In my column this week I argued that there is a new type of digital etiquette where asking for directions, leaving a voice mail message and saying “thank you†in an e-mail can be considered rude.
As a result, my in-box this morning was filled with almost a hundred e-mails calling me rude, ungrateful, self-centered, old, young and a curmudgeon. There were also lots of ironic “thank you†e-mails. The column also generated more than 450 comments, most of which accused me of being insolent, at best.
Below is my response to a few of the comments.
Marin, LA: This article just reeks of self-entitlement and impatience that many people have developed in the digital era.
Nick Bilton: I agree that there is impatience in the digital era, but it is not self-entitlement. The reason for a lack of patience is the unending technologies that are commonplace today. As I’ve written bfore, digital communications methods do not have an off-the-hook option, as landline phones did in the years before answering machines. E-mail, text, chat and a long list of other means of digital conversation simply can’t be turned off. You are either connected, or you have to connect later. It creates an unmanageable flood of messages and as technology won’t fix the problem, people have chosen to do this by creating new forms of digital etiquette.
Tess Harding, The New York Globe: Mr. Bilton seems alternately confused, irked, critical and demeaning of his less Internet savvy yet, in my opinion, more civil communicants. Connectivity has taken its toll on him and his friends â€" and it’s quite sad.
Nick Bilton: I couldn’t help but detect that although readers might feel that way about me â€" which is completely their prerogative â€" the reality is, I’m not the ! only person who acts this way with digital communication. Many teenagers despise talking on the phone. They don’t believe in voice mail. And one-upping me, they don’t use e-mail. It’s a choice of text messages, or the latest chatting app on their phones. Are they rude, or sad, or less civil No. They are just living in an era with different forms of communication. I’m sure this was the same conversation that people had in the 1880s when the telephone started to proliferate.
Botticelli, Long Island: Why are we so impatient with electronic technology, yet we are overjoyed to discover a letter from a dear friend in our mailbox, which takes inordinately longer to retrieve, open, read, and (God forbid) reply.
Nick Bilton: I completely agree. I recently had a friend stay with me for a few days and she thanked me with a physical card â€" sent in the mail, with stamps! That felt incredibly special. I’ve also seen some teenagers who make handwritten card, take a picture of them with their phone, then send that.
Patronzo, Brooklyn: I always just say “thanks in advance.†Seems to work.
Nick Bilton: There’s a good suggestion. As Daniel Post Senning,  of “Emily Post’s Etiquette,†told me, people who don’t send “thank you†e-mails are trying to be polite by not wasting the receiver’s time. This solution seems to work for both. I’ll try that at the end of my e-mails next time.
Jack Dharma, Hartford: The fact that he communicates with his mother by Twitter tells me all I need to know about this millennial.
Nick Bilton: Actually my mother loves Twitter and probably uses it more than I do. Additionally, she lives ! in Englan! d, which is an eight-hour time difference from where I live, in San Francisco. So rather than call each other in the middle of the night, a simple @-reply on Twitter will be found at the optimal time for both of us.
Jake Soiffer, Brooklyn: As a 17-year-old, it’s kind of frustrating to read the comments here and find them all made by condescending older folks who don’t seem to get the gist of this article. As a society, we communicate a lot more than we used to (or, at least, the younger half of us do). We’re constantly in touch with each other, via text, e-mail, Facebook, whatever. If we don’t use these tools efficiently, they will consume huge portions of our time.
Nick Bilton: Thank you, Jake. Thank you.
