Understanding the bandwidth limitations of "e-comm"

It's not my intent to coin a new term, but in today's age we have all begun to rely on various forms of electronic communication. In short: "e-comm." But the point of this post isn't (specifically) to talk about the wonders of email, IM, SMS, or any other TLA. My purpose is to apologize (publicly, this time) for making some invalid assumptions about the effectiveness of email.

It can be very difficult to interpret tone of voice in an email. Even when you (think you) know the person with whom you are conversing, misinterpretations can happen. That's why those little "emoticon" things were invented. They take the place of the very crucial tone-of-voice, body language, and facial expression information that we all automatically add to the content of our in-person communications. If we then abbreviate excessively, as is common in text messaging, the bandwidth issue becomes even more pronounced. I don't use SMS for very much; can't see how anyone could.

I'm not saying you cannot have an effective electronic conversation with a good friend, but if they are sensitive to the subject matter, you might need to pay attention the fact that they might not understand you are kidding them. That was my mistake.

I admire my step daughter immensely. She's very smart, creative, fun, insightful, and very, very sensitive. In an email recently I kidded her about her habit of never answering emails, and she then replies immediately, launching into a long rant telling me how very busy she is. Which, of course, she is. And which, of course, I already knew.

I don't know if she's still pissed with me, because I don't have the guts to send her another email asking. Of course I apologized to her (in an email, no less); I just haven't heard anything since. Given how much pressure she feels she is under, I really don't want to be adding to her overall stress level. It isn't healthy for either of us. :-) (I am kidding, of course!)

So, when I saw this recent blog posting about bandwidth and the need to "escalate" our communication methods as the importance of the conversation increases, I though it apropos.