Politeness and the Web

[Psi-Lord]

In another thread, noir wrote:

It's okay with 해요체. Anywhere from 해체 to 해요체, 합쇼체, 하오체 are used online (the last of which quite humorously).

Although I believe this question may not be all that straightforward, I was wondering – in a Web environment such as the UniLang forum, is it better to pick a speech level and go with it, or, once one knows about real life age gaps, social distinctions etc., to change levels accordingly? If I’m 29 and address two people I’m not familiar to or friends with, but which I know are 18 and 45 years old, are the age gaps important regarding the choice of level, or should I treat them both equally owing to this being an online forum?

And does one tag 씨 to screen/user names (e.g. noir씨), or any other sort of honorifics at all?

[Karavinka]

EDIT: I mistakenly edited your post instead of quoting... sorry!

The most common one would be haeyoche, and some people prefer haeche or hapshoche depending on the forum environment. Most forums in DCInside, for example, use haeche as a general rule but a total newcomer might be expected to use haeyoche until the person gets used to the environment. Hapshoche is not as common, but it might be used in the forums where the participants are generally expected to be mature and some formality is demanded. As you post on a forum and if you're not targetting a specific individual, you would use one form of formality.

Individuals online may decide to use a more real-life style of formality, if the two people agree doing so. I have a few friends with whom I chat quite regularly on irc and msn, and although I have known them for years, we still use the general haeyoche to each other although somehow they're all older than me. It entirely depends on the preference of the individual, and the online practice of addressing each other in general haeyoche translates to the offline meetings. So the last question is yes, whether they're younger or older, it is preferable to use haeyoche first.

The safest title to use online is nim.

(I cannot type Korean on this computer, so please bear with it.)