www.felixcohen.co.uk

A torn and lovelorn BoingBoing reader
writes; is it OK to ask for a girls email address if she seems interesting but doesn't necessarily share all your views?
Disregarding the question of whether it is appropriate, in a Mars/Venus way, to KO someone simply for disagreeing with you, I'd like to address the far more fundamental issue of; is it appropriate to ask for a girls email address. What sort of geeky, technophile message does this send out, or is it just as acceptable as getting a phone number in the year 2006.
There's a lot of psychological arguments to be made that email provides different modes of communication to a phone conversation (I'm wilfully disregarding the question of SMS'ing at the moment); it has many commonalities with the time-honoured letter, but even then lacks the appropriate social cues that one would get from hand-writing, layout etc. And is it then appropriate to judge them based on their email domain; I'd sure as hell consider what I was doing if a girl ended up having the email fluffybunny69 at hotmail.com (sorry, whoever has that mail, but really...).
I've been offered email addresses a couple of times since I mmoved to the big smoke, and kinda assumed it was a subtle brushoff; "sure, e-mail me, but at least I can pretend my spam filter caught you...". Perhaps I'm wrong, and the email is the equivalent of the mobile number now; it certainly seems a lot harder to stalk someone with just their email address, and if your date is planning on googling you apres your next meeting, he or she can probably find some interesting snippets from it, like message board postings and so on.
But it says a lot about peoples online presence; which are you more likely to be upset about, a day without your email or a day without your mobile phone. Hell, I'd go for the email anytime, which may surprise some of you, but I guess I can treat that like going on holiday and coming back to a mound of exciting mail on the doormat, whereas a phone has real-time aspects.
So, in response to the lovelorn boingboing reader, I think my response has to be; get her number, dude; you can always get the email later if you feel a burning desire to forward tat or show links, but a voice chat is a lot more interesting for both of you.
And really, if she disagrees with you about Microsoft's Quality Assurance/DRM, perhaps you should take her out just to talk some sense into the poor girls head. Not everyone can be as wise and sensible about user-experience as most BB readers; if it works for what she needs, I guess it works for her. Take the opportunity to enlighten her with your swanky Apple or KDE desktop if you ever get her back to yours...
A brief hey to BB readers who've found their way over here...feel free to take a look around. Especially at some of my swanky new URL's; many people seem to enjoy these cocktail discussions

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