#2 — option 2 — Grice's Maxims

Grice's four maxims seem to be phrased with face to face conversation specifically in mind, so it is important to consider how different communication technologies may alter the way the maxims are actually used, much in the same way different technologies alter the features that characterize coversation (ch. 1).

The first maxim, the maxim of quantity declares simply that you should say as much as you need to say, but no more, to get your point across to your audience. It's clear that this maxim is very sensitive to production costs in different mediums. For example, in face to face conversation production costs for speech are practically nil, so if you need to formulate a very long and complex utterance to make your point, that's a viable option. In contrast, in instant messenging, production costs are very high since we can think much faster than we can type. For this reason, a communicator in IM will more strictly enforce the first maxim in their utterances. In a medium with low production costs, such as face to face conversation, the maxim can be bent a little. For example, while conveying an anecdote to a friend, there may be certain details (such as the weather, the color of a person's hair) which, although not directly vital to the point of your story, still help flesh out what you wanted to say. In a medium with high production costs like IM, a speaker is much less likely to include such details.

The maxim of quality says that a speaker should not intentionally communicate a falsehood (they should not lie), and they should also not say things which they have no reason to believe are true (don't say things for which there is no evidence). This is a maxim that a speaker is more likely to adhere to strictly when they are using a delayed-response communication technology, such as letter writing or email. In synchronous or nearly synchronous mediums like face to face conversation and instant messenging, a speaker probably won't really have the opportunity to fact check themselves, so if they are unsure of something, they may go ahead and say it anyways, possibly with the addition that they aren't sure of themselves. On the other hand, when writing a letter, a speaker has plenty of time to find and check reference material if they are unsure of something they want to say, so they can take the time to make sure they have correct data before communicating their thoughts.

The third maxim, the maxim of relation, declares that a speaker's utterances should be relevant to the direction or goal of the conversation. This seems like a rule that most speakers follow in most mediums, and is if anything effected more by social situation than by technological medium. For example, 'relevance' would be much more narrowly defined in a business meeting than in a casual conversation. Some people might argue that differences in conversation flow in mediums like IRC and IM constitue differences in relevance, but I would argue that these are really differences of structure, and fall under the guides of the maxim of manner.

The maxim of manner addresses the need of speakers to be as clear and as brief as possible, and to structure or order their utterances in such a way as to make understanding easiest for addressees. The exhortation to be brief seems to closely tied to the first maxim, and the need to be clear seems universal. These two aspects interact in the form of conventions that might otherwise be unclear, such as 'lol' or emoticons. On the one hand, such conventions are obscure and nigh indecipherable to those who are not experienced with such things, but on the other hand they make online communications considerably more brief if all participants are familiar with the conventions. I would argue that since, as language conventions, they are meant to be perfectly clear to the communities that use them, they help make online communications briefer without sacrificing any clarity.

The need for structure, however, seems to vary greatly by medium. For example, there is much more structure in a letter than in a face to face conversation, and there is more structure in a face to face conversation than in IRC or IM. In a letter, we do not ramble because we have time to plot out what we want to say and how, as mentioned earlier. In face to face conversation, we don't have the luxury of time. In instant messenging, we still don't have indefinite time to construct utterances, but we do have a record of utterances by all participants, which makes it much easier to keep multiple and unrelated threads interspersed with each other in a single conversation. Or, in the case of IRC, to follow a conversation that you are having with one person while other people in the chat room have different conversations about different topics with different people at the same time. In this sense, the choice of medium greatly affects what level of structure is expected and useful in communication.