This was a teacher that told me in the 90s. “Phone calls are an invasion. When you call someone you’re saying ‘stop everything you’re doing and talk to me’. This was specially true when Caller ID was not a thing.”
Leaving a message equals to a DM or text. The recipient can respond later, but a call, it must be at that moment. It’s synchronous.
It infuriates me when I'm talking to someone, their phone rings, and they instantly take the call while I'm still talking. It's like someone interrupting me and they instantly switch focus to the other person, like what they have to say is more important than me.
And it irritates my friends how I'll quickly check who it is, then ignore the call while someone is talking to me. "Aren't you gonna take that?" No, I'm listening to you right now.
I don't have a problem with phone calls and prefer them for urgent matters, but people need to stop with the preamble and reiterations. Asking me if I have time takes as much time as just telling me what you have to say. I already know you don't really care if I have a moment because you'll just say what you want regardless of my answer.
Agreed. There are only three modern/common communications channels which are truly synchronous:
In-person communication
Phone calls
Video calls
Everything else is asynchronous, and does not necessarily involve an interruption or a disruption of your time - you can get to it when you want to, within polite reason.
And with the fragmentation of our attention due to social media - to say nothing about the broader nature of our modern culture - being able to handle communication asynchronously is becoming very important to people.
One thing that severely degrades the usefulness of the phone network is all the spam calls. It’s all I get these days. I can’t just call someone and have them pick up because nobody answers calls from unknown numbers.
It’s especially frustrating when I’m waiting for a call, like for a delivery, and have to pick up every unknown number.
ETA: Also, the immediacy of phone calls make them mainly used for emergencies. If I get a call from someone I know the first thought is “oh god what’s wrong?”
So I don’t call people because I don’t want to freak them out.
How is spam calls such a problem? Have probably had 2 cold calls the last 10 years. In norway you register on a goverment do-not-cold-call list and basically I have not gotten sales calls since.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the scammers used my country’s do-not-call list as a list of known live numbers to call. Because no one’s enforcing it and you don’t really know who’s calling with the number is spoofed.
It's more of a problem in different countries. Also I find there's a blitz every now and then and I'll get 3+ spam calls a day, and then months without any.
Unfortunately I've heard the list is not well-enforced, so the do-not-call list functions more as a list of confirmed working numbers with humans on the other end. That's why I've never tried using it...
I get probably 5 spam calls a week so if that keeps growing, I might have to give it a try...
I get about 10-15 spam calls a day, but I do have two business lines forwarded to my personal phone too. If I do answer a call from a number I don't know because I'm expecting a call, and it turns out to be spam I just hang up immediately.
How? Asynchronous communication is better for a lot of people. And now that we have really good choices for that, it's hard to ignore.
A phone call demands that you drop everything in that moment and pay close attention to the person on the other end. If they ramble, deviate, breathe heavily, have a lot of background noise, etc, you're stuck with that experience for the duration. Also, recording without consent is illegal in a lot of places, so you have to be able to write things down in order to refer back to the conversation if it contains any important information.
In contrast, everything else is self-documenting, can be read through multiple times, and can be handled when there is time to focus on that task. As a bonus: most people can read and understand text faster than they can listen. So it's just more efficient.
Oh god, a 5 minute voice note with no accompanying text, just shoot me. Like you're really going to make me listen to you ramble on a 1x speed while you get to some point that I guarantee could fit in one or two sentences, if you took the modicum of brain power required to compose your thoughts into coherent words.
PS. I understand a lot of people love sending voice notes back and forth, and that's totally fine if it's the thing.
How to really be Satan: send an important video note. Make it recorded outside with a lot of wind and background noise. Then, just to be fun, slow the video down to 80% playback speed, reencode it, and send that!
This is precisely why you should never quit via a conversation with HR. You should send HR and your personal email an email detailing your resignation. Same for anything else that is sensitive. I'm fact you should keep record of everything you do for the company via email. It helps you personally because you can show how many good things you did that year. They can't comeback and say you were Lazy if you can show an email trail showing the exact opposite. Similar in cases of sexual or racial abuse...don't say anything to the perps...email them describing exactly what they did and cc or bcc your self and HR.
That thing about there not being a recording is precisely why emails give me mad anxiety and calls do not. Granted, you have to tell/text me to find a time that works for both. Otherwise, I'll return the call at my convenience. Also, I hate when a task has to be on my mind for several days because there's back and forth over email because of questions. Makes me anxious as well. Guess what I'm saying is, people have different preferences for different reasons and that's fine. No reason to argue why you think your preference is objectively superior.
Oh wow that's so strange. I love emails, because I can reread everything I just said before hitting send. Whereas when I'm having a verbal conversation, I'm never going to say things as clearly/accurately because I feel like I'm just riffing off of the top of my brain pan.
I absolutely detest text messaging or emails. You have a problem? Call me because I can probably solve your issue in one minute of phone call. I have been almost always been subjected to texting sessions that lasted for several hours because the dumbass on the other end lacked the spelling and vocab skills to provide an accurate written description of the problem.
Time is money and even sometimes life threatening unless the fastest method of communication is use. And fastest ain't an email or text.
Think of it as a way to say you have no clue how to communicate correctly through the written word. By the time I'm forced to wade through your lack of punctuation, misspellings and the autocorrect blunders and the stupid emojis to decipher what you REALLY meant, I already have equated your IQ to be around the range of my old orange tabby cat.
If you send me a text, I will consider it of such low priority that I might get back to you in a week or so.
Perhaps you could consider that for diverse reasons people have different prefered ways of communication. You have your own prefered way for your own reasons and that's ok. That doesn't mean you should disrespect other people's communication choices or them personally.
Fundamentally everyone here is putting a lot of effort into defending not participating in phone calls where as if they just picked up the phone the whole thing would be over now, but instead we're all texting eachother trying to prove our points ultimately getting nowhere.
So I rolled a critical fail for reading comprehension and thought the comment I replied to was literally about whether or not we used to call DM's PM's 😅.
Well, they were before we decided every scrap of data needs to be vacuumed up to the cloud for marketing reasons, in that no one in the 90s was wasting committing computing resources to scan them and the necessary storage/databasing to store them long term aside from an inbox. I can say with a good degree of likelihood that my IRC chats and maybe AIM/MSN convos are probably gone, and that's good thing.
Being private and nobody wanting to actually read them are two different things. Owners and operators of irc serves, bbs, etc have historically always been able to read the data flowing through them. Especially in the early internet and arpanet days where encryption didn’t even exist nor would it have been feasible given the computing power required at the time. My only point is that “private messages” have never been private if they’re through any service on the internet that is not verifiably encrypted end to end.
For the workplace, calls are king. If you're a professional, calling another professional, it's the easiest and fastest way to exchange information back and forth. Long email chains that take several days to reach their conclusion are inefficient. If you need something done, in the work/business arena, just call. Younger generations are entering the workforce for first time and are scared to make or answer calls. It's embarrassing.
Sure, outside of work, keep calls to a bare minimum. Family usually text first to arrange a phone call.
People have no back bone anymore. Oh no, I'm getting telemarketing calls... Just hang up.
Id say 20% of the time at work when someone calls its usually someone trying to do a sketchy end-run around the rules or get access to something they shouldnt have and they dont want it documented that they asked.
Sometimes it's better to not put things in writing. I hear what your saying, but some sensitive topics require a personal connection to truely discuss, with tone of voice to help
I use ms teams for work, and I agree, it's been a game changer in terms of productivity. But I'll still call someone in teams of I know they're at there computer. Camera on an all. It's about being personal. Building rapport with colleagues and other professionals aids tremendously with productivity and also job satisfaction.
Calling with IT professionals is extremely inefficient when discussing technical details where correct settings (ip's, ports, paths etc) matter. At best a call here is only useful to indicate the urgency of the mail that was sent.
Easy, back in the day all we had was phone call for instant communication, so not much to compare to.
Also, you didn't call a person, you called a house or place of work. This meant it was used more sparingly (need to keep the line open/share with the rest of the house) and if you were away, then that phone call couldn't bother you. This also meant people were used to not being able to reach who they wanted to talk to, so if you felt like letting the answering machine get it, no one would think anything of it. You were either on the phone or present in the moment, not trying to talk with a number of people who don't know each other.
