This month’s Media Safe 101 is about virtual friendliness. This whole business of participating in the virtual blogosphere is rather confusing. What is so puzzling is how the behaviour and language codex of this community or society differs from the real world, or at least the world that I have lived in for the last forty-nine years.

How can I behave friendly towards someone who I have just met virtually without signalling that I consider that person a friend or that I am looking for a friend? That vast pool of knowledge we usually communicate through our senses (e.g. facial expressions, tone of voice, body language, and verbal inflection) now is communicated through written words or an occasional photo. And this form of communication seems wrought with inadequacies and misinterpretation... (more)