Rebuilding Rob

In what ways do you communicate online?

Online communication is a wonderful thing, for the most part. It has reunited people who live thousands of miles apart, and people who haven’t seen each other in years, or even decades.

For my last two high school, reunions, information was disseminated entirely online. There were no flyers printed. There were no invitations mailed out to alumni. Thanks to communication, the last two event planners didn’t have to go through the arduous task of trying to locate my entire graduating class.

Social media is another beast altogether. I believe that social media has caused just as many problems that as it has solved. Maybe even a few more. Sometimes I wish we could just go back to email and instant messaging. But as they say, we can’t put that genie back in the bottle. Social media and other ranch for another day though. Today I’m just going to talk about the ways in which I communicate online.

Blogging

Obviously, you know that I communicate online through blogging, or else yo wouldn’t be reading this article right now. When I first started this blog about 10 years ago, I had much the same goal that I had when I was journaling as the kid. I just wanted to get Thoughts for my brain into some form of media

For the last five months, I have been writing daily, sometimes two or even three times a day, on this blog. Admittedly, it is become something of a dopamine rush for me; in the same way, that people get a kick out of their social media views and likes increasing.

It does surprises me which entries that will get more likes, more comments, and more views. I’ll finish a post, and think to myself: Wow, that got deep! I really tapped into some real emotion here; only to find that most readers don’t find it as interesting as I do. On the other hand, I’ll go on a rant about the cult of Taylor Swift, and be stunned at how popular the post gets.

At the same time, I am trying to wean myself off of that dopamine rush. I realize that my likes, comments and subscriptions will ebb and flow just like anything else. Unless I’m willing to dump serious money into this blog, it will never “go viral; nor will I ever “become an influencer“. And that’s OK. At the risk of sounding selfish, I blog first and foremost, for my own satisfaction.

Direct messaging

I remember back in the heyday of America online, one of the perks that set it up across from other companies. Was it instant messaging tool. I remember using that, and I also remember MSN, trying to make a direct messaging application as well. Sadly, instant messages were not enough to save AOL.

Today, I do much of my online communication through Facebook messenger. It works on very much, the same idea as the old AOL IM service. When you are as old as I am, it’s funny to think that we reached a point where writing an email is considered too time consuming.: but here we are.

I know that for the kids today, Facebook is considered “the one that old people use“. And it is. I have some friends who will correspond with me via Snapchat or Instagram direct messaging service, but I don’t personally use either of those as a primary means of direct messaging. I’m still a Facebook guy, I guess.

E-mail

And most business settings, email is still the preferred method of communication between work colleagues. And my school, my principal, and our school superintendent, still send group messages, almost like the old style memos, to staff members via email. Meetings and conferences are still arranged via email/Microsoft Outlook/ Microsoft Teams. Even my fellow teachers and I will shoot messages back-and-forth to one another throughout the day using email.

Of course, one needs to exercise some restraint when using business related email servers. We’ve all heard the stories about people who lose their jobs over going on a rant about some company policy on an office email account.

Microsoft Teams

No, I’m not shilling for Microsoft here, but the last two school district I’ve worked in have started to make a gradual shift towards the Microsoft Teams platform. During the Covid lockdowns, Teams was the software that we used to conduct our online classes when we’re forced to go virtual.

At the time, I had recommended to everybody to add the Teams app to their smart phones. Because of it, a lot of my students who don’t have home computers or home Internet connection were able to attend classes via other smart phones.

Even though, as we are back in school, face-to-face, full-time again, my coworkers and I will use the Teams app to message each other for instant communication. The main problem with Teams is that it is a business application that has since involved into also being used for education. Still, like Outlook, one needs to have a Microsoft account in order to access Teams.

In what ways do you communicate online?

Thanks for stopping by Rebuilding Rob. Be sure to like, comment and subscribe to my blog below. It’s greatly appreciated! Also, feel free to follow me on social media as well! Check out my most recent posts as well as some earlier related posts:

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• A Day in the Life of Rob
• Rob Reviews: The Acolyte. Am I missing the boat here?
• Rob goes green
• The nicest, coldest drink ever

The article “How I Communicate Online” originally appeared on Rebuilding Rob.