Are online friends just as important as offline friends?

[Nah 3,181]

Yes

 

I have barely any friends in real life, mainly cause I am socially awkward, a social isolationist, and have no desire for love, or sex, or rap, or country music, or sports, or facebook, or.....

 

Rant over, you guys are all my real friends!!!!

[Anachronous 682]

Having a considerably active circle of friends and social life, I'm here to say that these friendships online are just as important. It depends more on what goes into it than, as my colleagues have said, the medium through which it is conducted. Also, to be quite honest, a good stock of people I know personally are vapid beyond belief and worthy of a slap in the face with their juvenile conduct.

 

People online aren't necessarily "better" than people in real life. I know this as well as anyone. But on sites like these, where people share a common interest among one another from the very beginning? Well, it definitely helps along forming closer friendships and bonds. There's no real need to put yourself out there and find a common ground because it's already there.

[Mr. Wobbels 664]

Internet = Infinite Awesome People

 

So yeah, friends are friends bro.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Mr. Wobbels

[Pony Joe 582]

I all depends on the person. I would consider my IRL friends a bit more important, but maybe that's because I've known them longer, share a couple hours with them each weekday at school, and am obligated to buy them physical birthday gifts.

[Fox 5,330]

Make friends with everyone! Online friends have feelings and are important, but you should make everyone your friend. Be more like Pinkie Pie.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Fox

[Doctor XFizzle 8,651]

I have one really good online friend and we both share the same interests and can talk for hours on them. Something like that can hold more substance than a friend you can physically hang out with but either has a very busy schedule or you don't converse too much outside of the physical interactions.

 

I can see myself and my online friend being bros if we lived near each other. Maybe one day him and I can meet at a football game or UFC show, something like that.

[LunaShy 167]

yes the are i made friends with I am fluttershy almost 2 years ago and spend more time with him than almost anypony i know. He is probably mah best freind ever! Brohoof Georg : )

[I am Fluttershy 20]

Wow, thx buddy!! Brohoof Jef.

 

Yeah I would you are meh best friend ever!! XD

[Radiance64 7,051]

I like to think so, a friend is a friend after all.

[I am Fluttershy 20]

Exactly, I have known him for 2 years and we are best friends... I may even get to go over to where he is because I have family there.

[LunaShy 167]

Exactly, I have known him for 2 years and we are best friends... I may even get to go over to where he is because I have family there.

 

ill try not to throw u in a dumpster : )

[Guest]

I believe online friends are just as important as offline friends, like others have said a friend is a friend is a friend!

[Aureity 3,055]

There are real people behind those screens. Real people whose personalities you have gotten to know through texts and chats. And in some cases, you know them better than you would if you had met them in person (A lot of people here open up as to what they're feeling when they probably wouldn't in real life). There's a face behind every avatar, and a personality that shines behind every post. Friends made on the internet are friends all the same.

[Marcato 2,143]

This is potentially one of the most contriversal topics on the forum.

 

Online friends are very different from IRL (in real life) friends. IRL you know the person truly. Their voice, how they look, and you normally understand them better. Online friends are very anonymous and can still easily enough turn on you. Although real friends do the same, its not unheard of for online friends to be completely different from how they act online than in person or over voice/video chat. Some use the internet as an opputunity to bully while others use it as a place to find friendship when they cant find it at school or anywhere in the real world. There are some definate pro's and cons to this and its sometimes tough to figure, depending on what your situation in life is at the time.

[DashingRainbow36 263]

You just have to be careful. And this would work with friends IRL. Ive seen people get played by "friends" online, and be crushed by basically someone being a giant troll. I'm not saying you have to be suspicious of everyone, but don't let someone on the interent or IRL drag you along, and then crush your soul. I go to this video chat site once in a while and this moderator in one of the rooms was getting really friendly with someone online named Terry. Terry was eventually going to come home from a deployment in Iraq and meet her for the frist time. The day before Terry was supposed to be state side, he sent her a letter saying that he actually had a wife and three kids and was fucking with her for kicks. So she told everone in her chatroom what happend. It turnes out that some guy in the chat room (rick I think his name was) was a very experinced hacker. He eventually found this duchebags real name, and found out he was never even in the army, but did have a wife and kids. Terry apparently had a business that had its own webpage, so he took the letter and made it the front page of this website, and probably ended that guys marriage. The ultimate revenge I say.

 

So just be careful with who you meet online or IRL. You never know what you may run into.

[Luurilka 325]

"online friends aren't real"

 

'nuff said.

[Bronium 512]

I think online friends are even more fantastic! I mean, pretty much everyone on the internet needs not worry about how they act on the internet. They're free to be as jerk like and open as they want. And I think that an online personality is more true to the person than those of real life. And if you are friends with someone online, you're more likely to have made friends with what a person really is.

 

I mean, in real life, everyone is thinking of their reputation and just showing what I like to call their public self. As you get to know them, they show more of their private self. Which is fantastic. But on the internet, they show more of their private self (by private self I mean personality and not real life information) to others and you can almost be sure of that they won't just change on you.

