Even though a few people have had it for awhile, Facebook Chat launched for the rest of us today. Just what I need: another network to chat on.
One of the things I noticed right away is that there is no “away” status like most instant messaging clients. You’re either online, offline or idle. It got me thinking again on a subject that comes up with friends and I quite a bit: “What is the purpose of an ‘away’ message anyway?” I don’t think there is any standard netiquette.
Some people treat it like an answering machine. When they see you’re “away” they’ll IM you anyway knowing you’ll get the message when you’re back.
Some people treat their “away” status as a way to limit incoming chat traffic knowing that less people will bother you if you’re listed as “away.”
Generally, I use my “away” message as a way to let people know I don’t want to be bothered by IM. For one example, if my away message says “Meeting,” that means I’m in a meeting and don’t want to accept chats. I stay online in case I need to ask a coworker or friend a quick question during that meeting. There’s a number of situations where I want to remain connected to the network in “away” mode and not wanting to receive chats that I don’t initiate.
I rarely IM people that are in “away” mode unless it’s urgent or I think it’s important.
Some people argue that if you don’t want to receive chats you should be offline, not “away.” It looks like that’s the philosophy Facebook had when deciding how their instant messaging client worked.
I’m curious: how do you use the “away” message?
Comments 13
As you know, I treat it as an answering machine because well, you’re “away” and you’re asking to get to the message later. If you are offline, it’s for a reason and you won’t be spooling messages.
After you explained (complained?) to me that I was not understanding what “away” meant, I have done what I can to avoid sending you messages when you aren’t active. To me you should get offline or stop your client from popping up new messages when you’re away — afterall, that’s what that function is for IMO.
Good luck.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 08:25 ¶Most of the time that I use “away” mode it’s because I’ve stepped out for a second; to get dinner, run to the bathroom, answer a phone call, etc. I have a chat window open with one or more people about 95% of the time that I’m online, so I don’t think it’s necessary to completely sign off when an away message will work.
While at work, away is used more like the answering machine you mentioned. Throw up a “meeting” away message and catch up when I get back.
I usually sign off completely when going to bed and when I go back and forth to work and home. That’s about it.
Plus, I hate when my twitter messages get backed up in my email, so staying online allows them to just keep coming to IM. I could log into Twitter each time I went somewhere to change my updates to web only, but it’s just quicker to set myself as away and walk away.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 08:27 ¶I wish more clients had invisible mode. I always used that on Yahoo when I wanted to be online, but didn’t want others to see me. That seems to be almost what you use Away for.
My usage though…
Offline when I don’t want to be bothered.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 08:56 ¶Away when I’m either away for a short time or at my desk but would rather not be bothered, but also don’t mind if I am.
Yeah, the answering machine method is pretty much how I use it. When I’m online, I’m almost always away.
I’ve noticed that when I do set my status as available, a handful of people take the opportunity to strike up mindless chatter which I am completely uninterested in. I stay “away” to fend that off. Those couple people ruin it for everyone! If I’m on a computer, I’m probably doing something else on it, so any mindless chatter is an interruption.
Most people will message me anyway if they have something to say, which is fine. I’ll get back to you if/when I have a response. What I like about gTalk is I have that chat transcript handy and searchable in an interface that I use frequently.
I sort of assume that other people use it the same way, so if I see someone is away but I have one sentence to share, I’ll probably send it via chat instead of email and I don’t expect them to respond right away.
But it depends on whether I usually see them as available or away. For someone that’s usually available, I’ll take their away message to mean that they really are away and I’ll hesitate to send an IM. If it’s someone that’s usually away, I’ll send it and just wait for them to respond.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 09:07 ¶I’m from a different world. A world of private life, where people can be away without twitters and feeds filling up online in-baskets of ‘work’ to sort through or even mass delete later. Yes, it does lead to some disconnect (but that is the point too, double edged sword deal), I am seldom the first to know any news (Paul Douglas is really gone, wow!), but it leads to a simpler online, less stressful life.
