Traditionally, as in other qualitative methods that use interviews, data collection in UDUM is done in face-to-face encounters based on the model of daily conversations in informal contexts. With the advent of the Internet, a large part of such conversations migrated to online environments of instant message exchanges, which soon became widely popular. The main argument of this paper is that, since then, data collection through informal online interviews, which have equally informal online daily conversations as a model, has become a serious and viable research procedure. Specificities, requisites, advantages and disadvantages of this new form of interview are, therefore, discussed. The history, reasoning and needs that legitimate it are also revealed.
UDUM; qualitative methods; on-line interviews; informal conversation