I'm taking one online class and I only have one other online class expeience to compare this to (I have a paper due tonight by midnight, btw but that's beside the point, Lol)..  Anyway, Before the semester began I emailed the teacher and asked for a syllabus to look over, She didn't send me one but told me what book to buy and reminded me when blackboard would be up.  So I've emailed her probably 3X this week for clarification of some of the assignments, We were back and forth a lot and one of my last contacts with her was kind of blunt and to the point, Please give me specifics of what you are looking for!  She proceeded to tell me that students shouldn't talk to her in the tone she thought my email sounded like.  The irony is that the other online experience was similar to this too, The teacher was snotty and took her time replying to emails (Sometimes as late as 10 days out) but expected more efficient communication from students if the need arose, etc!  I'm not the only student at my school that feels this way too but I'm wondering if this is normal in general or maybe just specific to the school I go to, These online instructors are only online teachers which sorta make me wonder too......  But after this semester I may have to withdraw entirely and if I do I want to be optomistic about online school if I want to finish, So far I'm not getting that feeling!  Thanks for any insight!