Before the Internet, people would make friends through school, clubs, parties, social gatherings, work, and traveling. Today, well, let's just say things change.

Here is what I have been noticing:

There are many different kinds of friends people have these days. At the top of the list are the people we call our best friends. Those are the people who we have been friends with for awhile. They are the people we tell our secrets to and the people we invite to places.

Next are the people we call friends. Those are the people who we might see the most. They are our coworkers, classmates, and people we think about every now and then. We might send them birthday cards, or at least birthday emails.

After that, we have our acquaintances. The people we see at the supermarket and say hello to. They are the people we have met, but never really think about unless there is a reason, like an upcoming friend's party.

Then we have our online friends. This group of people are the ones we used to know, and might have been friends with in high school, or even elementary school, and have found lost touch with. But, thanks to those wonderful social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace, we can now call them friends again. The great thing about them is simply adding them to your friends list is enough. There is no need to call them or try to get together. You can keep up to date with them and 50 other friends without any personalization.

The next group is the people who we have never met, but talk to over the internet. Usually these are the people we play online games with or have "conversations" with online. These friends might not even live in the same country and we will never meet them. We do not even know if they are really the people in their profile pictures. It makes no difference, though. Just knowing there is someone in front of another computer willing to chat with you is enough to call them friend.

At the bottom, there are the people on our friends list who we do not know, will never know, and probably don't want to know. These people are the ones that go around asking for adds just so they can build their friends list. They feel the more people they have as "Friends" the more important they are.Or, they want to send all kinds of self promotion and/or spam.

So, to wrap things up, the definition of "friend" has changed. It used to mean the people you hang out with, call all the time, go to the movies with, and want to be around. Now, it still means those things, but it also means everyone you know or have contact with and usually add to your friend list on social networking and/or gaming websites.

This change is not a bad thing, but it should be recognized. Hold those people who you are friends in the traditional sense with close. It seems to be getting harder to find them.