Exploring the distribution and relationship between MSN and the physical world

Recently with rapidly developed information technology, people are able to communicate with others through various channels. The instant messaging applications, such as MSN, Yahoo Messenger and etc., make the communication among people getting more closed and connected. The instant messaging software is usually installed in a standalone computer to provide the handy way to communicate with others via the Internet connection. For the modern age, it is convenient and efficient for people to use such instant messaging software through high-tech facilities. However most of the instant messaging software mainly provides the text-based functionality for people to communicate with each other. And this will easily cause the misunderstanding of literal meaning without feeling the emotion with others. The advantages in conventional face-to-face communication could be the disadvantages of the modern communication with instant messaging software. Conventional face-to-face communication allows people to talk to others directly, and it is hard to make misunderstanding with feeling the emotion. But the disadvantage of conventional face-to-face communication results from the spatial and temporal restrictions. Accordingly people are not able to find other people whom he wants to talk to anytime anywhere. The goal in our research is to use Social Network analysis methodology to explore the distribution between the instant messaging software and conventional face-to-face communication.