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lot of time consuming media in their private spaces will be unable and unlikely to participate in their local communities” (Emanuel 15). In addition to understanding the positive and negative impact of technology, it is also important to explore the ways that it will influence the field of communication in the future. It is hard to predict what the long term impact of the many new communication mediums will be, as research up to this point has only been based on the short term data. But even without substantial data, it is apparent that technology will continue to change communication. Scholars have begun to consider how it will be impacted in the future. For example, it has been noted that people who are connected online are usually connected offline as well. “What happens via new technology is completely interwoven with what happens face-to-face and via other media–the telephone, the television, films, music, radio, print” (Baym 721). All forms of communication seem to become connected. This will become influential because it has been apparent that online communication is impacted by offline communication. It will be interesting to see how online communication will impact offline communication. This is already seen in changes of speech, as many young people use abbreviated language that was began online, such as OMG or LOL. To add to the research above about how many people find themselves distracted by CMC, research will continue to better understand the effects of this on interpersonal communication and on society. In the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Malcom Parks explained that, “We know something about distraction effects, but we know very little about the effects, if any, of regular, simultaneous multimedia use on attention, problem-solving, and face-to-face interaction. We know very little about the motivations for simultaneous media