But, more directly to your thread–I quit IM years ago for similar reasons. I would be online, but invisible or away almost all the time, because as soon as I would go visible, people would deluge me (understanding a deluge to me might be 3 people while yours might be 30).
I used to blame it on being old, but then I realized it was due to (1) me being private and (2) me not being interested in killing time chatterboxing.
Then as an adjunct reason–is this–I think prolonged thinking and reasoning, and I didn’t like the what the hell-does-that-mean mystery to all those 5 word thoughts.
Given all the other options–texting, cell, email, blogging, even Dodgeball…I do not miss IM in the least.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 09:25 ¶Erica: thanks for saying that. Your thoughts on IM are very similar to my thoughts about Twitter, actually. It ties into….
The Other Mike: I think you lead to another good point wether you intended it or not: you equated your IM experience to “killing time chatterboxing.” People use IM in different ways but I think of it as more of a tool than a toy. I get what you’re saying though: there are people that treat IM as all happy fun time. Maybe that’s why they invented the “away” message!
Good discussion.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 10:04 ¶If my status is “available”, I’m up for interruptions of any sort, mindless blither, or whatever. If it’s “away”, I’m actually not there, and the chat window is functioning as an answering machine. “Busy/Do not disturb” usually means I’m in a bad mood, but I’m available if you really have something to say. If I truly don’t want to be bothered, I just stay offline.
“Away” and “do not disturb” are also handy, because they give me permission to be rude and ignore someone typing at me until I feel good and ready to respond.
-C.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 12:50 ¶This is clearly indicative of the always-on culture that a lot of us are a part of. Just because I can always be online doesn’t mean I should be or I want to be.
An away message is the new Caller ID. I’ll check and see who it is before I decide if I want to accept and respond.
I liked Invisible mode, too. But *someone* has to be “available.” If we were all sitting around invisible, IM would be kind of useless, eh?
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 14:32 ¶When I’m IM at all, away or not, it means that I usually want someone to talk to me. I personally use away to say that I may not respond but still people should send me messages because it’s fun, yes fun, to get little notes from my friends. So it’s a bit the answering machine mentality but beyond that it’s more expectant in that I want people to IM me even if I’m away.
Posted 23 Apr 2008 at 15:34 ¶However, I also understand that many times people put up away and don’t want to be disturbed so I don’t expect everyone to conform to my views even if I don’t fully understand the other side.
Gmail chat is my favorite because you can leave up an “answering machine” status message even if you choose not to be away. Lately, since most internet time is at work, I tend to be away.
I think I overall agree with Steven W.
And I”m frustrated with Facebook’s lack of an away message option.
Posted 24 Apr 2008 at 12:29 ¶I find the facebook chat to be more annoying than anything. I forget that I’m talking to people, or if they are talking to me, I don’t even notice. Maybe I’m alone in that one. I think it’ll take some getting used to. I use away messages a lot as an answering machine. Not only can I still get messages when I’m not near my computer, I can screen the messages I do get when I’m not in the mood to talk to people. I understand what you’re saying about the away message not working so well when you’re in a situation where you don’t want to be getting messages from people. For situations like that, I use email. It gets the message delivered to the person and I don’t need to worry about other people trying to talk to me when I don’t want to be disturbed.
Posted 26 Apr 2008 at 19:23 ¶Aaron Aaron Aaron. Everyone knows serif fonts are harder to read on screen.
Posted 27 Apr 2008 at 23:19 ¶Ususally, I sit on AIM as “away” because there are really only about 3 people who I will talk to on a regular basis, and this allows me to see when/if they are online or come online with me being able to filter or just not be messaged by the vast majority of people who I don’t really want to talk to all the time. I really miss the day when most people I knew were on ICQ so I could just go selectively invisible to some.
Posted 29 Apr 2008 at 06:53 ¶Post a Comment