As someone who has never been the most socially competent person in a room, I find myself increasingly in a tangle over the rules of digital communication.
Is it just me, or is the social etiquette of texts, emails and social media becoming more and more complicated by the day?
Should I seal my text with an x, or should it be two xxs, or should they be capital XXs? Will the receiver assume different things depending on which I choose? For example, does one x mean I like them less or they have annoyed me? Do two XXs mean I like them a little too much?
And then what about the time I take to respond? If I don’t reply straight away (as is often the case for me if I am out and about and perhaps need to check my ‘old-fashioned’ paper diary before I can reply) will the person think I am being rude or don’t want to see them?
Moving on to my next question, how long should my text be? If I choose a very quick and direct answer, does that also imply something about my feelings?
That’s just texting, then we can move onto emails. Do these require XXs at the end as well? At what point is it okay to end the conversation as one person will have to then end up being the one to not reply? Do I use emojis on emails or are they just for texts?
And finally – social media. Well, where do I start?
There are so many hidden meanings in all of these areas that I often find myself unwittingly upsetting or offending people without even realising. It has almost got to the point where I want to revert back to pen and paper or the good old-fashioned phone call (except no-one ever answers their phone these days as it takes too long apparently!)
Can we all just agree not to take umbrage at these issues? If we are upset with someone, we can just tell them – that way there will be no hidden meanings in the way we communicate digitally.