are internet friends "real" friends?

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Most irl friends are not real friends.

So internet friends? :lit:


Imo friend is too strong of a word for people you know online.
Internet buddy is much better
 
Yes and no.

Yes in the fact that you can legit form bonds with people from across the planet. What's the difference between watching a movie in person with friends, and watching a movie online with friends?

No in the fact that with very few exceptions, ain't shit gonna happen because of an online friend (i.e. networking or romance), and if you fall off the face of the earth into the forever box, they'll probably never know, and forget about you fairly quick.
 
Yes you can make true and honest friends on the internet. Keeping them is another matter, but you cannot deny that you can make them.
 
This has no clear answer, they can be, they can be not.
It also has historical precedent in the olden times.
With travel much more expensive and time-consuming, you could correspond with people regularly with letters and not see them in years.
You could also build friendships that way, especially in the intellectual sphere. Read a book or article you liked? Write the author a letter, and maybe you will stay in contact and become friends.
The difference is of course, that people in the past never run risk becoming withdrawn weirdos that never talked to anyone in person, like internet overuse sometimes does.
 
I'm in your only friend

Tell me the your mother's maiden name and your place of birth
 
I'm in your only friend

Tell me the your mother's maiden name and your place of birth
 
Yes ofcorz they are!!!
Back in the day I had Tom from Myspace as my top friend.
He never replied to me but we were still friends.
 
Local Degenerate said:
No in the fact that with very few exceptions, ain't shit gonna happen because of an online friend (i.e. networking or romance), and if you fall off the face of the earth into the forever box, they'll probably never know, and forget about you fairly quick.
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I won't disagree that this probably happens a lot, but man you can't deny that piercing feeling of knowing someone from a now non-existent forum and having no way to try and contact them exists as well.
 
The strongest friendships are formed through shared struggle or shared suffering. Hard to do that in a comfy chair.

You can simulate it by sharing some goal or effort, but most people never bother or bail since it's rather tricky to work together online and there's plenty to do on your own. Not that that lack of commitment isn't understandable: Why put in the effort when internet people are ephemeral? You'll make an effort if you have to see each other in person every day, but online you really don't. You can fuck off just like that and join a different chat group, keeping everything shallow and low risk as you would as a stranger stopping by an unfamiliar town. A rootless sort.

Perhaps our banishment from the mass and scale internet could be a blessing, if it could get through to us that we really don't have that many places to go, at least if we want to be honest with each other to any degree.

Even though that's certainly not the only issue confounding the matter, perhaps better effort should be made toward figuring it out while we can.

7-7-7 said:
yes! I met one of my best friends online almost 10 years ago. We talk almost every day.
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Then again, it seems some of us struggle with it a lot more than others lol. I just can't think of people you only talk to as friends in a real sense of the word.
 
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Definitely not if you're any kind of e-celeb and probably not in 99% of other circumstances either. That being said I've been playin vidya and talking about shit with a bro online for damn near a decade and I would consider him a better friend than anyone I know in person. I'd probably describe anyone else I know online as "friendly acquaintances" though.
 
There's para-social shit, dropping money on some e girl, but there's also no end of online meet ups where from forums to people meeting and marrying from online gaming or hobbies. There's people I talk with on Telegram, and while not agreeing on all stuff, people get along, shoot the breeze and so on.
 
I don’t really think so. Can they become so? Sure if you start interacting in person.

Ultimately online just isn’t the same.
 
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