No, no, a thousand times no.
I grow weary of the whole “technology is a Bad Scary Thing That Isolates People”. I think it’s a really naïve argument. There have always been lonely, isolated people. It just so happens that now, they can commiserate with each other. I find it hard to believe that someone who is shy and socially awkward would magically go out and talk to people had it not been for internet forums and text messaging.
Now, do we have many more avenues of communication now? Yes. Can it be overwhelming? Yes. Are there different nuances to each form of writing and communicating? Yes.
If anything I think what you see is people adapting and developing and playing within these new forms—be it developing the style of short, funny quips in your facebook status to learning that diary entries are really dumb in your blog.
I really don’t see online communication replacing face-to-face or telephone communication, but complementing it, especially for people that aren’t shy.
@cprevite: Despite the fact that I’ve created a democratized site, I agree with your friend. I think the trend now is to overvalue crowdsourced information, but for things like design, you can’t do it by committee.