Week 3 - Communication Types Exercise

I have to talk about how I communicate with my friends and family through communication technologies.

The tech that I generally use is email, instant messaging and Xbox Live.

I don't generally talk to family members using internet technologies, I talk to them over the phone, be it landline or mobile or in person, as most of my family though does live away (not immediate though) I use the phone.

Friends though I generally talk to via Instant Messaging services and email, as well as Xbox Live.

I use Windows messenger to talk to mates via the internet, the IM confersations are very casual just as if i was talking to them in person, though we do very often share links with each other.

Email I don't use as much to talk to friends, I generally use email for online newsletters, keeping in touch with the university and info from sporting teams, websites I am a member of etc.

Xbox Live however is very different. I play video games with people (generally those who I have never met, sometimes from overseas) and have the ability with the right periphials to talk to them and even see them, though to see them you need an Xbox webcam, which I don't have as I don't think its worth the money as it isn't fully used yet by game developers.

Speaking to people that I don't know over Xbox Live isn't that different to people that I do know as you very quickly become 'friends' with the people, you also know their basic likes and dislikes due to the profile on their gamercard.

I don't talk to people I don't know over IM, but I do on things such as forums, but generally these forums are specialist (i.e. Sydney Roosters forums) so we all know we like at least one thing the same.

I have been using IM, email and forums for a long time, probably since I started using the net, but due to not having broadband until recently I have only had Xbox Live since the 1st of Feb 07.

Basically I started using this tech cause my mates were (in regards to IM, email, forums, etc) but I always wanted to use Xbox Live because I love the idea of online gaming, plus games have a MUCH longer life span when you can use multi-player.