It seems as though the attempt to achieve immediacy through the internet can be successful or not depending on the personal motive for this immediacy.
Success seems to go awry when people truly hope for reality through the computer medium. In a program on ABC several years ago, it discussed how online dating services like Match.com did not work because relationships never really work out once people who seem to connect online actually meet person-to-person. For people who seriously want to emulate reality, they meet disappointment.
Then again, immediacy attempts like fantasy sports have proven themselves extremely successful. This gives those who are less athletically-gifted a chance to emulate reality, but at the same time not put too much of reality into their actions.
I've actually found that I'm more likely to get along well with someone I meet online than someone I randomly meet in "real life". Almost all of my best friends today are people whom I originally met through the web in one way or another. It's funny now, being so close to them, to think that our relationships started online. Anyway, it's definitely given me reason to think that great relationships really can come out of the internet. (That being said, I meet most people online through fan groups, not dating services...)
Yes, that's what I was getting at. Meeting people online is so different from meeting people in real life that when these two mediums come together (as in meeting your online friend in person), this "real" perception of this online friend may not be what you initially thought. Hence the failure of immediacy.