Downsides to Intrafamily IM?

Frisky070802 writes "The NY Times has run a column on how many families now use instant messaging within a household, for instance to ask what someone wants for dinner. This is especially popular as whole houses get wired (or wireless) and computers are scattered throughout the house. This is the case at my house but I tend to be the only one who stays on AIM reliably. Can Slashdotters offer some personal experience, pro/con, with being instantly and constantly accessible to one's spouse and children? Does this tend to break down your 'personal time'?"

Comments

this is stupid

[SpacePunk]

What ever happened to just screaming/yelling down a hallway?

Re:this is stupid

[OS24Ever]

Well in my house when it's 2AM and I'm still playing SWG or DAOC my wife yelling up the stairs would wake up our 2 yr old and 4 month old pretty quickly.

Also, as us geeks make money we tend to get bigger houses where yelling between floors isn't as easy as it used to be (at least that's the case at my place) and sometimes the IMs I get are along the lines of ...

'Come Downstairs and start the grill please'

"Come downstairs and start the grill - i'm hungry'

'When are you going to come downstairs and start the grill'

'If you don't start the grill I'm going to cook the steaks on a broiler!'

She started it, and she's the normal person of the house.

Re:this is stupid

[llamaluvr]

It's sorta been a joke with my family. When I'm home, we'll usually have two computers working in the house (my laptop and their desktop). We have one 4-port router in the den, so both computers are generally in there. My mom has given up telling me in person to clean my room, so, we'll both be typing away in the same room 3 feet away from each other, and all the sudden I'll get an IM from her asking why I haven't cleaned my room. I've been tempted to block her ;-).

Re:this is stupid

[eyeye]

Have you ever had this message:
"Son, I know you didnt notice me come in but could you jerk off to net porn after i've finished checking my email?" ;-)

Re:this is stupid

[Scrameustache]

Well in my house when it's 2AM and I'm still playing SWG or DAOC my wife yelling up the stairs would wake up our 2 yr old and 4 month old pretty quickly.
'Come Downstairs and start the grill please'


What kind of weird kinky game are you playing that involves a grill at 2AM? : )

I have a simple paging protocol...

[raytracer]

It usually involves me yelling at the top of my voice. I envy those who have a house so large that my voice does not provide adequate coverage.

Re:I have a simple paging protocol...

[56uSquareWave]

There is a very simple solution to voice amplification, it requires a pringles can... joe

My problem

[Anonymous Coward]

My problem is having way too much virtual sex with my sister... it's taking a toll on our real social lives.

Okay, this is going to far.

[bryanp]

Put the mouse down.

Step away from the keyboard and nobody gets hurt.


Now go out and interact with people. They're in the same friggin house with you fer chrissakes.

Intrafamily IM

[willith]

HotMamma24242: hay guys wut up its dinnr time
LittleBro33: cool
OlderSis53137: i dont lik 2 eat im 2 fat
DadInCharge98324: shut it oldersis youl eat wut ur mom telz u 2 eat and like it 2 lol
LittleBro33: lolololol haha u got n trubl
OlderSis53137: shut up il run aimnuke on u
*LittleBro33 has disconnected
HotMamma24242: its not nice to aimnuke ur brothr
DadInCharge98324: ur gonna get a spankin
OlderSis53137: no1 n this famly understands me i h8 u all
HotMamma24242: but i made teriaki chikn

Re:Intrafamily IM

[CmdrGravy]

OffcrDibbl4193: Hi this the LAPD, how can we help
OlderSis531357: Hey OffcrDibbl cum rnd n arest my dad, he sez hes gonna sxuly abuse me
OffcrDibble4193: Do you have any evidence of that mam ?
OlderSis531357: Yeah luk at this:

DadInCharge98324: ur gonna get a spankin
OlderSis53137: no1 n this famly understands me i h8 u all

OffcrDibble4193: OK, we'll be right around

Re:Intrafamily IM

[JDWTopGuy]

MikeLjakson666: bedtime, evry1!

Personal time?

[CelticWhisper]

Well, I don't know about you, but in my experience I...oh, dammit! Hang on, my kid just IMed me, he needs help with his homework. I'll finish this later. To the living room I go...

Good way to stay in touch

[Henry V .009]

I use instant messaging with some of my extended family members. It's a great way of staying in touch. The only excuse for instant messaging someone in your own household, however, is if you do not possess muscle control over your legs. I mean, good god. Walk down the hallway and get a little excercise at least. That much laziness and your computer chair will give you bed sores.

Re:Personal time between spouses

[Peridriga]

Have sex then when your not talking...

Not like your keeping her around for her 'fab' shoe collection are you?

Ahhh older technology....

[twoslice]

What ever happened to just screaming/yelling down a hallway?

The old-fashioned wireless communications method - very nice!

To the newer geeks: The above post is referring to the old wireless technology that utilized a unique QOS priority technique. Messages were encoded using higher and higher DB levels that really worked well - the louder the scream the faster people responded....

Re:Ahhh older technology....

[JDWTopGuy]

This technology also transmits location information as metadata.

Re:Ahhh older technology....

[Mr Guy]

The problem is that in the very young and the very old there is a major problem with packet dropping.

