ABSTRACT
Technology affects people's lives in both predictable and unpredictable ways. When one considers the influence that computers have on the way people engage in relationships, it is important to understand that people are just starting to assimilate them into their daily lives. Computer-mediated communication (CMC) has infiltrated a variety of aspects of people's lives. With the movement toward increasing use, CMC has proven to be a valuable tool for many people to initiate, develop, and maintain relationships. Although e-mail has not achieved the universality that the telephone has, the signs point to a similar pattern of assimilation. Computer-mediated communication represents the wide spectrum of media that use some form of digital encoding, and in many ways, it is a misnomer to discuss CMC as a unifying concept. Instant messaging services represent a addition to the family of synchronous CMC media.
