The Sound of Silence
- Thursday, July 25 2013 @ 07:10 am
- Contributed by: Jet
- Views: 988
Imagine this: you’ve been at work later than usual and at the end of an interminable day, you stagger over to your computer to check whether you have any online dating site messages. To your delight, you do - and it’s not just one, it’s over a dozen! But wait - a second look reveals that all of the messages were sent from the same person. What’s going on? Is this a glitch?
The first one seems innocuous enough - your standard first-contact email. You haven’t looked at the profile of the author yet, but there’s nothing in the email that would deter you from doing so. Curious, you move on to the next message.
“Oh my gosh!” it says. “I completely made a typo back there! You must have thought I’m such a dunce! I hope this doesn’t harm my chances of getting a reply...” You hadn’t actually noticed a typo, so you turn back to the first message. Ah yes, there it was - your brain filled in the proper spelling and you hadn’t even seen it. Still, nice of them to clarify. You jump ahead to the third message.
“...Look, it was just one tiny typo. I can’t believe you’re giving me the silent treatment because I haven’t passed your silly arbitrary test...”
And the next: “You’re not perfect either, you know. On your profile you use a comma when you clearly should have used a semicolon. Jeez, passed junior high English much?...”
The messages continue along this vein, becoming increasingly agitated, aggressive and even abusive. If you were interested in checking out this profile before, you certainly aren’t now. So what can we learn from this series of unfortunate messages?
First, once you’ve sent a first-contact email, it’s best to wait for a response before you send another one. Really, that’s fair advice for all emails. Sure, exceptions can be made for people with whom you have established relationships - maybe you haven’t heard from a friend in awhile and you’re verifying they’re all right - but for people you don’t know very well, it’s best to just let it lie.
Second, remember to do your proofreading before you send the message, not after. Sending a follow-up or a correction might be acceptable in blatant or offensive cases, like an embarrassing autocorrect or if you mangled the numbers in an address. For a simple and obvious letter swap, just let it lie. Typos happen to the best of us, and one tiny mistake won’t make or break your chances (if the mistake is even noticed!).
Finally, relax and walk away from the computer. Remember that you have no clue when your message will be read, or if the person will have time to respond or check out your profile when they do first read it. Don’t read too much into a prolonged silence. Even the worst-case scenario, where the potential match never responds, is less stressful and embarrassing than going on a twelve-message rant for no reason - and once you’ve crossed that line, your chances are shot anyway. Once you’ve sent the message, it’s out in the ether; don’t sabotage yourself by over-thinking and overcorrecting.
The first one seems innocuous enough - your standard first-contact email. You haven’t looked at the profile of the author yet, but there’s nothing in the email that would deter you from doing so. Curious, you move on to the next message.
“Oh my gosh!” it says. “I completely made a typo back there! You must have thought I’m such a dunce! I hope this doesn’t harm my chances of getting a reply...” You hadn’t actually noticed a typo, so you turn back to the first message. Ah yes, there it was - your brain filled in the proper spelling and you hadn’t even seen it. Still, nice of them to clarify. You jump ahead to the third message.
“...Look, it was just one tiny typo. I can’t believe you’re giving me the silent treatment because I haven’t passed your silly arbitrary test...”
And the next: “You’re not perfect either, you know. On your profile you use a comma when you clearly should have used a semicolon. Jeez, passed junior high English much?...”
The messages continue along this vein, becoming increasingly agitated, aggressive and even abusive. If you were interested in checking out this profile before, you certainly aren’t now. So what can we learn from this series of unfortunate messages?
First, once you’ve sent a first-contact email, it’s best to wait for a response before you send another one. Really, that’s fair advice for all emails. Sure, exceptions can be made for people with whom you have established relationships - maybe you haven’t heard from a friend in awhile and you’re verifying they’re all right - but for people you don’t know very well, it’s best to just let it lie.
Second, remember to do your proofreading before you send the message, not after. Sending a follow-up or a correction might be acceptable in blatant or offensive cases, like an embarrassing autocorrect or if you mangled the numbers in an address. For a simple and obvious letter swap, just let it lie. Typos happen to the best of us, and one tiny mistake won’t make or break your chances (if the mistake is even noticed!).
Finally, relax and walk away from the computer. Remember that you have no clue when your message will be read, or if the person will have time to respond or check out your profile when they do first read it. Don’t read too much into a prolonged silence. Even the worst-case scenario, where the potential match never responds, is less stressful and embarrassing than going on a twelve-message rant for no reason - and once you’ve crossed that line, your chances are shot anyway. Once you’ve sent the message, it’s out in the ether; don’t sabotage yourself by over-thinking and overcorrecting.
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