I'm not understanding this... of course its easier to transfer money over the internet, then to give someone wads of cash. When I have to loan money to my family, I do it over the internet even though they live 5 houses down from me. The question was about willingness, not ability.

The more advanced our communication becomes, the more we distance from eachother.

Sounds odd coming from someone my age but if I look at my younger sister and the people of her age they use msn and such to keep contact where as I at that age would go over to a friend's house to chat. I'm somewhat fearing people makeing the same mistake as me, pushing away real life friends for online friends and ending up in a situation where they got no real life friends to fall back on. They might not realise it but real life contact is quite important. Perhaps drifting away from the main topic a bit, but without love and affection people eventually get very ill, and the internet can't make up for that.

Oh, real life friends are important too. And I've several of those as well. But my online friends are just as important (some admittedly more-so). I'm not really advocating dumping real life friends in favor of online friends at all. Friends are friends, no matter what sort and they're all wonderful to have.

I probably spend more time talking to my friends online then I talk to my friends that I met elsewhere. I've never wanted or needed any kind of help from any of my friends, so thats not really a consideration to me. I do tend to be more open to people that I've met online, as well as have better conversations.

Hmm, I don't think I've ever needed my friends either, however sometimes you look around the room and IF you needed something, you wouldn't ask any of them for help. And sometimes you look around the room, and you wouldn't be able to decide who to call first because they would all help you at the drop of a hat.

And sometimes you have too much pride to ask anyone for help anyways, so it doesn't much matter to you if you think they'd help or not

I have found online friends to be better than friends I have met out in the real world in that respect. Mostly because I have found that meeting people who share a common outlook is much easier online. Also from a personal point of view I have found some difficult topics to be easier to talk about with a friend online than with a friend IRL. I owe a couple of online friends a great deal, for help they have given me in the past.



Borrowing money? Only to very good friends, and only if I have met them a few times IRL and still consider them good friends, and assuming I even had any money to lend

I have met up with about 20+ people from online over the last few years, 4 of those involved me flying to another country, even if that country was reasonably close by

Five of those 20 are still very good friends.



Depends how well I know them, I have a had a few online friends to stay with me but actually I had met all of them at least once before they came to stay. Hmmm, no wait, one I hadn't met before hand, but he swore to me that he wasn't an axe murderer, and I decided to take his word for it

So in summary I'd say online friends are definately important, although in my case all good online friends eventually became IRL friends too, so do they still count?

This is like asking, "If your best friend IRL moves across the country, is he still a valid friend?" The answer is a resounding yes.

Lending money? I tried putting Shiri as a beneficiary on my life insurance, just so he could let you guys know if I suddenly died. Beat that.

I want on your list.


*kills Sylphas*

Better to do it through an intermediate so as not to raise suspicion.

I'll do it for 10% of your cut.

Most of my friends don't have money.. but the one time I ran out of cash at walmart I almost cried on one of my friends, because I've never.. not had money. So she lent me $3.

And Ialie has personally spent money OOCly to keep Joli from suiciding.. so I guess that counts. (Sometimes I wonder if she regrets that)

I've spent hours talking online to my online friends about things going on in my life. I think that they don't judge me as much like my real friends would. There are things I just can't talk to my real life friends about and I would sooner flee to a computer than to a phone..

Who would be suspicious of Shiri?

"We think that 14 year old looking British kid flew over here, murdered this guy, then ran back home again without anyone knowing."
"Why yes, that sounds very plausible. Arrest him!"
*shiri gets arrested and extradited to America*

I don't think I value my online friendships nearly as much as my real ones, mostly because I don't interact with them as much, don't know as much about them, and have never met them. I have a thing about actually meeting people.

So far, I've met two people that I met online, both of them in my area. And there's one that I'd really like to meet, but he's far away.

I don't think about most of you when the computer is off, sorry!

...14 year old looking?

He was talking about this:

I value both my online and offline friends equally. Some of my friends are somewhere in the middle of that. I don't really see what the difference is as long as they fit my criteria of a friend. There are only a few people (both online and offline) that are closer to my heart than others. They've earned a place as a real friend because they're there for me when I need them the most and I realise that I wouldn't mind doing the same back for them.

You can't really say that someone is a better friend to you just because you see him/her in person almost all the time... I still put my best friends above the classmates I'm closest to. As for online people... I've got a list of people I feel that I can trust and talk to and have even met some of them.

So I guess for me... One main criteria of a real friend is being someone that I can trust to be there for me when I need it the most. It doesn't matter whether you're online or offline... Some people can't even rely on their neighbours.

(Lending money is a personal choice though, I don't think there's one answer for all situations.)

Why can't we be friends

oh my god. Satan! I have that song in my head now.