 

Of course, being on a forum such as this one, you're more likely to act as if in real life, as you try to maintain a reputation on the forums but past that, it's more likely that you're the real you and not the you most people see.

 

So I'd say that online friends are just as important as those in real life.

 

Oh, and I have 3 friends in real life as of this moment and around 10 during the duration of my life. Where 3 have been online and 7 have been in real life. Of the 7 in real life 6 have left me. And of the 3 online, only 1 has.

 

All 7, I found to be completely different to when I first met them, so I started to dislike them and distance myself from them. Well except for one. That one did that to me, but that's a different story.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Bronium

[Harebrained 39]

Sometimes it's easier to discuss at length through text, and some of the best, most insightful discussions that have helped me grow as a person took place online with friends I've never met (some became offline friends, too, or visited). The "real" factor of a friendship shouldn't be determined by whether or not you're together in meatspace, but by whether or not it's productive and you actually have a sense of each other as human beings.

 

Getting out of the house is more important, though.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Harebrained

[Cupcake Ice Cream 436]

I place them equally but I admit I am quick to get rid of dead weight. By dead weigh tI mean people who want to down me or make my life miserable. But regardless, I cherish my IRL friends the same as the online ones

[Despair 114]

I find it very difficult to find people who have the same interest as me IRL. So, I turned to the internet for friends and here I am now.

[Xellos 1]

Actually people you meet online can be extremely important. If you've found the kind who you just feel like you have always known and can trust with anything the net argument will be a moot point.

From my own example. I met my own special somepony almost 13/14 years ago. She started it off by wanting to get to know me cause yeah I didn't know her at all at the time. But over the years freindship has become close very lovey dovey relationship. That might not sound to out of the normal.

But bear this in mind I'm from Northern Ireland and she is from The USA. If not for the net we would never have met. Last year in NY was the first time we met each other in person and honestly that time felt just as if we had been around each other all those years. It was really natural and we definitly grew closer. So much so I'm reverse homesick now.

 

Don't let anypony tell you that the good freindships you will establish online are nothing. They can be some of the most important you will ever establish.

[Envoy-in-exile 101]

Friends, wherever you meet them, are just as important.

Edited July 5, 2012 by Envoy-in-exile

[CapnKrunk 307]

I dont really care if I have IRL or online freinds.As long as you have freinds.Your good.

 

But I kind of like Online freinds a little bit better.Because they talk to me a little bit more than some of my IRL friends.

[Klopp 2,050]

Yes, friend online can be better than real friends, cause Arylett is an online friend and she is the best ever. :3

 

Some online friends might suck at times though.

Edited March 20, 2013 by Sir Klopp

[MVC NVMXD JVRXD 2,406]

Since this thread has been revived, and my views have changed a ridiculou amount on this matter, I believe I'll go ahead and throw another wall of text in here.

 

 

I joined this community back in November, and quickly made good friends with a fair chunk of people. Hell, back before we had 500 members I had pretty much become friends with everyone. (I thank my punish username for that) Anyways, I made more friends in this community than I have ever made in real life for all the days I've lived. It's certainly easy to say that those friendships were not worth any less than the friendships I have made IRL, and in many cases the friends I have made here have been far greater than those I've met in person.

 

On particular case is with my best friend, Nico, who I declared as my Best Brony Buddy early on when we first met. Looking back, he was honestly the best friend I'd ever had, even though all we ever did was chat and play Osu For some reason I just liked the guy a hell of a lot, and we chatted a bunch with each other until his computer went all crazy, which was horrible cause I really enjoyed my chats with him. However he soon came back and we chatted a bunch again until his computer, yet again, blew a gasket, and we had to cease communication for about two months.

 

Well, two months ended just one week ago last Friday, and when he logged back onto Skype I was extremely happy to chat with him again. He was certainly surprised at my reaction, but I honestly missed the guy a ton. Now, to cut a long story short, he eventually asked me to be his boyfriend. I was shocked, surprised, and any other synonyms you can think of, all at once. After a years work of thinking crammed into a 36 hour period with no sleep, I came to the realization that I actually WANTED to be his boyfriend. For a guy who was strictly heterosexual up until that day, this was all extremely weird to say the least.

 

Anyways, today we still have lengthy chats, they are the only thing I look forward to every day now, and I just want to have the guy here in AZ soon so I can give him a ridiculous quantity of SNUGGLES! I am extremely happy, more than pleased with the fact that I am now bi-sexual (Or, Nico-sexual anyways ) and have what is honestly the best friend I have ever had as my boyfriend.

 

So yes, online friendships can easily be as important as those IRL, and can even surpass beyond any expectations you might have imagined possible. From my own extremely odd yet wonderful experiences over the past week, I can tell you that online relationships can make you the happiest you've ever been in you're entire life.

 

 

More ideas for my Kloppfic....

Edited July 5, 2012 by One Fine Djentleman