Asynchronous/Synchronous Communication
Direct communication, where all parties involved in the communication are present at the same time (an event) is a form of synchronous communication. Examples include a telephone conversation, a company board meeting, a chat room event and instant messaging. Asynchronous communication does not require that all parties involved in the communication need to be present and available at the same time. Examples of this include e-mail (the receiver does not have to be logged on when the sender sends the e-mail message), discussion boards, which allow conversations to evolve and community to develop over a period of time, and text messaging over cell phones.
