IM vs. face-to-face interviews

Interestingly, when reading my thesis-articles, quotes from face-to-face interviews appear just as eloquent as quotes from instant messenger-interviews. Yet talking (putting experiences into narratives on the go), is rarely a very smooth process, and I have edited quotes from face-to-face interviews to make them more readable (I'm not doing a conversation analysis in any case). I consequently disguise a rather interesting and important methodological aspect of instant messenger versus face-to-face interviews.

Consider the following excerpt from a face-to-face interview with 17-year old Morten:

"I have therefore added many people to my Live Journal friends-list just so that I can read what they write by watching my friends updates without them having the possibility to. Maybe they think they are on my friends-list and get to read all of my entries, but they really don’t get access to read my closed entries, because they are not in the right group like, you know."

I was rather intrigued when I realised how much I have actually edited the above quote, but I guess (hope) the meaning is intact:

"I’ve added many people to my Live Journal friends-list to be able to keep track of their updates. Maybe they think they get to read all of my closed entries, but they can’t because they are not in the right friends-group."

My MSN-interviews (only five) last longer in time, but yield about 1/3 of the words if compared to face-to-face interviews. The answers are more concise with a lot less filling-words. Consequently they do not contain a lot less in "content".