BY AKIKO NAKAGAWA

The world has changed a lot in this decade. It can't be discussed without speaking of computers. In the 21st century, the day will come when everyone has their own computer. Many students in Sapporo University have their own personal addresses and can use computers freely in the computer rooms. Of course, there are students who have their own computers. The purpose for using a computer varies from student to student. They make papers, get information from the Internet, and send e-mail with their computers. E-mail is used most frequently by students. They send e-mail to friends not only abroad and in different colleges but even within our university. And, they even find new friends on the Internet, and send e-mail to them not having met.

There was a conversation with two students of the English Department about e-mail: one student said, "Usually, I can't say what I want to my friends, but sometimes, I can more easily when I e-mail. I can e-mail someone in my free time when I don't want to speak to them directly. I'm looking forward to opening my e-mail mailbox." The other, who found e-mail friends on the Internet said, "Usually, I can't speak to strangers to make friends. But e-mailing, I easily can." Thus, a large number of the young are "communicating" with friends by e-mail in recent years.

Why did they find it so interesting to send e-mail? When pagers were popular as a way of sending messages, "Bell Friends" became very popular among the young. Both e-mail and pagers are used as a way of communicating with friends far away. Therefore, they don't have to meet face to face, but just watch the machine. That means an unsubstantial acquaintanceship with people on the Net with whom one has no direct connection. Actually, we don't get nervous when we send e-mail, and in addition, we can say what we mean more concisely with e-mail than with spoken words.

However, is this real "communication"? It seems that they avoid communicating with people and try to escape into the world created by the Net. In addition to e-mail, video games which can be played with strangers are put on sale one after another these days. One sits alone in front of the TV. But it's so interesting that the players are absorbed into video games before they know it. Virtual reality, the world created by computers, can become a "real" reality for the player. It's possible for them not to be able to distinguish virtual reality from the real world. In the future, we ourselves may become managed by computers and there seems to be a possibility of computers' usurping our position. And so, computers can become dangerous instruments for us.

Computers won't vanish from the world, for the time being, because they are indispensable to us. But we shouldn't flee the real world. We, who must build the future, should communicate face-to-face so the world will not to be taken over by computers.