I sniffed this very conversation over Christmas time while visiting family ( I removed the destination address for privacy concerns: )

Mother: Dinner time, go wash up.
Sibling in college: blank stare at computer screen
Grandfather: continues watching tv
Mother: DINNER TIME
Sibling in college: blank stare at computer screen
Grandfather: When is dinner?
Mother is forced to use hardware extensions to alert grandfather and sibling through sequential pinging and alerts.

I'd rather just use IRC anyway

[mrpuffypants]

Dad: What? You won't eat your vegetables?
Kid: Nope. They're gross.
Dad: (Goes to computer) +b #tvroom
Kid: NOOOOOOOO!!!! BUT DAAAADDDDD!!!!

No Family

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't have a family, you insenstive clod!

I think I'll IM myself to ask myself what I want for dinner.

Re:beats bellowing down the stairs

[ethanms]

Well why not just get some webcams and video-conference?

"How's the weather in the living room dear?"

"Just peachy snookums, let's go to www.pizzahut.com for dinner!"

"Great idea pooky... let me just finish up my orders at www.peapod.com and www.netflix.com"

Loss Of Personal Time

[Jubii]

Can Slashdotters offer some personal experience, pro/con, with being instantly and constantly accessible to one's spouse and children? Does this tend to break down your 'personal time'?

No more than having a cell phone on your hip when you go to the toilet:

"Hello?! Uh... I'm busy... Doing... stuff. Nevermind that sound, what do you want!!?"

Sheesh, that's the worst.

Problem:

[Doomrat]

kewlkid: okay baby i'm taking off ur pantz...
gran1922: okay
kewkid: fuck i thought you were melissa. sorry gran
gran: dont stop...!

Re:beats bellowing down the stairs

[Anonymous Coward]

yes but if she came to you to ask the same question, you could reply "you are, baby" and fuck her brains out. try doing that with aim

I love IM, and I hate it

[agwis]

Here is a typical day for me when I have to work at a client's office:

wife> you'll never guess who called
me> can it wait? I'm working here.
wife> oh it'll just take a sec...
wife> blah blah blah
me> *insert random emoticons to make it appear that I am actually paying attention*
wife> ok, so when will you be home?
me> soon, I just got to finish this one last thing...which I will get done as soon as we quit talking.
wife> ok bye

* a couple of minutes pass *

wife> guess what happened on *insert dumb soap opera here*

and so on. Once I put her on my blocked list but she figured that out and really got pissed.

I'm reading this topic with much interest and interested on how other people deal with IM. I like it and hate it at the same time!

-Pat

Re:I love IM, and I hate it

[Pig Hogger]

wife> you'll never guess who called
me> can it wait? I'm working here.
wife> oh it'll just take a sec...

This nothing that can't be cured by

ntalk -o $WIFE | eliza | ntalk -i $WIFE

Re:I love IM, and I hate it

[bruthasj]

Make sure you have that AI thingy installed, because she won't like it (esp. if her name is eliza or lisa) when she gets something unintended:

bash: eliza: command not found

Get off the keyboard and walk into Junior's room..

[mojotooth]

If for no other reason than you might catch him doing something he's not supposed to be doing. I know that, as a child, I was terrified of doing something I wasn't supposed to be doing because my mom/dad could wander into my room at any moment.

As if the threat of going blind wasn't enough... ;)

Re:Sometimes this is the only way.

[lxs]

me, my brother, my mom and my dad all live in different cities.

Wow, your family must live in an enormous house.

Re:Non-Indentured Servitude link

[Call Me Black Cloud]

Well, I for one don't enjoy tossing my information about willy-nilly just to read an article

Psssst...don't tell anyone I told you this, but...you don't have to use your real information.

Parenting in the Digital Age

[Uggy]

True Story

With technology has come a multitude of conveniences, time savers, and capabilities of which our primitive ancestors could never have conceived. Take for example, the instant message. It is instantaneous, travels at the speed of light to its intended recipient, delivering important potentially critical information at the click of a button. It can be sent across the world, around the block, or to the next room.

Laura at 15:01:18: Jaimito is poopie

Jim at 15:01:43: Roger, I'll change him.

Toxic waste disposal emergencies such as the one above could have not been addressed with such efficiency before the days of IM. Thank the Lord!

Actually...

[twoslice]

There was no carrier sense and no collision detection.

It was called collision avoidance. When your old man was communicating you avoided interrupting him otherwise there would have been a collision between you and him...

star trek!

[aj444]

lets face it, star trek style comm badges is were this is all heading.

Re:Non-Indentured Servitude link

[kjd]

Well, I for one don't enjoy tossing my information about willy-nilly just to read an article.

How about tossing it around pell-mell? Helter-skelter? Higgledy-piggledy?

Re:instant messangers

[a20vertigo]

hah! I removed Windows/MSN Messenger with XPLite, and my CPU turned into a quantum singularity!

Re:Congratulations

[LC Gundo]

I really wasn't expecting this.

I'd like to thank all the little people who made this possible.

What about bots?

[blastedtokyo]

kid:is dinner ready yet?

mom:wow, you really don't eat much for lunch. I'll get it ready

(translation: kid is doing weed with his friends and getting the munchies)

mom: are you ready for dinner?

dad (autoreply): don't bother me for 30 minutes in the bedroom, I've got a videoconference

(reality dad's screwing the babysitter)

Once mom gets her own bot figured out this family will really be f'd up