Now everyone has a phone at their hip. You can call someone and if that someone sends it to voicemail, you know they did and it can become a point of drama depending on the circumstance. Now I can be in the middle of text conversations with a half dozen people across half the world and so when my phone unexpectedly rings then I wonder who is this asshole who thinks they deserve my full attention over these other folks, even though the other person has no way of knowing about those conversations. We are expected to juggle concurrent conversations and a phone call derails that.
Y'know, I've been thinking it's more than that lately. Yes, all that is true, but I think the younger generations who grew up being terminally connected to everything, always having to have a phone on them, always needing to be able to be reached by people, all their business on social media etc... I think we've developed an unspoken respect that when we contact people we let them respond on their own terms. If you text someone you are telling them, hey, I need something but, you can read this when it's convenient, and you can respond when and in the method that's convenient to you. When you call someone you are saying, I need something and I need you to deal with it right now over immediate voice chat. Yes, we can say I'm busy therefore I'll let it go to voicemail, but in this day and age of respectful texting being the norm, we often assume a call out of the blue from a known number IS something important that requires immediate attention.
This creates a generational disconnect. Like when my phone rings unexpectedly at work, it's 95% this one colleague in his 70s who is nice enough, but it instinctively feels rude because I feel like I need to answer. From his perspective, if I just don't answer that's fine and that's the etiquette he was used to, try to call and no biggie if it doesn't connect.
Going the other way, I know someone dealing with a person in their 80s over urgent important stuff and that person just will be utterly unreachable so much of the time. For them, there's no such thing as "urgent enough to need immediate attention" because that was just not possible for them and society developed around the norm of folks just not being available as much.
It's kinda childish, especially when you need something done now that requires details and understanding with no failure.
Edit: not to say you can't achieve this with other forms but the idea that there aren't millions of situations where you picking up the phone is more advantageous than a text.
Example and my ass just got outta bed and the coffee is still drippin'....if I have any questions, I can refer to the text instead of calling your ass...I do shit late, want a call at 2am?
Clearly not. Business calls should happen during business hours only. BUT, it is also pretty clear that direct speech is the most efficient way of communication when you don’t need a written record, so calls definitely have a purpose.
especially when you need something done now that requires details and understanding with no failure.
That's about the only reason a call is better and should be scheduled as a meeting If at all possible. If there's no need to have a back and forth conversation just text or email so I don't have to disrupt the half dozen other things I'm currently working on to deal with you. As for humanity I spend enough time interacting with people I don't want to talk to. I'm not hurting for more.
Yeah but the world's not just some corporate environment where you can just schedule a call, nor is it all about wither or not you feel like you want to talk to people or not.
I mean it sounds like you're talking about specific scenarios in your life and not considering that picking up a phone and talking to someone is not much different than walking over to your neighbors and asking to borrow their wrench.
Sure you could text, but for god sakes man, where's your humanity?
Maybe life is a lot different than it used to be but when I look around at all these people defending so vigorously anti social behaviour, I can't help but think that inherently something is wrong.
walking over to your neighbors and asking to borrow their wrench.
This is exactly the kind of thing that could be easily addressed via a text message. "Hey do you have a wrench I can borrow?" That's a Yes/No question. Nothing to go back and forth over. If you want to chit chat you can do so when they bring it over.
Sure you could text, but for god sakes man, where’s your humanity?
Where's your humanity? By calling someone you are demanding their attention NOW. Even if they don't intend to answer, their phone ringing for 30 seconds is annoying and distracting. Just hearing the damn thing go off elevates my stress level. As opposed to a text or e-mail they can respond to at their convenience and only gives them a simple notification. Expecting someone to drop everything to address your needs instantly is more anti-social than respecting that they may be busy right now and send a text instead. I was raised to be respectful of others' time when asking someone for something.
I can’t help but think that inherently something is wrong.
There is. Talking on the phone has been turned into a miserable experience 90% of the time. We're sick and tired of dealing with people's bullshit at our shitty jobs all day and then getting spam calls when we're at home. Having to drop everything to deal with a phone call is annoying and we don't want more of it. There's nothing "inhuman" about being stressed out and tired. There's about 6 people on this planet I enjoy speaking to and the odds that it's one of them calling when my phone rings are next to 0.
Idk man. Sounds like you're projecting quite a lot lol.
I for one will continue the tried and true act of comradery amongst my fellow peers and continue to recognize that we live in a society with many facets of living. You can do whatever you want, but I like the idea of spontaneously sparking up conversations with strangers and neighbours and friends and family. It might be the worst thing ever to you, but using the phone to call people in the real world is no big deal lol.
I'm not projecting, I'm giving you my perspective. You can ignore it if you wish but there's a subset of people who your behavior is pissing off. Spontaneous conversation isn't as fun a time for everyone as you seem to think it is.
And my perspective is that if you're going to get pissed off about things like this then you should probably have a long hard look at yourself in the mirror lol.
Also in my experience it's not that hard to play the field and figure out when people you are talking to want to talk or want to just get straight to the point. 🤷🏻
I don't know that it's going to happen, I cannot prepare
Usually during the call I'm forced to hold the phone, meaning I can't look stuff up or write stuff down easily
I fidn listening way harder than reading, and the quality of calls doesn't help with that
I much prefer text because it give some time to delay answering until it's convenient for me, look up answers to any questions I may have, and because I can re-read and think about stuff.
Calling is like an interrupt forcing me to drop everything there and then and immediately provide an answer, messaging is something I poll every now and then when I'm not overloaded or focused so I can actually take the time to answer.
Why would a call necessarily need "an answer"?. If my parents call, it's because they want to talk like humans do.
If someone calls because they need an answer, perhaps you should answer?
Granted, i've noticed that people call for the most basic things nowadays, just cause they can. That's the real issue, not calls in and of themselves. Its a skill like most other things.
Most people call me to get some information or to push some information to me. Unless they need the answer now I want a text message of some sort, not a call. I'm okay with people like my parents calling at a predetermined moment to catch up. But most people who want to call me want to do so at a moment when a text message would be hugely preferable, so I don't answer unless I get a reason (via text) why the call should happen now. In many cases this leads to the conversation going much more efficiently via text and allows me to actually defer it to when I have time or energy for it.
They objectively take longer. And honestly, nuance is lost in text. Especially if you rush it and dont use grammar, use abbreviations slang without context.
Text is good when you need to convey things that take a long time to find. In IT that means, ip-addresses, fqdn, configs etc. But if i need a yes or no answer, i wont be sending an email or even a dm. People have shit to do and they might be waiting for me/the response to get back to their own thing.
What nuance. Thanks to the time I can spend writing a message, I can commit to adding the details in readable format, and this data stays for reference. Whether it's instruction, some info or a question.
During call, I am scrambling to answer ASAP - like a lot of folk I know, and seemingly a lot of commenters here - so you get partial, jumbled up answer.
Calls are okay when asking about preference - something you can answer from the get go - if you want some information, use message.
Texts are easy to forget and difficult to write? Disagree. Texts are easy to remember and can be viewed back at any time. Writing is a bit slower than speaking, but at least it allows you to think about what you're saying. There's definitely a place where speaking is preferable, but then it should be in person or via a laptop video/voice call so the quality is better and I can do other stuff.
Between ages 13 and 18 if I received a phone call it was because I was in trouble, so now when I get one there is a pang of guilt and panic over whatever it is I could have possibly done
The idea of having a phone at 13 seems foreign to me. I wouldn't have known what to use it for, the again smartphones weren't around yet when I was 13.
That is stuff that people have been doing for decades already.
I'm a developer (amongst other things) and when I'm busy I need 20-30 mins too to get in the stream of thoughts. I simply close the door, puty phone on DND, and I'm off.
Disagree. Part of my job entails calling people (and I even started at a phone helpdesk 20 years ago) and I still despise and loathe calling on the phone with people I don't know for making appointments or getting quotes. To the point it will probably impact my health since my dentist only takes appointments by phone. (Before my sister in law worked there so I could DM her to ask her directly)
So, you agree that the statement that it gets easier with exposure is nonsense? Or do you mean to say that every one who disagree has mental health issues? Because you're talking about a decently large chunk of people here.
