Resumen
The article focuses on the quality of online social relationships. People use the Internet intensely for interpersonal communication, sending and receiving email, contacting friends and family via instant messaging services, visiting chat rooms, or subscribing to distribution lists, among other activities. The evidence is clear that interpersonal communication is an important use of the Internet, if not its most important use. Claims regarding the Internet's usefulness for developing social relationships, however, remain controversial. Both personal testimonials and systematically collected data document the deep and meaningful social relationships people can cultivate online. This evidence, however, conflicts with data comparing the value that people place on their online relationships with offline relationships and with data comparing social relationships among heavy and light Internet users. First there is a need to know how computer-mediated communication affects the quality of particular social interactions and relationships.