Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control

While surfing the 'net with the hated AOL explorer today, I discovered yet another reason to detest AOL: AIM Fight.

AOL is the company that brought the Internet, along with all its good and evils, into the mainstream with its irritatingly effervescent quips of "You've got mail" and "Hello [insert mangled pronunciation of Asian name]." It also popularized the now preferred mode of communication among teens: instant messaging. With its promise of "instant" gratification and a short hip abbreviation (IM, as in "I am cool because I IM"), IM quickly caught on with the technologically-inclined generation of youngsters.

Bear with me here as I sound like a sociology textbook, but I am trying to understand the mass appeal of IM. As someone who has stubbornly labeled herself as uncool, I have long resisted the lures of instant messaging. Alas, even I fell prey to its benefits as I strove to maintain contact with my friends from summer camp.

IM is fast, cheap and easy. Fast as it's instant, cheap as it's free, and easy as it doesn't ask anything of you. Conversations on IM demand no commitment from you more than a few typo-riddled phrases littered with "lol" and "lmao." In fact, how can it? These few words in their uniform font look the same on the screen no matter what you actually mean or intend; no wonder IM communication is just as often miscommunication. Take a word like "so," which can be sarcastic, complimentary, angry, humorous, confused, questioning, manipulative, amused, or tired all depending on how you say it. Intonation, facial expressions, volume, hand gestures; these communication cues are totally lost when transcribed through the keyboard.

What I'm trying to get at here is that IM has created vast but impersonal social networks. Of course, IM is not the only factor, xanga, myspace, livejournal, facebook and other such websites have all contributed to better connected, but oddly enough, worse tied webs of contact.

It would have pleased the Social Darwinists that our culture has managed to marry the principles of competition with the Internet and its social networks as well. As oversensitive teenagers would have it, it is no longer about not who you know, but how many you know. This new round of competition is all about how many people you are friends with, and thus your perceived popularity.

What drew my indignation toward AIM Fight is how easy it makes comparing people's "popularity." By facilitating such comparisons and calling them "fights" with all due fanfare, AOL has only exacerbated the competitive woes of our culture. The program allows you to compare your "popularity" (its exact word) with others through the number of active buddies to the third degree. You are now only a click of the mouse away from self-gratification or a steep drop in self-esteem.

While I have often simultaneously chided and praised the anonymity of the internet, I find this is be a disgusting violation of privacy. It is too intimate just as it is discreet and uncontrollable. Equally disgustingly, I found myself fascinated with this program and proceeded to "fight" with a number of buddies.

One feature of AOL mail that has always caused me to fear using it is how it alerts you when a recipient has read your email. As with AIM Fight, I have realized that willful ignorance is perhaps the key. While this may run countercurrent to my nature, sometimes it is simply better not to know.