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Now as for SETI, it is a waste of time in its current form. Now I do believe an alien civilizations are out there, possibly within our own galactic neighborhood ( within 100 LY). Unfortunately, I do not believe we are advanced enough to detect them . I doubt they are using radio waves (in fact, I doubt we will be in another 100 years). Also, there is the big problem of background noise. These earth based dishes pick up a whole lot of static in the form of earth-bound radio transmissions as well as satellite interference. They need to get a reciever up into space and away from all of the trash. Visual astronomy took a giant leap forward with the Hubble; now they need to do the same with radio astronomy. Once they do that, it MIGHT have a chance, but it goes back to my first point; they must also be using radio waves for communication.

Since there are only four fundamental forces in the universe and EM appears to be the most practical for long distance communication, why would they not use EM? We break up our search into tiny narrow band channels. We also are able to filter terrestrial noise out of the system. My search is looking at millions of frequencies simultaneously.

"Since there are only four fundamental forces in the universe and EM appears to be the most practical for long distance communication, why would they not use EM?"

Four fundamental forces in the universe governed by classical physics. Quantum Physics predicts additional forces and additional properties of the classical ones, which makes more exotic communication possible.

The EM search is an important one, and I expect it will bear fruit some day. Just don't subscribe to the notion that EM is all that's available for communication. We are actively tinkering with alternatives now.

Since there are only four fundamental forces in the universe ...

An oft-repeated error of scientists is that there are four undamental forces: stron, weak, gravity, and EM. You guys are always forgetting the most important one...
The Sex Drive.

Well, consider the case of lasers used in communication. Being as highly focused as it is, wouldn't it be extremely difficult to detect if not aimed right at us? I realize that it is still EM communication, but it does not propogate in all directions like a radio transmission does. In other words, they'd probably have to be making a directed communication attempt with us, where picking up a radio transmission propogating in every direction might be more likely even if they aren't intending for us to find it. I'm also not sure that SETI is searching in the visible EM spectrum, which is where a laser would be. That's on the more practical side of what another civilization might be using to communicate.

On the impractical and totally unprovable side, I would argue that a civilization a few million years ahead of us may have found some ways to bend the rules. I realize it has no sound scientific argument behind it by our current physics laws, but its something to consider.