neděle, prosince 01, 2013

Writings and the incidental (mis)understandings

In the past few decades we have seen a huge boom of writings in the connection with the development and grow of the World Wide Web. There are traditional books, newspapers and magazines, but also the number of websites and blogs is growing, Seems that almost everyone with the ability to read and write does.

This is great!
The technology makes it easy to spread the information fast and worldwide, but are our brains ready to make some sense of it all?
After all not everything is applicable everywhere and for everyone. Take the weather forecast around the globe - what is the weather like say in Panama would only interest me if I were to spend holiday there which is very unlikely.
 
Of course, I still ask google first if I need to know where is the country talked about in the news, that's exact and there is only one answer - although it usually appears on many different pages and in many different formats ;). For more complex questions where expert or local knowledge is beneficial I would rather ask the expert - or whom I consider expert in te field in question and better in face-to-face conversation, because trying to clear up anything by e-mail usually leads to more confusion on both sides of the line. Needless to say that it is frustrating if you - as a sender - consider each word and its place in the sentence and after getting a reply you realize the recipient clearly took from your carefully written mail completely different meaning.


This is quite common I think as only 7% of the meaning is in verbal communication and the reaction to the e-mail sent is not immediate. You write an innocent "have a good day" mail in a good mood after the breakfast, but the recipient reads it after a dispute with the boss at the time the l'esprit d'escalier takes on and you'll be the one shouted at. Yes, it is not fair, but ...

To avoid such misunderstandings the mailers should have a sensor and refuse to send or read a personal e-mail in case of person's bad mood. Words are like arrows and can't be recalled.

However, do we want to have so much control taken over by the computer programs? 
What do you think?
Did you have a moment when you thought "oh shit, I shouldn't have written it" or the opposite "oh shit, does the sender think I'm a complete moron"?
If so, did you let it fade away or tried to come clean?






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