The other day my sister finally allowed me to read her senior project on Bruce Springsteen (she was hesitant because, as a huge fan, she feared I would be overly critical). Within this document, there were several underlined words, and although I was quite sure that interactive capabilities had not quite been developed for regular, old-fashioned printer paper, I felt compelled to click on the underlined words. I think I may have even tried to do so.

My point here is that the internet has rendered underlining useless in every situation that does not include a hyperlink, even outside of cyberspace. This convention has just become so accepted and understood that using it for anything else seems somewhat naive. Although I stopped using underlining in any situation years ago, many people still do not realize that this is a no-no. While I don’t necessarily expect a high school student to realize this, I find it frustrating that teachers still allow this usage for emphasis. Just like green is the new black (until fall, when black will be the new black), bold and italics are the new underline, and everyone should be directed as such.

Now that I think about it, I’m quite looking forward to interactive paper.