In a few short years from its inception, the Internet developed its own “virtual” culture, with its own standards of behavior and appearance. If you are vague on this notion, simply watch the language and attitudes conveyed in social media, messaging, and email messages. Over the years, some commonly accepted standards have evolved that may be worth paying attention to. These include:

• Be polite, thoughtful, ethical, and law-abiding. The Internet is a public place. It is wise to act accordingly. Civility, thoughtfulness, compassion for others, and a desire to help have important places in the online behavior repertoire. Learn the ropes of Internet Ethics and Privacy. Start with a search engine entry on “ethics and privacy on the Internet.”

• When you send an email, always include a subject line that tells the recipient what’s in your message. Keep your subject lines short; learn to think like a newspaper headline writer. And use the active voice. When the topic of an email thread changes, either edit the subject or start a new thread. Otherwise, you will lose the capability of easy message retrieval by subject in the future.”

• Include only one major subject in each email message. Don’t put a major project report in the same message with chit-chat about yesterday’s barbecue.

• Use paragraph headings. If the main idea in your message has more than one part, do your reader a favor by introducing each part with extra space and a heading.

• Manage who receives your messages. When you mail to one person, use private email. When you send a message to a group, post it to a group discussion app or “cc” your private message to the whole group. Send a message only to those who really NEED to see it. This reduces the workload for everyone. Consider using the “blind copy” or “BCC” field when sending to a group, especially if it includes people you don’t know; this function keeps everyone’s email address private and prevents scavengers from collecting group members’ addresses and using them inappropriately or selling them to companies that send junk email.

• Avoid embarrassment by checking your recipient list before sending. Let’s say Bob sends a message to Carol, who forwards it to you. You click on “Reply,” thinking your response will go to Carol. But it doesn’t; it goes to Bob. Not a serious problem, unless your response (intended only for Carol) reads: “What’s wrong with this Bozo, anyway?” Avoid the inevitable soap opera by always double-checking your “To:” line before you send a message. Better still, make a habit of never sending a message that might offend.

• Always check the FAQs before posting a question to a social media or learning platform discussion forum. Don’t waste other people’s time. Before you ask others for help, make sure your answer isn’t already clearly posted. This goes for comments on YouTube (etc.) videos too. If you’re in the habit of fast-forwarding through a video, don’t be surprised if the questions you post in the comments get ignored.

• Avoid using all uppercase letters. ALL CAPS LOOK LIKE SHOUTING TO THE READER! If you are aiming for emphasis and differentiation, use color, bold, italic, _underlines_ or *asterisks* or extra white space. Even if you intend to shout, *never* use uppercase for more than a few words; it’s just too hard to read.

• Watch your language. Informality is one thing, but multiple typos, misspellings, and sloppy construction are just plain rude. With auto-completion and apps such as “Grammarly,” there’s no real excuse anymore for bad grammar and spelling. And, profanity, however common in the spoken world, looks glaringly out of place in print. If your email or messaging app has a built-in spell checker, use it.

• Always respond promptly. If you have no answer, send a reply anyway, saying, “I’ll get back to you on this.” (Then flag the message so you don’t forget! Most email clients have reminders or reminder apps you can add that will aid you with this.) If you must, say, “Sorry, I can’t help you.” In any case, kindness dictates that you never ignore a message sincerely sent. (If it isn’t obvious, this doesn’t apply to spam, scams, or brazen sales pitches.)

• Limit your messages to one or two screens. If your message goes longer than two screens, go ahead and make it as long as you want, because no one’s reading it anyway.

• Be clear about your feelings. Use emoticons when appropriate. Keep in mind that irony, sarcasm, and other modes of “double meaning” almost never “work” online.

• Always re-read your message before you send it. Change anything your recipient might misunderstand. Modify spelling when it could affect your meaning.

• Include your name at the end of every message you send. Phone numbers are also a good idea. If you like to include an inspirational quote at the end of your messages, keep it short and to the point, and change it frequently.

• Give explicit agreement and disagreement. No one can see you nodding your head and grunting (or shaking your head) at your computer screen. Say, “I understand,” “I agree,” or if you think its important to disagree prior to a deeper discussion, you can say “That hasn’t been my experience.” (Way better than, “I think you’re wrong!”).

• Reinforce and encourage. In the absence of visual cues, people are sometimes left wondering. Say, “Well put,” “Good point,” “What a useful idea.”

• Avoid sending junk mail, chain letters, or jokes to a busy person. An email recipient is a captive audience, forced to open every message to find out what’s inside. For someone with dozens of messages to open, every extra click is a pain in the neck. If you must send jokes, do it infrequently or restrict them to outlets such as Facebook where people are used to wasting their time this way. This allows your intended recipients to choose whether or not to read the message.

• Respect the privacy of others. Never forward a message to a third party without permission from its author. By the same token, if you’re going to mention someone in an important email, think about including them in the CC of that message, especially when the discussion will impact them.

• Let apparent provocation go by without offense or attachment. Because body language, tone, and connotation are absent in computer-mediated communication, you may hear words in a way the writer did not intend. Remember the correspondent who received a missive that said, “I resent your message.” S/he responded with a flaming, “How dare you!” only to discover that the sender had intended to say “ree sent,” not “ree zent.” If a message triggers negative emotions in you, you may be more tempted to fire back an angry retort because the recipient isn’t right in front of you. Don’t.
  
  Always assume the best, responding in a positive way and not at all until you recover your emotional neutrality. Write your “flame” message, if you must, but don’t send it. Let a day pass, reread your message, and then decide how to respond.

• If you must have a confrontation, do it in the real world. The written word is simultaneously permanent and open to interpretation. Hide behind it at your own peril. Instead, pick up the phone or pay a visit.