But on the internet, the words and the ideas are still there… that’s what matters. People who have just met, say in a chat room, can just dive into deeper conversations getting to the core of our person faster and know who we really are. Because, honestly, it’s easier to open up when you don’t see someone’s facial expression. We can pretend we didn’t cringe when someone types that they’re 41 and when you thought they were 28, and you can keep talking. Point here being, we can set aside any visual prejudice and just have open, raw conversations with anyone. And I’ve found that the internet is the place where I have some of my richest conversations, that last the longest. Not in one sitting, but in talking over months and years.

And now for a hilarious quote from an acquaintance I saw leaving facebook… his reasons were, “Because the internet is the most fake and illegitimate form of meeting people and maintaining communications, I’ve ever encountered. I could just be doing better things with my time.” Sir, if you ever happen to read this, I have met a countless number of worthwhile people on the internet, and it has been my strongest tool of maintaining communications. Especially with my friends across the country from summer programs. One friend in particular I e-mailed daily for a year and a half, and we still e-mail each other now at least twice weekly. Another I’ve been in contact with for nearly four years now.

Saying that, I want to ask those people, who dismiss the internet as a “real” form of communication then,  if they don’t read books, or have never been effected by a poem, because that’s the same thing. It’s the use of words for communication. As my friend Wil (@javajunky) said in our online conversation about this, “Text can convey a lot. Literature would be nowhere if it weren’t true.”

I fell that dismissing online communication is pointless for that reason. And if these people only want a “full relationship,” face to face with “real people,” then they better stop using phones, reading the news, and watching TV too, because those all dilute the full on experience you get face to face with another person. So, good luck, hypocrites. I’d like to keep all of my online friends right here. And who knows, someday I may get to meet them “IRL” as well.

Okay, so I had trouble uploading audio so I’m linking you to a site where I could upload it. It’s not my preference, but I’ll figure it out later if I ever post audio again. LISTEN HERE.

Thanks!