NMR: Chapters 35 - 40

A lot of these chapters had to deal with, either directly or indirectly and more abstractly, how our general sense of communication is not necessarily challenged, but arguably altered as a result of digital new media.  In Chapter 39, "Towards a New Classification of Tele-Information Services," by Jan L. Bordewijk and Ben ban Kaam, the authors look at the different social roles and how they each interact with one another in the varied world of digital new media.  Having grown up, for the most part and at least during my formative years, in a highly technology based world full of instant messaging and email, it is difficult for me to step back and observe exactly how technology has negatively or positively affected the way humans communicate with one another. One thing I found interesting was to consider how different this same article would sound if it were written now, by someone in my generation.  Would the new communication forms seem beneficial, offering new ways to communicate, or would it be seen as dumbing down the way we talk and interact with one another?