I can talk to people fine, though I don't enjoy doing it with strangers at random places. I just hate phone calls. It's not entirely rational, no doubt, though I still object to the silly stupid remark it's "mental illness".
Because it forces you to drop everything out of nowhere, losing all the focus you may have had. And then you might need to hold the phone, you need to find a place where you don't annoy everyone around you, and so you basically cannot look up anything.
Text is much superior imo, and messages can be answered whenever convenient (depending on urgency). But even people talking in real life are much better than a call. You can see them coming, you keep your hands free and a can usually stay where you are, they're way better to understand than shitty call quality.
Because we have more convenient methods. People have been shitting out in the open for a very long time but once the toilet came we (mostly) stopped doing so.
If talking to people is a problem for you then I'd argue that you're the problem, not obine calls. Not meant in a mean way, just saying that if you're not able to have a normal conversation with another human being, you maybe want to look into professional mental health support
Oh, no. It's phone calls. I have no problem talking to people in person. Or via messaging apps. I detest phone calls, though. I don't even like talking to my wife on the phone. Just text me.
Not once have I had a usable voice mail UI. Forced to go through 10 seconds of menu between each message to delete and select the next one, and 90% of them are people just hanging up after realizing they hit voice mail. Then the few times I do get an important message, I have to replay the full message multiple times to transcribe the number I need to call. No seeking, no ending the playback after I've passed the bit I needed, often terrible audio. Why do you do this when you have my email?
Combination of spam callers being more prevalent and the younger generation has unbelievably high social anxiety as a direct result of them mostly being raised indoors and alone with family.
I'm not saying that the way we older folks grew up was inherently better at all times, but it certainly forced us to converse with strangers and develop those skills.
My little twin brothers and my little sister were actually afraid to call a pizza place and order pizza when they were younger. They still don't really do phone calls aside from work related things or direct family.
I don't know why, but I despise phone calls. I'd even rather someone video call me or talk face to face. I just find it worse than every other method of communication.
People in the comments claiming it's social anxiety but I have no problem talking to people face to face or in an internet-based voice or video call. But phone calls are just ass. The audio quality sucks, I barely understand what the other person says and I don't get to choose when and where it happens, might be one or both people are in some noisy situation etc and it's just all around so awkward. I also think it's kinda rude. A message is "Hey I want to exchange X information, reply whenever you want", a call is "YOU WILL PAY ATTENTION TO ME RIGHT NOW". It's also incredibly annoying when some official place insists on phone calls only. Fucking brilliant, now I have to take half an hour of my day queueing and/or calling repeatedly to get done what I would have typed out in half a minute as an email. It's even worse if it's them who call you. "You will get a call from us in the next 3 days". Now I have to be on fucking high alert to be available at that exact time or the back and forth missed calls start. Instead of just receiving an email and replying whenever.
Edit: not to even mention that text is permanent and can be referenced later while calls are not
In a world where async communication is effortless, demanding immediate attention is antisocial.
You're saying that you don't care what I'm doing at the moment. You want my full attention immediately. Even leaving a message is more of a time waste than a simple text message
Strong disagree. A phone call isn't a demand, and doesn't mean that you don't care what the other person is doing. It's a request to talk to them, and can always be declined. Some things are more quickly and easily sorted out by phone call than text.
I guess that can be true because my phone is usually on silent, but a message would still be preferable because a missed call in my notifications doesn't tell me much of anything.
I would also put forward that a request to talk could also take the form of a request to talk, like hey are you free to talk about my part in the xyz project?
PS. I would ask the people who you call if they would prefer a text first. It could be you're calling people who are like you, but it's also possible that you're calling people like me, and they're too polite to tell you.
I want shit that leaves a record so when someone pulls a "I didn't say red", I can pull out the text or DM or whatever, and say, "So when you said red here was it that special red that's actually blue?"
You'd be surprised how often honest disagreements arise from bad recollection. It doesn't have to be ill-willed: we've all had the experience remembering a shared conversation completely differently from the person we had it with.
Sometimes I forget that some people actually make it in life. That they are left so intensely naive from living in a good place, surrounded by good people.
Since I have to give away 99% of my "confidential" information to landleeches to beg for a basement to barely survive in, scammers infest every nook and cranny of the rental market. Ive probably had my info stolen while looking for an apartment 10 times by now. Does anyone do anything about the scammers making fake rental listings? Fuck no! Centralize rental listings in one location? Get fucked!
This of course ignores the GiGa data leaks that happen every 5 days.
Every call I get is a scam call. Every single one.
Till you call I guess. Well guess what, the actual people who want to call me aren't much better then the scammers.
I'm so glad you are living such a good life that you look forward to a phone call. That you are excited to voluntarily interact with another human being. Not everyone has such a privilege.
Basically, as soon as other reliable methods became widely adopted. No, I don't have any phone call related anxiety or whatever, I'll call someone if I really need to, I would just rather not. I'd much rather get a text that says, "Hey, we're meeting up at 7pm to go out and do, XYZ, do you want to come?" than a phone call that starts with that and turns to "So anyway, did I tell you my mom blah, blah, blah... And I don't know what to say, because I kind of want to go, but it would be a lot blah, blah, blah."
Phone calls with friends and family have a way of spiraling off into tangents when I don't necessarily have the time to entertain them, but don't want to be a dick all the time telling people I don't have time at the moment to listen to them. If there's a self-service section to a company's website or app, I can usually do whatever I need faster than it would take me to get through the automated menus and hold music to call and have them do it. Like my pharmacy, if I want to refill a prescription online, I log in, check a box and hit submit. Done. If I call them, I need to go through three menus to get patched through to the pharmacy, tell them what I want, hold for a moment while they help someone in the store, give them my info and wait for them to look it up, etc.
When I plan to meet up with people, I make plenty of time to talk to them and listen to whatever. When I get what I think is going to be a short phone call that devolves into tangents, I don't necessarily have the time to entertain whether the fact that my friend's cousin had his toe amputated due to gangrene means he should get the spot on his nipple tested for leprosy, or if he should just improve his personal hygiene and see if it washes off in the shower.
If something really is going to be a pain to communicate via text, schedule that conversation and we can have a call to discuss it, but I'm not answering phone calls whenever somebody calls out of the blue unless I'm interviewing for jobs or expecting a call about some sort of emergency.
I don't like phone calls either. But now people are starting to send voice messages. Might just as well call me if you're going to steal 3 minutes with every message, with info which could have been typed in 5 words. I ignore voice messages, I tell people I do yet they still get angry with "why didn't you reply, all the messages is only 7 minutes of listening time it's not that bad". FFS
Honestly voice messages make me unreasonably angry. It's all of the inconvenience of a phone call with none of the immediacy, like voicemail but for every sentence. Thank you for sharing my hatred, I feel less alone
"I don't want to use both hands to type" - use SwiftKey swipe. Works great.
"I don't want to use one hand to type" - use voice to text. Works great.
"I just want to publicly use voice messages because everyone does it" - I don't want you as a friend, family member, colleague or anything else. I hate you, everything you send me will be blocked and marked as spam and you just removed yourself from my contact list.
And if you really don't want me to call you or call you back .... text, email or send me a message that says
CALL ME
That is the single most disgusting uninteresting uninformative and ugliest thing that anyone can text me. You can text me a dick pick, ransom demands, blackmail images, racist crap or gore pictures of something and I wouldn't complain and probably might even respond to you ... but if you just text me 'CALL ME', I'm blocking your number or contact and never answering anything from you again.
In addition to everything else, there's also a feedback loop of spam calls predominating. The more legit conversation moves to other methods, the more spam calls stick out. That, in turn, means even more people prefer something other than phone calls. It eventually gets to the point where 99% of calls are spam, and that whole method of communication becomes useless.
There are people like me who use voice calls about half the time for work. My number is on my email signature and my emails may get passed around, which I don't mind. When I arrive to a new work site I give my number to at least one person, more commonly three or four. So if I practice what seems to be common today of not answering numbers I don't have saved, I could miss critical communication, and waste time hearing a voicemail and calling back.
