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Path: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!hplabs!tektronix!reed!ellen
From: ellen@reed.UUCP (Ellen Eades)
Newsgroups: net.social
Subject: Re: Electronically Mediated Human Relationships
Message-ID: <3962@reed.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Aug-86 21:56:20 EDT
Article-I.D.: reed.3962
Posted: Thu Aug  7 21:56:20 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 9-Aug-86 11:35:42 EDT
Reply-To: ellen@reed.UUCP (Ellen Eades)
Distribution: na
Organization: Reed College, Portland, Oregon
Lines: 37

> chrisa@tekig5.UUCP (Chris Andersen) writes:
>>A topic that intrigues me greatly is the emergence of person-
>>to-person relationships mediated entirely by electronic (non-
>>television) means. 
>I would not hesitate to say that the field 
>of electronic, person-to-person communication is probably 
>the single most important aspect of computers today.  

That's an interesting suggestion, and I'm glad Chris brought it
up, because quite frankly although electronic communication is
very important to me, I hadn't thought of it as important to
computerdom.

I've met several dozen (at least) fascinating individuals via
the net.  I have only met four of them face-to-face;  I'd like
to meet the rest very much.  Now that I've graduated from Reed
and don't have that particular social circle around me, I
appreciate netfriends even more, and my mailbox is usually
satisfyingly full.

One major problem of EC, of course, is distance.  I'd love to
spend more time in close physical proximity to my netfriends,
but living on opposite coasts -- or even adjoining states --
tends to make that difficult.  Should I get interested in
developing a closer relationship with a netfriend, this will
make things even more bizarre...

Every once in a while the net hears about folks who met via the
net becoming items, or engaged, or even (heavens forfend!)
married.  I'd be interested in knowing how they managed the
distance problem.

Ellen Eades
-- 

		  "Holy Ovaltine, Batman!"
			-- Burt Ward