friends. And, actually, the picture you see is my xanga blog!

The picture is made by myself.

I include this picture because I want to show how a xanga blog looks like.





























This is a picture showing how we can invite new friends to talk to via icq.

It is copied from http://www.vwenthusiast.com/junk/icq

I include this picture because it shows us how to get started to make friends on the Internet.

Key quotes

1/ ‘Online communication via discussion forums and synchronous text can offer an increased sense of community and cohesion for students in online education. Online education environments and the communication that supports them encourage and support inquiry, team projects, and problem-solving skills.’
(from a website :http://www.lts.rmit.edu.au/renewal/onlcomm/why.htm)


2/ ‘The researchers found that participants who had been assigned to the ‘deception’ condition were more likely than truth-tellers to choose avatars that looked different from themselves.’
(from a website: http://deception.crimepsychblog.com/?p=242)

3/ ‘IRC is a network of computers, referred to as IRC servers, which allows thousands of people around the world to have simultaneous contact with one another.’
(from a book called Person to Person on the Internet by Diane Reiner and Keith Blanton, AP Professional, 1997, p.64)

4/ ‘Oulu, a quiet university town on the Gulf of Bothnia in Finland, was the unlikely birthplace of what is now a computer network serving thirty nations and tens of thousands of users.’
(from a book called The IRC Survival Guide—Talk to the World with Internet Relay Chat by Stuart Harris, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, 1995, p.4)

5/ ‘Canadian weblog expert Peter Scott has developed a widely accepted definition of a ‘blog’or‘weblog’: it is, he says, ‘a Web page containing brief, chronologically arranged items of information’.
(from a book called Weblogs and Libraries by Laurel A. Clyde, Chandos Publishing, 2004, p. 2)