I'm not saying one or the other is more correct, just that there are different situations to consider.
Phone calls used to be better when they were analog land lines. The fidelity(idk if that's the right word, but go ahead and catch my drift) was amazing.
You could hear every breath, every intonation in voice, every shift in body language. I think our subconscious works on stuff like that a lot more than anyone cares to admit. Every phone conversation you've had in the past 10 years has been digitally compressed.
The headsets themselves were ergonomic. Easy to use, fit the face and head alot better than the phones we use nowadays.
Because the more serious discussion the more time I want to have to be able to convey myself concisely and prepared. Phone calls can be awkward and reactionary. plus how the fuck have we not yet solved phone audio quality and consistency problems.
But also why specifically? I love any opportunity I get to talk shit about their anticonsumer practices and this shit is right up my alley, what are they blocking now?
Personally since chat/messages are now ubiquituous, call implies you need my reply/attention/input now, and/or need the vocal tonal part of communication.
If you call, and it's clear there was neither reason, I'm annoyed. There was no reason to interrupt me, as I'll assume there's an emergency or urgent situation and pick up dropping whatever I'm doing.
There are exceptions of course, but nowadays those (like family get-togethers or check-ins) have honestly moved to group video chats so they're not "calls", either.
At my workplace, the response time for text-based messages (eg via Teams) varies wildly. Sometimes I get a response promptly. Sometimes it’s same day, sometimes it’s later that week, and sometimes I don’t get a response at all. So unfortunately the best way to get an answer I need is to just call them. Do I need that information that instant? Not necessarily, but I can’t risk the message being put off/ignored/forgotten for a week or more.
For me I hate phone calls because it's someone demanding I drop what I'm doing to address whatever they want. Keep in mind, 99% of phone calls I get are at work form co-workers.
The number of "quick calls" that are actually quick I can count on 1 hand, and still have room for more. I have tasks to accomplish, things to do. And I'm spread so thin between all the things I do, there's a fair chance I'm going to forget something about what you asked/told me. If it's in text form I can review it when I loop back to it. You need me to check/validate/run something, cool. I have record of what, when, and if I completed it. Just because you have a question does not make it an emergency on my part.
As for my home phone, the only folks who ever call me are either telemarketers or scams. If a friend called I'd probably answer (if I have the time). But I think most of my friends are in the same boat, we have so much to do these days (non-recreation) that it's just not easy to find time. A lot of my friends have side-hustles or a second job or are in class (like me) in order to stay competitive. When I was a kid, I remember my parents could unwind at the end of the day, friends would just come over to hang out. It just ain't like that no more.
Just because you have a question does not make it an emergency on my part.
This is it for me. If someone is an auditory processor, or needs a more nuanced conversation in order to understand something, I sympathize. But not everyone is like that. Just send a quick message asking to chat (or better yet, find time on my calendar if it's for work), and then I can prepare what I know on the subject, review it, and get back to you.
Otherwise you're going to get an ear full of ummmmmmmmmmmmmmm uhhhhh hmm hang on, I was just hang on, just loooking that upp.... click scroll scroll click click scroll scrolllll Right, so (silence while I'm reading) Right, uh, so Okay It was last Tuesday Was that it?
Calling is 10 times faster for 90 percent of my issues in my job. And my job is dealing with issues for 30 different people happening simultaneously. So yea, I like to cut back time when I can.
Because I take no joy in small talk, waste of time.
I type basically as fast or even faster than I talk.
I can maintaine multiple conversations at once.
And I can answer when I want instead of being locked up with one person that gets its way.
Not having to be available at the ready for people is great.
If you arrange for a call, through another asynchronous mechanism, then it's fine. If you cold-call me to ask about the weather (or, more seriously, anything that could have been a text message), I'll leave decapitated horse head in your fridge.
I say this as an autist who used to fucking loathe talking on the phone: Its that the phone takes up too much mental energy and time, yet has a time limit on your own responses. Its hellishly stressful when you are socially incompetent, and now a lot of even non-autistic people are becoming socially incompetent.
Now its funny, I hated phone calls back when everyone liked them. Now I'm pretty OK at them because I worked at a call center for a year and now it seems like everyone now hates phone calls. I kinda recognize that the one nice thing about phone calls is there is no "set up your account before ordering your food" type bullshit. There is a consistency to phone calls.
There’s also a faster sense of done-ness with a phone call: the conversation is almost always over at the end of the call, whereas with something like text it can take ages because it’s so spread out.
That… and my insecurity as to what a sane-and-polite-but-not-overdone phrasing would be fades quicker than when that phrasing has been immortalised through writing. It’s just over sooner (provided you actually manage to get through to someone)
I think I'm fairly neurotypical but I don't like calls either (though I recognize some things are better on a call). for me it's just that it's feels unnatural that you're supposed to be talking to someone just as you would normally but there's no visual component. it's awkward. imagine two people in the same room having a conversation but they're looking at the wall instead of each other.
Two words for me. Read. Receipts. I have found that someone will inevitably text me and say, "why didn't you respond?" Fucker. You texted me. Want me to actually engage with you? Call me. Otherwise you're now at my mercy.
I prefer calling because it's easy to silence and just let it go to VM if I am busy. Call back immediately and that's usually a sign of being needed.
For me, calls interrupt my workflow with things that don’t need immediate attention anyway. So it draws focus away unnecessarily.
I also prefer to have a written record of things if they’re important. That way you can always refer back to it. A phone call just annoys me at best and divides my attention. So it’s in their interest as well that I can respond when I’ve got time.
My biggest reason for not liking calls is that I often very much struggle to actually hear what's being said. I'll take talking in person over a call. Text mediums also have the benefit of being able to be referred back to. Great to double check something, or to cover your ass. I'll take a paper trail any day of the week.
That said though, in my professional life I have encountered a surprisingly huge number of people who just cannot write clearly. It baffles me. Ultimately, to each their own, and I'll try to meet people where they're at. But I much prefer written formats.
I have never liked to talk on the phone. I hate talking to someone when I can't see their face... which is weird because I did VO for years and often did it with someone directing me remotely, but somehow that was different.
When I need to solve a problem I use the fastest method. Talking about the problem. Anyone who thinks they can do that as quickly through texts or emails is just not interested in quickly resolving it. No way anyone can solve a problem faster with anything less than a conversation.
Has anyone ever actually thought otherwise? I know plenty of people who even say "I know it's faster to call" before sending a text or something. I feel like you created a scenario that really doesn't exist. People don't dispute what is quicker just that they don't wanna do it that way.
I'm sure the same people who post this are also top contributors in anti work. Just miserable people being miserable. Worst part, they'll call on self identified autism or neurodivergence making it slap to the face for those actually affected by it.
I'll forever fight for those on the spectrum and I've got no patience for pretend victims.
Triggered? Why? I guess you feel problems are solved quicker by slow back and forth text.
Oh and by the way what does me being on the spectrum have to do with anything? You sure you are commenting on the right thread? Since it seems like you read a lot in to my post and pulled autism out of it.
Outside my job I rarely answer the phone. I haven't had voicemail set up on a phone in years. But when its a job you have to communicate.
This was a teacher that told me in the 90s. “Phone calls are an invasion. When you call someone you’re saying ‘stop everything you’re doing and talk to me’. This was specially true when Caller ID was not a thing.”
Leaving a message equals to a DM or text. The recipient can respond later, but a call, it must be at that moment. It’s synchronous.
It infuriates me when I'm talking to someone, their phone rings, and they instantly take the call while I'm still talking. It's like someone interrupting me and they instantly switch focus to the other person, like what they have to say is more important than me.
And it irritates my friends how I'll quickly check who it is, then ignore the call while someone is talking to me. "Aren't you gonna take that?" No, I'm listening to you right now.
And people who use text apps for synchronous communication are holding it wrong. I shouldn’t be expected to respond immediately to a slack message.
Your not. They have false expectations and that's their problem.
You've never met my wife.
I don't have a problem with phone calls and prefer them for urgent matters, but people need to stop with the preamble and reiterations. Asking me if I have time takes as much time as just telling me what you have to say. I already know you don't really care if I have a moment because you'll just say what you want regardless of my answer.
