I don't like your tone

Let's talk about conveying tone through text.

Sometimes it can be difficult to gauge a person's feelings or intent from just reading words they've typed. Here is an example: Dennis just posted on Facebook about how beautiful his garden has become. You reply "that's great, dennis". Dennis may not know how to take your comment; was it sincere or sarcastic? Now, if you were being sarcastic then you've done a fairly good job of conveying that. If you were being serious, though, a better reply would have been "that's great, dennis!". A smiling emoticon at the end is optional.

Exclamation points are helpful tools because they prevent comments/sentences from reading as flat! Sometimes you will want a more deadpan sentence, but if you're trying to communicate in a friendly, cheerful way then exclamation marks can help! Adding a question mark to the end of a question (that sounds a bit redundant, I know), also helps to convey genuine curiosity. For example, "why would he do that" vs "why would he do that?".

Excess punctuation is something many people use (I sure do, multiple times a day) when communicating. Sometimes ! is just not enough, and you need !!!!!!!!!. Likewise for ?/?????? and ./.......". Excess punctuation marks convey intensity/urgency/confusion/hesitation, depending on the type used. In the same vein, CAPSLOCK is also used for intensity, SOMETIMES IN COMBINATION WITH EXCESS PUNCTUATION!!!! Of course, do not use anything I've been talking about in this paragraph in situations in which you are trying to put forth a professional image.

People have their own typing styles. Do you know yours, and do you know how to effectively use it?

For more on this subject, check out this website.