So, is a phone call conversation somehow inherently more important than an internet chat conversation?
The reason I ask, is because I was (and actually still am) talking to a friend of mine on AIM…at the same time, my sister was on her cordless phone with our other sister…and her battery ran out (perhaps because she hasn’t put it on to charge for days). She asked if I was online…of course the answer was Yes. She asked if she could use my phone and I just turned and looked at her and told her I was talking to someone online.
I ended up giving her my phone to take into her room to plus into her phonejack, but she gave me such a look for daring to think that my conversation could be just as important as hers, when it was “just” an internet chat.
I don’t have this problem so much anymore, but when I was living at home and was online talking to someone, I would often be asked to log off so people could use the phone. Which is fair enough, I suppose. But the worst was when people would come into my room and strike up a conversation with me, even though I’d keep on typing away. I mean, if I were on the telephone, with the handset cradled against my ear, you wouldn’t interrupt me, would you? So why is it when you can see I’m talking to someone, you think it’s hunky dory to talk to me then, too?
I don’t know about more inherently important, but it seems to me that most online conversations lack the sense of urgency that a phone conversation has. I mean, generally, being online–for me, anyway–is more me just hanging out. Usually, there’s nothing too horribly urgent. When I’m on the phone, though…I’m usually on it for a reason.
As for which should receive priority…well, unless there was something really big going on with your sister’s friend, you have priority. If she’s just shooting the breeze…well, tough. It’s your phone line, and you were there first.
And, dantheman, I totally hear you on the conversation thing. . .it drives me absolutely batshit. I came up with a pretty good solution, though; I simply keep my focus on the computer screen and answer in one word sentences. Usually, after the third " uh-huh," or “nope,” whoever’s talking to me gets that I don’t want to be bothered.
My typing is so bad that I can’t go very fast online and so when I am in a hurry and there is a lot of info to pass, I use the phone.
My family is scattered all over and we use email mostly now since we are online for various reasons and it saves a lot of money. Email is pretty fast even if a few of us are on silly little local providers…
I use instant messaging as my only daily means of communication with my fiance, Gunslinger, who is currently 1,700 miles away in Texas while I wallow here in New York. (I will be joining him come summer.)
Until my parents installed an extra phone line just to handle the modem, I was constantly being kicked off any time anyone wanted to use the phone. Even if it was just my foster sister wanting to call one of her friends and talk for four hours (her side of the conversation being “::giggle:: ::giggle:: He so HOT! ::giggle:: ::giggle::”
I would occasionally point out that she could talk to her friends IN PERSON every day, whereas I could not talk to my fiance at all except online due to the long distance bills. I would always be squelched, because it was “just the internet.”
::sigh:: I don’t understand it.
It’s kinda like how our relationship is immediately suspect because we met on the internet (here on the boards, to be precise), as opposed to, say, in some bar while drunk off our stools. Doesn’t make sense to me.
That’s exactly why! Cause you know the only people you meet on here are freaks, pyschos, and wackos. And anyone on here is half a person. If you met two, that might be okay.
Living with Grandma I used to get kicked off all the time… in fact I was only allowed online after a specific time at night (And I had a bedtime so I wasn’t allowed on past that… even on weekends!)
Now I have a DSL line so the phone is free whenever someone is online so it’s a null issue.
Most of the time when I’m online it’s just random chatting with friends I have made around the world (A couple of them call me sometimes but not often as that far long distance is expensive… Kentucky and England to Canada… I’d call them but mine is even more expensive than theirs) Sometimes it’s really important though… like just being supportive to someone who is feeling blue.