New relations
(31%/NC = 668)
:
These users reporting the motivation of seekingnew relations and the opportunity to meet new people. Easy and cheap opportuni-ties for contact with new people are seen as the main incentive. Several of the us-ers are aware of the danger of “risky contacts,” but find it both more convenientand more exciting to meet new friends in an online situation like this than to beconcerned about potential risk. Further, an SNS makes it possible to verify theperson and his or her profile (e.g., interests, look, friends) and to see if he or sheis interesting or “safe,” as opposed to ordinary open chat rooms without any pub-lic profiles. In addition, through SNSs, people meet each other in ways that mightbe more truthful and open than offline meetings; in that sense, SNSs have the po-tential to facilitate communication between people who might be prejudicedagainst one another in the “real world.” Further, these findings imply that severalrelationships that begin online migrate to other settings. According to one user,“It is easy to get in touch with new people, but also to limit or to cut off contact if the person is getting too eager or aggressive or because of other reasons. There isalso other fun aspect with those sites, such as free SMS on www.biip.no”.Subcategories include: