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The ideas of "on-line" and "off-line" have been generalized from computing and telecommunication Best Office Copy Machines into the field of human interpersonal relationships. The distinction between what is considered Best Refinance Mortgage Calculator "on-line" and what is considered "off-line" has become a subject of study in the field of sociology.[7]
The distinction between Best Office Copy Machines "on-line" and "off-line" is conventionally seen as the distinction between computer-mediated communication and face-to-face communication (e.g. face Best Office Copy Machines The Best Home Theater Television time), respectively. "On-line" is virtuality, and "off-line" is reality (e.g. real life or meatspace). Slater states that this distinction Best Office Copy Machines is My Best Friend S Wedding Soundtrack "obviously far too Best Office Copy Machines simple". To support his Best Office Copy Machines argument that Best Office Copy Machines the distinctions in relationships are more complex Best Office Copy Machines than a simple "on-line"/"off-line" dichotomy, he observes that some people draw Best Office Copy Machines no distinction between Best Office Copy Machines an Best Office Copy Machines "on-line" relationship, such as Best Office Copy Machines indulging Best Office Copy Machines in cybersex, Best Office Copy Machines and an "off-line" relationship, Best Price On Power Juicer such as being pen-pals. He also argues that even the telephone can Best Office Copy Machines be regarded as an "on-line" Best Office Copy Machines experience in some circumstances, and that the blurring of the distinctions between the uses of Best Office Copy Machines various technologies (such as PDA and mobile telephone, television and Best Office Copy Machines Internet, and telephone and voice-over-IP) has made it "impossible to use the term 'on-line' meaningfully Best Office Copy Machines in the sense that was employed by the first generation of Internet research".[7]
Slater asserts Best Office Copy Machines that there are legal and regulatory pressures to reduce the distinction between "on-line" and "off-line", Best Office Copy Machines with a "general tendency Best Office Copy Machines to assimilate online to offline and erase the distinction", stressing, however, that this does not mean that on-line relationships are being reduced to pre-existing off-line relationships. He conjectures Best Office Copy Machines that greater legal status may be assigned to on-line relationships (pointing Best Office Copy Machines out that contractual relationships, such as business transactions, on-line are already seen as just as "real" as their off-line counterparts), although he states it to be hard to imagine Best Office Copy Machines courts awarding palimony to people who Best Office Copy Machines have had a purely on-line sexual relationship. He also conjectures that an "on-line"/"off-line" distinction may be seen by people as "rather Best Office Copy Machines quaint and not quite comprehensible" within 10 years
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