Netiquette

Netiquette is not a word that i was familiar with, in fact i had never heard the word before in my life. However after reading about it on Moodle and other websites, i discovered that i did have some understanding of what it was, without even realising it. Though i'm no expert, after scoring a surprising 70% in the netiquette quiz, i realised there were still quite a few things that i did not know.

This made me think about how many others had actually ever heard of netiquette, or if they even thought there were manners for the internet? Of course then i had to think about people's perceptions about the whole thing. The question is not 'do people know about Netiquette?' it's more like 'what does Netiquette mean to different people?'

Does everyone interpret words or sentences in capital letters as someone shouting? Or do they perceive it as something important, or a warning, or excitement? When
i read an email i have to think about the context that the words or sentence is in, also i have to look at who wrote it.

So this begs the question, do people really take offense to messages that don't follow the Netiquette guidelines? I personally don't. Many people don't realise that they could unintentionally be insulting somebody, and i keep that in mind when reading an email.

Netiquette is good information to have for the future however, especially for the work place. Work related emails to colleagues are not the kind of things you want to be unintentionally insulting, or rude. Though it is safe to say that people will read what they want to read and interpret however they see it.
Whether it is fair for people to take offense to people who don't know better or not, Netiquette will never be cut and dry.