Sarah Story spotted the little yellow man in the bottom corner of her computer screen. She clicked on him, typed her password as fast as she could and let out a sigh of relief.
She was logged on.
Sarah is one of 36 million users of America Online's Instant Messenger service that allows people to chat with each other through text. About 15 percent of AIM users are from 13 to 17 years old.
"During the summer when I'm at home, I spend about 10 hours a day online," Sarah said. "It's great. I can watch TV, talk on the phone and IM six people at once."
The AIM attraction has sparked major interest among adolescents, but has this fascination turned into an addiction?
According to Krista Thomas, spokeswoman for AIM, the average time of use is six hours daily.
"Log-on time for AIM is booming," she said. "One reason that AIM is so popular is it helps things get done quickly; it has speed benefits."
Many people say they're hooked on the service because it serves as a medium through which people can communicate with greater efficiency. Some people even use the feature to talk to themselves.
"I talk to myself on different accounts often," said Aly Fiebrantz, a senior at Alta Loma High School in Rancho Cucamonga. "It's fun that way, especially when I'm bored."
It is this mindset that Alan Kanner, a psychologist at the Wright Institute in Berkeley, condemns when analyzing the increasing trend of communication through impersonal technology.
"Narrowing the amount of information and development of linguistics causes us to lose people skills," Kanner said. "We start spending less time with people and forget what we are truly missing."
Ruchi Jhaveri, a senior at the Harker School in San Jose, said there are both advantages and disadvantages of messaging for her.
"It's easier to bring up difficult topics online than it is on the phone or in person," she said. "Even though it's convenient, my parents hate it because it wastes so much time. When I'm doing my homework and online at the same time, it takes double the time to get it done. "
One of the reasons AIM has reached so many people around the world is through advertising, from television to Internet to magazines. Thomas said the service makes money "from the pop-up screen that appears when people sign on, to new video chatting available for all to use."
But Kanner said advertisers love the service because it delivers them a captive audience.
"Marketers hire psychologists in order to analyze and understand the adolescent mind," he said. "These professionals understand teenage desire and, therefore, market towards this specific population with their ads located on the AIM screen."
Katie Heil, a senior at Presentation High School in San Jose, agrees that AIM is useful at times to talk with many friends, but is useless when having important conversations.
"My goal is to stop using the service as much as possible because of a fight with my friend," she said. "I wonder if the same conflict would have happened in person, because online chats open the door to say whatever without understanding how the other person feels."
Katie's mom, Barbara, enjoys the AIM service because it enables her to talk to her five children all around the world. "I talk to my husband sometimes through AIM because his office is on a different side of the house than mine," she said. "It's more convenient than walking to ask a question."
This trend is not going to go away. In fact, the technology is evolving to allow instant-messaging capabilities on smaller handheld devices such as PDAs (personal digital assistants) and cell phones.
Although many young people say they like that AIM enables them to stay anonymous and not deal with people face to face, experts like Kanner say that can cause teens to become distanced from real-life communication. That can be helpful for shy people, who find it easier to communicate online, but if they only chat online, they never truly learn the skills they need to socialize at school.
Some psychologists believe that a possible remedy could be for teens to just take a step back and reevaluate their positions online, making sure that they don't lose fundamental skills in the process of their impersonal chatting.
While closing the windows on her screen, Sarah witnessed her conversations finish box-by-box, click-by-click. As the file menu dropped and the cursor descended the list of options, Sarah pondered whether to sign off or not.
She opted for her "away" message - so she could stay connected, just in case.