Online Communication

E-Mail
The first Electronic Mail (E-Mail) was sent in 1971. It is a digital message sent across the Internet. E-Mail is a simple yet essential way of communicating with someone that is not in the same county as you. When E-Mail was first available for the message to successfully sent both parties had to be online at the same time but as time has gone on E-Mail has improved drastically and now you can send a message to someone without them being online and it will be stored in their ask box and they can read it when they next go online.

The main advantages of E-Mails are: that it’s free, paper free. quick and super convenient. Because of all these points E-Mailing has become a world wide phenomenon. However there are huge disadvantages of using which is mostly spam which is where companies get hold of your e-mail address and send you a lot of unwanted messages but, you are able to block e-mail addresses so that you’ll never receive another message from them and you can also direct messages from that e-mail address into your junk box so that you don’t get notified about it and it doesn’t appear in your inbox. Another problem that can happen when you have an e-mail address is hackers; which is where people find out what your password is and can steal your identity.

I have had an e-mail address for 7 years but I have only used it on a regular base for about 3 years. I mostly only use my email to send work to my school address so that if I don’t have my memory stick to hand I can still do my work. I also find it useful so that I have a backup of all my work as you can save up to and over thousands of e-mails whereas you have limited space on a memory stick. The major way in which I use my e-mail address is for verification of who I am, for sites like facebook and I get notifications from the social network sites I’m on and I currently have over 4000 e-mails which are mainly from the social networking sites that I’m on.

Not many members of my family use or even have an e-mail address but my sister does and she uses it in the way that I do mainly. My dad however uses e-mail a great deal, mainly to keep in contact with his friends and he also uses it to talk to his college and get information that he needs.

Instant MessagingInstant messaging is a quick and easy way of communicating. This form of communication is mainly used by the younger generation as it provides immediate communication with the other person. To be able to chat to the people on your friends list you need to have an e-mail address, in order to do this you need to add their e-mail address and they have the choice of whether or not to accept you as a friend.

The advantages of instant messaging is mainly that it is instant and you can also talk to more than one person at a time which is very useful rather that telling everyone individually. The disadvantages of instant messaging are that you have a risk of being hacked and then having all your details stolen.

The instant messaging service I use is MSN not many people my age use it anymore as they'd rather use others but I find it a very useful way of keeping in contact with my friends that still use it. And I also like that you are able to send images, music and files through it although it can take a while. The main thing I use MSN for is webcam which is where I can see the person I am talking to and physically speak rather that typing what I want to say which I personally really like especially when I’m on holiday as I can still keep in close contact with my family.

Blogger

Blogger is a blogging site when you are able to write posts about a particular topic and people are able to follow your blog if they are interested in what it is that you are writing about. Blogger is hosted by Google and has been since 2003. With Blogger you are able to add labels to your posts and then when people search for the same thing that your label is they will be directed to your blog and they will then be able to read the post.

I have only recently started using blogger for school purposes and have got a separate blog for nearly all my lessons and I update them all weekly. Personally I like the idea of a blog as you are able to write about things that interest you, or in my case know what I learnt a week ago because I have it written down in my blog. The advantages of having a blog, like I’ve mentioned is that you can follow blog that write about things that you're interested in and also that you can look back at older posts you've made to remind yourself of what you've done so far. But their aren't many major disadvantages except for there not being any security settings so you can have literally anyone looking at your blog and you might have a few personal post.

Another blogging site I use is Tumblr, which was founded in 2007 so it is a relatively new blogging site and has in total 17.5 million bloggers. You are able to post text, images, video's, links, quotes and audio which will go directly on their tumblog. This site allows you to follow people that you know and also people that you don't know without your acceptance.

 

www.facebook.com/

Facebook
Facebook is a social networking site that was launched in February 2004, since then it has become one of the most popular social networking site with 750 million active users. The idea of facebook is to add people that you know and they go in your friends list and then they are able to view your profile and they are able to see yours, look at your pictures, read your status updates, find out your personal interests and they can send you messages or chat to you as well.

I have only been using facebook for about 3 years in total but I don't use it that much even though most of my friends use it. I mostly only use it to keep in contact with relatives that I don’t see that often but other than that I don't really go on it. I currently have 304 friends which consist of friends and family. Advantages of facebook are that it is a free way to keep in contact with your friends and family even if you're in a different country. Disadvantages again, would be hackers and I have recently had a couple friends who have been hacked and have had to make new accounts.