Agreed. There are only three modern/common communications channels which are truly synchronous:
Everything else is asynchronous, and does not necessarily involve an interruption or a disruption of your time - you can get to it when you want to, within polite reason.
And with the fragmentation of our attention due to social media - to say nothing about the broader nature of our modern culture - being able to handle communication asynchronously is becoming very important to people.
One thing that severely degrades the usefulness of the phone network is all the spam calls. It’s all I get these days. I can’t just call someone and have them pick up because nobody answers calls from unknown numbers.
It’s especially frustrating when I’m waiting for a call, like for a delivery, and have to pick up every unknown number.
ETA: Also, the immediacy of phone calls make them mainly used for emergencies. If I get a call from someone I know the first thought is “oh god what’s wrong?”
So I don’t call people because I don’t want to freak them out.
excellent point.
How is spam calls such a problem? Have probably had 2 cold calls the last 10 years. In norway you register on a goverment do-not-cold-call list and basically I have not gotten sales calls since.
Sadly, I live in the USA and do not have a functioning government. We can’t get health care, let alone reliable span call blocking.
"Do not call list" more like "Look at that list of numbers to call"
I wouldn’t be surprised if the scammers used my country’s do-not-call list as a list of known live numbers to call. Because no one’s enforcing it and you don’t really know who’s calling with the number is spoofed.
It's more of a problem in different countries. Also I find there's a blitz every now and then and I'll get 3+ spam calls a day, and then months without any.
Unfortunately I've heard the list is not well-enforced, so the do-not-call list functions more as a list of confirmed working numbers with humans on the other end. That's why I've never tried using it...
I get probably 5 spam calls a week so if that keeps growing, I might have to give it a try...
I get about 10-15 spam calls a day, but I do have two business lines forwarded to my personal phone too. If I do answer a call from a number I don't know because I'm expecting a call, and it turns out to be spam I just hang up immediately.
How is having a functioning government? I hear it’s wonderful
How? Asynchronous communication is better for a lot of people. And now that we have really good choices for that, it's hard to ignore.
A phone call demands that you drop everything in that moment and pay close attention to the person on the other end. If they ramble, deviate, breathe heavily, have a lot of background noise, etc, you're stuck with that experience for the duration. Also, recording without consent is illegal in a lot of places, so you have to be able to write things down in order to refer back to the conversation if it contains any important information.
In contrast, everything else is self-documenting, can be read through multiple times, and can be handled when there is time to focus on that task. As a bonus: most people can read and understand text faster than they can listen. So it's just more efficient.
People who send voice notes piss me off so much.
Oh god, a 5 minute voice note with no accompanying text, just shoot me. Like you're really going to make me listen to you ramble on a 1x speed while you get to some point that I guarantee could fit in one or two sentences, if you took the modicum of brain power required to compose your thoughts into coherent words.
PS. I understand a lot of people love sending voice notes back and forth, and that's totally fine if it's the thing.
How to really be Satan: send an important video note. Make it recorded outside with a lot of wind and background noise. Then, just to be fun, slow the video down to 80% playback speed, reencode it, and send that!
What if I send you a link to a video message I recorded and posted on YouTube? Also it has ads on it.
This is precisely why you should never quit via a conversation with HR. You should send HR and your personal email an email detailing your resignation. Same for anything else that is sensitive. I'm fact you should keep record of everything you do for the company via email. It helps you personally because you can show how many good things you did that year. They can't comeback and say you were Lazy if you can show an email trail showing the exact opposite. Similar in cases of sexual or racial abuse...don't say anything to the perps...email them describing exactly what they did and cc or bcc your self and HR.
That thing about there not being a recording is precisely why emails give me mad anxiety and calls do not. Granted, you have to tell/text me to find a time that works for both. Otherwise, I'll return the call at my convenience. Also, I hate when a task has to be on my mind for several days because there's back and forth over email because of questions. Makes me anxious as well. Guess what I'm saying is, people have different preferences for different reasons and that's fine. No reason to argue why you think your preference is objectively superior.
Oh wow that's so strange. I love emails, because I can reread everything I just said before hitting send. Whereas when I'm having a verbal conversation, I'm never going to say things as clearly/accurately because I feel like I'm just riffing off of the top of my brain pan.
My nightmare: when I ask someone what times they are good for, and they give one specific time on one specific day.
I absolutely detest text messaging or emails. You have a problem? Call me because I can probably solve your issue in one minute of phone call. I have been almost always been subjected to texting sessions that lasted for several hours because the dumbass on the other end lacked the spelling and vocab skills to provide an accurate written description of the problem.
Time is money and even sometimes life threatening unless the fastest method of communication is use. And fastest ain't an email or text.
Long way to say you're a slow reader
Think of it as a way to say you have no clue how to communicate correctly through the written word. By the time I'm forced to wade through your lack of punctuation, misspellings and the autocorrect blunders and the stupid emojis to decipher what you REALLY meant, I already have equated your IQ to be around the range of my old orange tabby cat.
If you send me a text, I will consider it of such low priority that I might get back to you in a week or so.
Perhaps you could consider that for diverse reasons people have different prefered ways of communication. You have your own prefered way for your own reasons and that's ok. That doesn't mean you should disrespect other people's communication choices or them personally.
This whole statement vibrates in Boomer
Fundamentally everyone here is putting a lot of effort into defending not participating in phone calls where as if they just picked up the phone the whole thing would be over now, but instead we're all texting eachother trying to prove our points ultimately getting nowhere.
I firmly disagree, but that's because for me writing and reading are much easier than verbal communication.
This issue really only comes up when people like you and people like me have to communicate.
This is also why I keep a notebook at work. Without it, spoken exchanges would essentially be a lacuna in a conversation for me.
I 'member when they used to be called PMs.
I guess they aren't private anymore.
They never were
My username and the hundreds of others like it back on R*ddit indicates otherwise 😆
Your username is not proof that your messages on Reddit were encrypted and not visible by anyone but you and the other party…
I was referring to that part specifically 😅. Yes that's how I unironically read it.
just because people used to trust the government doesn't mean they where ever trustworthy.
You're username proves nothing except you used to believe.
So I rolled a critical fail for reading comprehension and thought the comment I replied to was literally about whether or not we used to call DM's PM's 😅.
Well, they were before we decided every scrap of data needs to be vacuumed up to the cloud for
marketingreasons, in that no one in the 90s was wasting committing computing resources to scan them and the necessary storage/databasing to store them long term aside from an inbox. I can say with a good degree of likelihood that my IRC chats and maybe AIM/MSN convos are probably gone, and that's good thing.Being private and nobody wanting to actually read them are two different things. Owners and operators of irc serves, bbs, etc have historically always been able to read the data flowing through them. Especially in the early internet and arpanet days where encryption didn’t even exist nor would it have been feasible given the computing power required at the time. My only point is that “private messages” have never been private if they’re through any service on the internet that is not verifiably encrypted end to end.
For the workplace, calls are king. If you're a professional, calling another professional, it's the easiest and fastest way to exchange information back and forth. Long email chains that take several days to reach their conclusion are inefficient. If you need something done, in the work/business arena, just call. Younger generations are entering the workforce for first time and are scared to make or answer calls. It's embarrassing.
Sure, outside of work, keep calls to a bare minimum. Family usually text first to arrange a phone call.
People have no back bone anymore. Oh no, I'm getting telemarketing calls... Just hang up.
Id say 20% of the time at work when someone calls its usually someone trying to do a sketchy end-run around the rules or get access to something they shouldnt have and they dont want it documented that they asked.
Sometimes it's better to not put things in writing. I hear what your saying, but some sensitive topics require a personal connection to truely discuss, with tone of voice to help
Yeah but why phone calls? Slack or some equivalent is just superior in every way.
I use ms teams for work, and I agree, it's been a game changer in terms of productivity. But I'll still call someone in teams of I know they're at there computer. Camera on an all. It's about being personal. Building rapport with colleagues and other professionals aids tremendously with productivity and also job satisfaction.
Calling with IT professionals is extremely inefficient when discussing technical details where correct settings (ip's, ports, paths etc) matter. At best a call here is only useful to indicate the urgency of the mail that was sent.
