BKLOVONL.RVW   950228
 
"Love Online", Phyllis Phlegar, 1995, 0-201-40965-8, U$9.95/C$12.95
%A   Phyllis Phlegar 71562,407 phlegar@delphi.com pphlegar@aol.com
%C   1 Jacob Way, Reading, MA   01867-9984
%D   1995
%G   0-201-40965-8
%I   Addison-Wesley Publishing Company
%O   U$9.95/C$12.95 800-822-6339 617-944-3700 Fax: (617) 944-7273
%P   184
%T   "Love Online"
 
I find communications technology interesting, but it has always been the social
aspect of computer-mediated communications that grabbed my attention.  (My
first major article on an Internet list was an analysis of the fact that
messaging systems seem almost predisposed to generate misunderstandings.)  So,
I am very pleased to see a study of romance online.
 
I am not quite as pleased with the almost total preoccupation with "cybersex". 
I agree that an insistence on purely platonic relationships in the digital
medium is both silly and futile.  Nor do I dispute the assertion that "typing
dirty" to someone else can be stimulating.  (At the same time, I am reminded of
Bill Cosby's comment on erotica, that, if you are hungry, you don't go and
watch your neighbour eat a steak.)  Primarily, however, I think it belies the
subtitle to the book, "A Practical Guide to Digital Dating".
 
Some of material is quite practical.  Chapters four to six provide a
reasonable, if very basic, guide to bulletin board systems (BBSes), commercial
online services, and the Internet.  Chapter two also provides some helpful tips
for the online novice.  Lurk before you leap.  Make friends, first, in the
topical areas:  the "Hot Tub" chat area devotees are not great
conversationalists.  Be honest, but careful, and don't believe everything you
read.
 
However, with "computer sex" popping up repeatedly, it's easy to see that this
work started life as a series of magazine articles.  Dating gets fairly short
shrift here, although the material is nowhere prurient.  You can develop
friendships, and even romance, online.  The net is *not* just one enormous
singles bar.
 
copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995   BKLOVONL.RVW   950228

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