Jan 29 2011

8 Interpretations of Silence when using Instant Messaging (via The Couch Manager)

I am always on IM, and this post talks about all likely interpretations people draw when there is a sudden silence of the other end. Great post!

8 Interpretations of Silence when using Instant Messaging I use Instant Messaging (IM) a lot in my job to manage my team and connect with friends. I love it because I have the unparalleled advantage of multi-tasking different conversations with so many people at once. Of course, it does have a few drawbacks, but overall, I still think it’s a valuable tool in the arsenal of online communication – particularly for couch managers. However, there is one pet peeve that most individuals share when using onlin … Read More

via The Couch Manager

One comment on “8 Interpretations of Silence when using Instant Messaging (via The Couch Manager)”

  1. Ha Ha, I so agree. I see this happen on Skype all the time.
    Scenario: Person A logs on into Skype. He/She has 25 contacts. 10 of them are online. He/She hasn’t come online to speak to anyone in particular. Now, the moment he/she logs in, he/she sees one of his/her contacts going offline. What’s the immediate human reaction?
    (a) He/She is ignoring me
    (b) How rude!!!
    (c) Why did he/she have to go offline the moment I logged in?
    (d)Have I offended him/her in any way?
    When in reality, it could be any of the following reasons the other person signed off:
    (a) He/she logged off even before he/she saw Person A come online
    (b) He/She was at work and knew that if Person A saw him/her online, they would end up chatting and he/she could not chat at that moment
    (c) He/She just wasn’t in a chatting mood at the moment
    (d) or some reason which had no connection with offending Person A.
    After all, if he/she did not want to associate with Person A, it is very simple to remove someone from your skype list.
    So, Person A has just spent almost half a morning (or if he/she is the paranoid type, half a day or even the entire day) mulling over why the above happened.
    I’m sleepy and will be back with more…

    Reply

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