Thats an insane take. Especially for anyone that isn't slave to the notification storm on a phone.
Again. Insane take by someone that likely is glued to a phone 24/7.
It's okay to not answer or answer and say, call me later.
My thoughts exactly.
Easy, back in the day all we had was phone call for instant communication, so not much to compare to.
Also, you didn't call a person, you called a house or place of work. This meant it was used more sparingly (need to keep the line open/share with the rest of the house) and if you were away, then that phone call couldn't bother you. This also meant people were used to not being able to reach who they wanted to talk to, so if you felt like letting the answering machine get it, no one would think anything of it. You were either on the phone or present in the moment, not trying to talk with a number of people who don't know each other.
Now everyone has a phone at their hip. You can call someone and if that someone sends it to voicemail, you know they did and it can become a point of drama depending on the circumstance. Now I can be in the middle of text conversations with a half dozen people across half the world and so when my phone unexpectedly rings then I wonder who is this asshole who thinks they deserve my full attention over these other folks, even though the other person has no way of knowing about those conversations. We are expected to juggle concurrent conversations and a phone call derails that.
Y'know, I've been thinking it's more than that lately. Yes, all that is true, but I think the younger generations who grew up being terminally connected to everything, always having to have a phone on them, always needing to be able to be reached by people, all their business on social media etc... I think we've developed an unspoken respect that when we contact people we let them respond on their own terms. If you text someone you are telling them, hey, I need something but, you can read this when it's convenient, and you can respond when and in the method that's convenient to you. When you call someone you are saying, I need something and I need you to deal with it right now over immediate voice chat. Yes, we can say I'm busy therefore I'll let it go to voicemail, but in this day and age of respectful texting being the norm, we often assume a call out of the blue from a known number IS something important that requires immediate attention.
This creates a generational disconnect. Like when my phone rings unexpectedly at work, it's 95% this one colleague in his 70s who is nice enough, but it instinctively feels rude because I feel like I need to answer. From his perspective, if I just don't answer that's fine and that's the etiquette he was used to, try to call and no biggie if it doesn't connect.
Going the other way, I know someone dealing with a person in their 80s over urgent important stuff and that person just will be utterly unreachable so much of the time. For them, there's no such thing as "urgent enough to need immediate attention" because that was just not possible for them and society developed around the norm of folks just not being available as much.
Why are people so offended over the fact there are some ppl who don't like phone calls? 🤷♀️ who cares
People who are so used to getting everyone to stop what they're doing get upset when they aren't the center of attention.
It's kinda childish, especially when you need something done now that requires details and understanding with no failure.
Edit: not to say you can't achieve this with other forms but the idea that there aren't millions of situations where you picking up the phone is more advantageous than a text.
Where's the humanity in us all
Example and my ass just got outta bed and the coffee is still drippin'....if I have any questions, I can refer to the text instead of calling your ass...I do shit late, want a call at 2am?
Clearly not. Business calls should happen during business hours only. BUT, it is also pretty clear that direct speech is the most efficient way of communication when you don’t need a written record, so calls definitely have a purpose.
That is simply not true. I've had many phones calls that would be far more efficiently done with a text or email.
Yes
That's about the only reason a call is better and should be scheduled as a meeting If at all possible. If there's no need to have a back and forth conversation just text or email so I don't have to disrupt the half dozen other things I'm currently working on to deal with you. As for humanity I spend enough time interacting with people I don't want to talk to. I'm not hurting for more.
Yeah but the world's not just some corporate environment where you can just schedule a call, nor is it all about wither or not you feel like you want to talk to people or not.
I mean it sounds like you're talking about specific scenarios in your life and not considering that picking up a phone and talking to someone is not much different than walking over to your neighbors and asking to borrow their wrench.
Sure you could text, but for god sakes man, where's your humanity?
Maybe life is a lot different than it used to be but when I look around at all these people defending so vigorously anti social behaviour, I can't help but think that inherently something is wrong.
This is exactly the kind of thing that could be easily addressed via a text message. "Hey do you have a wrench I can borrow?" That's a Yes/No question. Nothing to go back and forth over. If you want to chit chat you can do so when they bring it over.
Where's your humanity? By calling someone you are demanding their attention NOW. Even if they don't intend to answer, their phone ringing for 30 seconds is annoying and distracting. Just hearing the damn thing go off elevates my stress level. As opposed to a text or e-mail they can respond to at their convenience and only gives them a simple notification. Expecting someone to drop everything to address your needs instantly is more anti-social than respecting that they may be busy right now and send a text instead. I was raised to be respectful of others' time when asking someone for something.
There is. Talking on the phone has been turned into a miserable experience 90% of the time. We're sick and tired of dealing with people's bullshit at our shitty jobs all day and then getting spam calls when we're at home. Having to drop everything to deal with a phone call is annoying and we don't want more of it. There's nothing "inhuman" about being stressed out and tired. There's about 6 people on this planet I enjoy speaking to and the odds that it's one of them calling when my phone rings are next to 0.
Idk man. Sounds like you're projecting quite a lot lol.
I for one will continue the tried and true act of comradery amongst my fellow peers and continue to recognize that we live in a society with many facets of living. You can do whatever you want, but I like the idea of spontaneously sparking up conversations with strangers and neighbours and friends and family. It might be the worst thing ever to you, but using the phone to call people in the real world is no big deal lol.
I'm not projecting, I'm giving you my perspective. You can ignore it if you wish but there's a subset of people who your behavior is pissing off. Spontaneous conversation isn't as fun a time for everyone as you seem to think it is.
And my perspective is that if you're going to get pissed off about things like this then you should probably have a long hard look at yourself in the mirror lol.
Also in my experience it's not that hard to play the field and figure out when people you are talking to want to talk or want to just get straight to the point. 🤷🏻
Nothing you want needs to be done immediately. NOTHING.
It's not always about what I want lol
About the same time that 99% of the incoming voice calls are scammers.
For me it's a few reasons:
I much prefer text because it give some time to delay answering until it's convenient for me, look up answers to any questions I may have, and because I can re-read and think about stuff.
Calling is like an interrupt forcing me to drop everything there and then and immediately provide an answer, messaging is something I poll every now and then when I'm not overloaded or focused so I can actually take the time to answer.
Why would a call necessarily need "an answer"?. If my parents call, it's because they want to talk like humans do.
If someone calls because they need an answer, perhaps you should answer?
Granted, i've noticed that people call for the most basic things nowadays, just cause they can. That's the real issue, not calls in and of themselves. Its a skill like most other things.
Most people call me to get some information or to push some information to me. Unless they need the answer now I want a text message of some sort, not a call. I'm okay with people like my parents calling at a predetermined moment to catch up. But most people who want to call me want to do so at a moment when a text message would be hugely preferable, so I don't answer unless I get a reason (via text) why the call should happen now. In many cases this leads to the conversation going much more efficiently via text and allows me to actually defer it to when I have time or energy for it.
You are perfectly allowed to say not right now, let's call tomorrow in the evening.
Texts are easy to forget and difficult to write.
In what way are they difficult to write?
And saying that is going to piss off a lot of folk. Nope. Best I can do is ignore the call and then send a message "can't now, will recall".
They objectively take longer. And honestly, nuance is lost in text. Especially if you rush it and dont use grammar, use abbreviations slang without context.
Text is good when you need to convey things that take a long time to find. In IT that means, ip-addresses, fqdn, configs etc. But if i need a yes or no answer, i wont be sending an email or even a dm. People have shit to do and they might be waiting for me/the response to get back to their own thing.
What nuance. Thanks to the time I can spend writing a message, I can commit to adding the details in readable format, and this data stays for reference. Whether it's instruction, some info or a question.
During call, I am scrambling to answer ASAP - like a lot of folk I know, and seemingly a lot of commenters here - so you get partial, jumbled up answer.
Calls are okay when asking about preference - something you can answer from the get go - if you want some information, use message.
So exactly what i said?
With nuance, im talking of inflections from speech. Which you can't get from text.
Who then might not call back at all, so it works out either way!
