Does Micro-Blogging Lead to Poor Communication?

by Rico on September 29th, 2008

Micro-blogging is appealing because a witty or insightful one-liner definitely takes less time and effort to compose than an essay. There’s no need to follow any structure; all you have to do is just express.

While websites like Plurk and Twitter can be liberating for this very reason, it carries a certain danger for people who communicate on a regular basis. As a writer, a proper and compelling introduction is crucial to getting the reader hooked on what I have to say.

Expression in Tiny Increments

Is it possible that, as you get used to expressing yourself in tiny increments, you lose the ability to articulate your ideas in a well thought out and comprehensive manner? I fear this is happening to me. For the sake of attracting enough responses to raise my karma—a rating system that rewards participation and eliciting it—I’ve learned to craft my messages in easily digestible snippets.

That’s not necessarily bad for writing. After all, good writers know how to attract attention to their prose. What I’m worried about is my ability to be consistently gripping. Has my focus on online soundbites robbed me of my capability to keep a reader hooked for an entire article?

What Does This do to Communication?

More importantly, what has this done for my communication skills? Have I learned to state my message as quickly as possible, for the sake of being understood promptly? Again, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, especially when your recipient wants to know what you have to say ASAP, but don’t I run the risk of leaving out important aspects of my idea?

Will I forget to craft productive-friendly emails, since I’d probably more interested in communicating from the hip, instead of taking the time to properly craft the email? Am I being paranoid? Fellow micro-bloggers (those who use services like Plurk and Twitter), what has micro-blogging done to your communication skills?

Tags: Communication, micro-blogging, problems

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