Is it scary to say "I am following you"?
The other day I was discussing something with a guy on the internet. During our conversation, I said, "Keep talking, I am following you" (I totally understand your point). On hearing my words he immediately logged out, and now he has stopped talking with me.
Now, I am wondering, whether using "I am following you" is inelegant, or scary, or some thing that should be avoided.
Context is key with most things in life.
Saying "I am following you" to a person who is walking alone down a dark alley at nighttime, is most assuredly something that should be avoided. Saying "I am following you" when referring to somebody's twitter or Facebook feed is not.
In this case, "I am following you" (and the negative 'I am not following you') in the context of keeping up with the conversation is a normal and widely accepted response, especially when it is qualified by first saying "keep talking'.
In my opinion, the misunderstanding was on his side rather than yours, but if you wish to be more clear in the future, another widely accepted expression would be
Keep talking. I am with you so far.
Normally, when we use the word follow to mean to understand something as it is being said or done, we use it in present simple I follow because we are talking about the situation now: we don't use the present continuous I am following.
When if comes to stalking, we more often use present continuous he is following rather than present simple, because it is an ongoing activity that has been happening for a while and is expected to continue. This may be why he found your comment disturbing- especially with online chat, where he doesn't have the context given by the intonation of direct speech.