Texts are easy to forget and difficult to write? Disagree. Texts are easy to remember and can be viewed back at any time. Writing is a bit slower than speaking, but at least it allows you to think about what you're saying. There's definitely a place where speaking is preferable, but then it should be in person or via a laptop video/voice call so the quality is better and I can do other stuff.
I feel attacked on a call, i need a breath of air to process and reply to something.
On a call i feel so forced to reply faster otherwise i can notice people get annoyed. Which often leads to me saying things i didn't want to.
Sounds like you need practice. How do you talk to people when you're not on the phone?
Your body language can indicate you’re formulating a response, which makes people less impatient.
On a call there’s no body language so if you don’t say anything for a bit people get annoyed.
Also text leaves a record behind, so if I forget an important detail from the conversation, I just just look it up.
Easy:
Between ages 13 and 18 if I received a phone call it was because I was in trouble, so now when I get one there is a pang of guilt and panic over whatever it is I could have possibly done
The idea of having a phone at 13 seems foreign to me. I wouldn't have known what to use it for, the again smartphones weren't around yet when I was 13.
I had a flip phone because I was a latchkey kid who walked to school. My parents wanted to be able to contact me and vice versa.
Why though?
What is so hard about getting a call and talking to someone?
I check my texts. I check my email. I check my DM. When I want to.
YOU choose when the call happens.
And ignoring the call or turn DND on isn't an option? No judgement, just curious.
That would be the mitigation to the problem, yes. But I'm describing why it's a problem in the first place.
You can't say "calls aren't that bad because you can do everything possibly to avoid them.". I'm avoiding them because they're that bad.
So then why are calls that bad?
Because I don't pick when it happens. And I have bad ADHD so being interrupted is a problem for me.
Well yeah, because I need to talk to you
People have been doing this without problems for decades, why is it a problem now if it wasn't 10-20 years ago?
When better options arise, people can start to dislike the old options.
Why do I not like washing dishes by hand? It wasn't a problem 30 years ago. For example.
Now you'll say it WAS a problem and they invented dishwashers to fix it. And I'll say they invented texting to fix phone calls.
That is stuff that people have been doing for decades already.
I'm a developer (amongst other things) and when I'm busy I need 20-30 mins too to get in the stream of thoughts. I simply close the door, puty phone on DND, and I'm off.
Messages are just as distracting as phone calls
It gets easier the more you do it like most things.
Disagree. Part of my job entails calling people (and I even started at a phone helpdesk 20 years ago) and I still despise and loathe calling on the phone with people I don't know for making appointments or getting quotes. To the point it will probably impact my health since my dentist only takes appointments by phone. (Before my sister in law worked there so I could DM her to ask her directly)
Exposure doesn't always make it easier.
That sounds like you have a mental health problem.
Ahh yes, everyone who disagrees with you must be mentally ill. Get bent.
So, you agree that the statement that it gets easier with exposure is nonsense? Or do you mean to say that every one who disagree has mental health issues? Because you're talking about a decently large chunk of people here.
But why?
Why is it so hard for you to talk to someone, to the point that it will negatively affect your health?
I can talk to people fine, though I don't enjoy doing it with strangers at random places. I just hate phone calls. It's not entirely rational, no doubt, though I still object to the silly stupid remark it's "mental illness".
I agree with that, and maybe that is the problem; I would pickup the home phone at home all the time, that no longer exists. Maybe it's a "lost art"?
Because it forces you to drop everything out of nowhere, losing all the focus you may have had. And then you might need to hold the phone, you need to find a place where you don't annoy everyone around you, and so you basically cannot look up anything.
Text is much superior imo, and messages can be answered whenever convenient (depending on urgency). But even people talking in real life are much better than a call. You can see them coming, you keep your hands free and a can usually stay where you are, they're way better to understand than shitty call quality.
I've said this elsewhere but...
First DND is there to stop people from bugging you when you're busy.
Second, people have been doing this for decades without problems, why is it a problem now?
Because we have more convenient methods. People have been shitting out in the open for a very long time but once the toilet came we (mostly) stopped doing so.
The "talking to someone" part.
What is the problem with that?
If talking to people is a problem for you then I'd argue that you're the problem, not obine calls. Not meant in a mean way, just saying that if you're not able to have a normal conversation with another human being, you maybe want to look into professional mental health support
Oh, no. It's phone calls. I have no problem talking to people in person. Or via messaging apps. I detest phone calls, though. I don't even like talking to my wife on the phone. Just text me.
Depends. Am I trying to get a super quick answer to a super short but urgent question? Or am I trying to have long form communication like a pen pal?
Voicemail should be lower on that list, I'd rather take a call than check voicemail any day.
Not once have I had a usable voice mail UI. Forced to go through 10 seconds of menu between each message to delete and select the next one, and 90% of them are people just hanging up after realizing they hit voice mail. Then the few times I do get an important message, I have to replay the full message multiple times to transcribe the number I need to call. No seeking, no ending the playback after I've passed the bit I needed, often terrible audio. Why do you do this when you have my email?
My iPhone just has a list of them where you can tap one and see a transcription I can quickly read to confirms it’s spam, does your phone not?
Maybe the speech recognition has improved since I last gave automatic transcription a shot, but in my experience it was almost always laughably bad.
Mine is fantastic on Android. I never have to actually listen to the voicemail.
You get a play/pause and even the ability to seek. Lucky you.
I have to use 3CX for work and it's the least bad voicemail I've had any experience with. Literally emails me the .wav so I can listen with VLC.
Sometimes I play techno and pretend I'm getting missions in armored core. Almost doesn't suck.
I just ring people back and ask what they wanted.
After a while they get the hint and stop leaving voicemails.
I'm glad ring central let's you delete in mass and transcribes them. Not listening to that shit.
Its my right to be not reachable, outside of work i will take time for your matter when its fitting for me.
And im forgetful and prefer to be able read important information again.
Thats why my phone is always on mute and my voice recorder tells people my email address.
Combination of spam callers being more prevalent and the younger generation has unbelievably high social anxiety as a direct result of them mostly being raised indoors and alone with family.
I'm not saying that the way we older folks grew up was inherently better at all times, but it certainly forced us to converse with strangers and develop those skills.
My little twin brothers and my little sister were actually afraid to call a pizza place and order pizza when they were younger. They still don't really do phone calls aside from work related things or direct family.
I don't know why, but I despise phone calls. I'd even rather someone video call me or talk face to face. I just find it worse than every other method of communication.
People in the comments claiming it's social anxiety but I have no problem talking to people face to face or in an internet-based voice or video call. But phone calls are just ass. The audio quality sucks, I barely understand what the other person says and I don't get to choose when and where it happens, might be one or both people are in some noisy situation etc and it's just all around so awkward. I also think it's kinda rude. A message is "Hey I want to exchange X information, reply whenever you want", a call is "YOU WILL PAY ATTENTION TO ME RIGHT NOW". It's also incredibly annoying when some official place insists on phone calls only. Fucking brilliant, now I have to take half an hour of my day queueing and/or calling repeatedly to get done what I would have typed out in half a minute as an email. It's even worse if it's them who call you. "You will get a call from us in the next 3 days". Now I have to be on fucking high alert to be available at that exact time or the back and forth missed calls start. Instead of just receiving an email and replying whenever.
Edit: not to even mention that text is permanent and can be referenced later while calls are not
In a world where async communication is effortless, demanding immediate attention is antisocial.
You're saying that you don't care what I'm doing at the moment. You want my full attention immediately. Even leaving a message is more of a time waste than a simple text message
This doesn't apply to landlines, ofc
Strong disagree. A phone call isn't a demand, and doesn't mean that you don't care what the other person is doing. It's a request to talk to them, and can always be declined. Some things are more quickly and easily sorted out by phone call than text.
I guess that can be true because my phone is usually on silent, but a message would still be preferable because a missed call in my notifications doesn't tell me much of anything.
I would also put forward that a request to talk could also take the form of a request to talk, like hey are you free to talk about my part in the xyz project?
PS. I would ask the people who you call if they would prefer a text first. It could be you're calling people who are like you, but it's also possible that you're calling people like me, and they're too polite to tell you.
