I don't remember my university offering courses on how to make friends. It might have – but I didn't know about it, and neither did any of my friends. No one ever mentioned hearing of such a thing.

Yet New York University now offers a seminar called Facebook in the Flesh, reports the New Yorker. The idea is to help freshmen who already know dozens of their classmates online but who worry they don't know how to make new friends in person. That's the fear and the whimsy behind NYU assistant dean David Schachter's decision to hold the workshop, even though he says he's never been on Facebook and his advice to students parallels exactly what users already do online.

The mind boggles.

It makes me think of the moaning and wailing surrounding mobile devices and how we supposedly don't connect "for real" anymore. How we're allegedly replacing real relationships with fake ones, true intimacy with illusion and strong social bonding with pseudo-social networking.

This is all because a lot of people apparently spend a lot of time conversing online rather than in the flesh. And in order to keep up with all these relationships, we're supposedly not being as attentive to the people around us as we should. Not our loved ones, mind you, but the people we encounter casually as we go about our lives: bank tellers, dog walkers, grocers.

Tell me again why I should spend less time with the people I love and more time with strangers?

Convince me that it's more important to yak with a stranger at the neighborhood coffee house than it is to text conversation with my dear friend Monique. It might look like I'm ignoring a passing acquaintance in order to "use my phone." But actually I'm checking in with a new mom who is running home, baby and business on her own while her partner's job has him commuting to Canada temporarily. (Hooray for unlimited international minutes!)

Explain to me why I am contributing to The Decline of Morals and Manners in This Society because I prefer to attend to friends and lovers through our cell phones rather than allow geography to determine who I can and can't relate with.

I don't dismiss out of hand the concerns about techno-communication. Daniel Goleman, a proponent of the science of empathy, intuition and emotion and a thinker I trust, writes about a mass wave of disconnection in the introduction to his book Social Intelligence.

In explaining how mood and emotion are contagious, he notes the ripple effect of rude behavior and how spreading negativity and hurt feelings damages the human web more than most people realize.

But rudeness is a separate issue from connectivity. Mobile devices should not make us impolite.

I recently caught myself flirting by text message while checking into a hotel. I didn't particularly want to connect with the hotel guy – I wanted to keep going with the sweet (and spicy) nothings.

It was an almost physical wrench to set the phone down even for five minutes. Yet to do otherwise would be as churlish as carrying on a conversation with a companion as if the clerk wasn't even there. (Which does happen, alas, but not by me.)

We all need to accept responsibility for our manners.

But harnessing technology to nurture our existing relationships has not damaged our ability to connect "for real." Connectivity gives shy swains time to craft what they want to say, and it gives extroverts layers of interaction to satisfy their craving for people contact and shared energy.

People once took for granted the idea that meeting new people was easier for some folks than others. And I think people who are not comfortable using technology to do that, who simply can't do it, or who have burned out or become overwhelmed by technology worry about those who can handle it.

I think they feel left out. Like we're in a secret club they can't get into, or didn't enjoy once they got through the door.

Mobile service providers know exactly what we use cell phones for. Cingular's commercials about what dropped calls can do to lovers get right to the heart of the matter. And Vodaphone has a great one about a sleeping model, an opportunist and the trouble we can get into with camera phones.

Just like the fears people express about internet users "replacing" love and sex with delusion and cybersex, the concerns about "everyone" interacting through devices rather than in person miss the point. Two points.

For one thing, many of the people we're interacting with through our mobiles are our intimates. They are people we feel so connected with, we want to be with them across time and distance.

For another, we have to trust each other to disconnect when we need to. I'm not going to bemoan a "dependence" on technology-facilitated communication (as if our entire economy isn't based on such a thing!) when we can all put down the phone or walk away from the computer when we get overwhelmed We are not going to wreck society simply because we can choose who we want to talk to at any given time, based not on proximity but on attachment and affection.

I even believe we are strengthening human bonds through these technologically supported connections.

With mobile devices especially, we're sharing the love. Our mobiles are less anonymous and more personal than online message boards or blog comments, and we use them as extensions of ourselves and our relationships. They define "personal tech." And the very limitation that makes flirting and lovemaking so fun also makes it too frustrating to bother with flaming and hate speech.

I have also found that nurturing relationships through tech has taught me to be more forgiving and patient. I'm a better listener, because texting forces me to slow down. I've also become better about asking for clarification when I don't understand something, rather than jumping to a conclusion; I don't agonize over the question, "What did he mean by that?"

Modern relationships – whether between colleagues, friends or lovers – flow between flesh and technology more easily every day.

Let's accept that we've been dazzled by the novelty of our devices long enough and dust off our manners. Then let's embrace the truth that emotions are contagious, and ensure that the emotions we inspire in even the most casual of encounters are pleasant or at least neutral.

And then let's get back on our devices and send a text message so hot, so loving, so clever that our bosom buddy cannot help but pass that warmth on to someone else.

See you in a fortnight,

Regina Lynn

- - -

Sex Drive appears every other Friday on Wired News. Between columns, you'll find Regina at reginalynn.com.

Don't Dismiss Online Relationships as Fantasy

Lovers' Digital Trails Capture Ups and Downs

Web 2.0 Leaves Porn Behind

Online Therapy: Like a Diary That Writes Back