Add, some things are time sensitive; which means yes, I do need your attention immediately
I want shit that leaves a record so when someone pulls a "I didn't say red", I can pull out the text or DM or whatever, and say, "So when you said red here was it that special red that's actually blue?"
Do the people around you do that a lot?
You'd be surprised how often honest disagreements arise from bad recollection. It doesn't have to be ill-willed: we've all had the experience remembering a shared conversation completely differently from the person we had it with.
Sometimes I forget that some people actually make it in life. That they are left so intensely naive from living in a good place, surrounded by good people.
Good for you.
Since I have to give away 99% of my "confidential" information to landleeches to beg for a basement to barely survive in, scammers infest every nook and cranny of the rental market. Ive probably had my info stolen while looking for an apartment 10 times by now. Does anyone do anything about the scammers making fake rental listings? Fuck no! Centralize rental listings in one location? Get fucked!
This of course ignores the GiGa data leaks that happen every 5 days.
Every call I get is a scam call. Every single one.
Till you call I guess. Well guess what, the actual people who want to call me aren't much better then the scammers.
I'm so glad you are living such a good life that you look forward to a phone call. That you are excited to voluntarily interact with another human being. Not everyone has such a privilege.
Basically, as soon as other reliable methods became widely adopted. No, I don't have any phone call related anxiety or whatever, I'll call someone if I really need to, I would just rather not. I'd much rather get a text that says, "Hey, we're meeting up at 7pm to go out and do, XYZ, do you want to come?" than a phone call that starts with that and turns to "So anyway, did I tell you my mom blah, blah, blah... And I don't know what to say, because I kind of want to go, but it would be a lot blah, blah, blah."
Phone calls with friends and family have a way of spiraling off into tangents when I don't necessarily have the time to entertain them, but don't want to be a dick all the time telling people I don't have time at the moment to listen to them. If there's a self-service section to a company's website or app, I can usually do whatever I need faster than it would take me to get through the automated menus and hold music to call and have them do it. Like my pharmacy, if I want to refill a prescription online, I log in, check a box and hit submit. Done. If I call them, I need to go through three menus to get patched through to the pharmacy, tell them what I want, hold for a moment while they help someone in the store, give them my info and wait for them to look it up, etc.
When I plan to meet up with people, I make plenty of time to talk to them and listen to whatever. When I get what I think is going to be a short phone call that devolves into tangents, I don't necessarily have the time to entertain whether the fact that my friend's cousin had his toe amputated due to gangrene means he should get the spot on his nipple tested for leprosy, or if he should just improve his personal hygiene and see if it washes off in the shower.
If something really is going to be a pain to communicate via text, schedule that conversation and we can have a call to discuss it, but I'm not answering phone calls whenever somebody calls out of the blue unless I'm interviewing for jobs or expecting a call about some sort of emergency.
Because we don't have those nice thick hard plastic handles to rest on your shoulder
Or how about those pink cute kool "princess" table top phones
You could fit a whole smartphone inside one of the later ones with the buttons that would leave marks on your face
I don't like phone calls either. But now people are starting to send voice messages. Might just as well call me if you're going to steal 3 minutes with every message, with info which could have been typed in 5 words. I ignore voice messages, I tell people I do yet they still get angry with "why didn't you reply, all the messages is only 7 minutes of listening time it's not that bad". FFS
Honestly voice messages make me unreasonably angry. It's all of the inconvenience of a phone call with none of the immediacy, like voicemail but for every sentence. Thank you for sharing my hatred, I feel less alone
Call: don't pick up.
Voicemail: disabled.
"ah well, let's leave a voice message then, I'm sure they'll appreciate it."
"I don't want to use both hands to type" - use SwiftKey swipe. Works great.
"I don't want to use one hand to type" - use voice to text. Works great.
"I just want to publicly use voice messages because everyone does it" - I don't want you as a friend, family member, colleague or anything else. I hate you, everything you send me will be blocked and marked as spam and you just removed yourself from my contact list.
And if you really don't want me to call you or call you back .... text, email or send me a message that says
CALL ME
That is the single most disgusting uninteresting uninformative and ugliest thing that anyone can text me. You can text me a dick pick, ransom demands, blackmail images, racist crap or gore pictures of something and I wouldn't complain and probably might even respond to you ... but if you just text me 'CALL ME', I'm blocking your number or contact and never answering anything from you again.
RIP your inbox
I mean, there could be a worse answer.
You know what, this would be easier if done in person. I have your address as ____. I'll be by in ten minutes.
In addition to everything else, there's also a feedback loop of spam calls predominating. The more legit conversation moves to other methods, the more spam calls stick out. That, in turn, means even more people prefer something other than phone calls. It eventually gets to the point where 99% of calls are spam, and that whole method of communication becomes useless.
There are people like me who use voice calls about half the time for work. My number is on my email signature and my emails may get passed around, which I don't mind. When I arrive to a new work site I give my number to at least one person, more commonly three or four. So if I practice what seems to be common today of not answering numbers I don't have saved, I could miss critical communication, and waste time hearing a voicemail and calling back.
I'm not saying one or the other is more correct, just that there are different situations to consider.
Phone calls used to be better when they were analog land lines. The fidelity(idk if that's the right word, but go ahead and catch my drift) was amazing.
You could hear every breath, every intonation in voice, every shift in body language. I think our subconscious works on stuff like that a lot more than anyone cares to admit. Every phone conversation you've had in the past 10 years has been digitally compressed.
The headsets themselves were ergonomic. Easy to use, fit the face and head alot better than the phones we use nowadays.
101 UNSCHEDULED VIDEO CALL
Because the more serious discussion the more time I want to have to be able to convey myself concisely and prepared. Phone calls can be awkward and reactionary. plus how the fuck have we not yet solved phone audio quality and consistency problems.
Blame apple
I always do.
But also why specifically? I love any opportunity I get to talk shit about their anticonsumer practices and this shit is right up my alley, what are they blocking now?
Personally since chat/messages are now ubiquituous, call implies you need my reply/attention/input now, and/or need the vocal tonal part of communication.
If you call, and it's clear there was neither reason, I'm annoyed. There was no reason to interrupt me, as I'll assume there's an emergency or urgent situation and pick up dropping whatever I'm doing.
There are exceptions of course, but nowadays those (like family get-togethers or check-ins) have honestly moved to group video chats so they're not "calls", either.
At my workplace, the response time for text-based messages (eg via Teams) varies wildly. Sometimes I get a response promptly. Sometimes it’s same day, sometimes it’s later that week, and sometimes I don’t get a response at all. So unfortunately the best way to get an answer I need is to just call them. Do I need that information that instant? Not necessarily, but I can’t risk the message being put off/ignored/forgotten for a week or more.
For me I hate phone calls because it's someone demanding I drop what I'm doing to address whatever they want. Keep in mind, 99% of phone calls I get are at work form co-workers.
The number of "quick calls" that are actually quick I can count on 1 hand, and still have room for more. I have tasks to accomplish, things to do. And I'm spread so thin between all the things I do, there's a fair chance I'm going to forget something about what you asked/told me. If it's in text form I can review it when I loop back to it. You need me to check/validate/run something, cool. I have record of what, when, and if I completed it. Just because you have a question does not make it an emergency on my part.
As for my home phone, the only folks who ever call me are either telemarketers or scams. If a friend called I'd probably answer (if I have the time). But I think most of my friends are in the same boat, we have so much to do these days (non-recreation) that it's just not easy to find time. A lot of my friends have side-hustles or a second job or are in class (like me) in order to stay competitive. When I was a kid, I remember my parents could unwind at the end of the day, friends would just come over to hang out. It just ain't like that no more.
This is it for me. If someone is an auditory processor, or needs a more nuanced conversation in order to understand something, I sympathize. But not everyone is like that. Just send a quick message asking to chat (or better yet, find time on my calendar if it's for work), and then I can prepare what I know on the subject, review it, and get back to you.
Otherwise you're going to get an ear full of ummmmmmmmmmmmmmm
uhhhhh hmm
hang on, I was just
hang on, just loooking that upp....
click
scroll
scroll
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scrolllll
Right, so
(silence while I'm reading)
Right, uh, so
Okay
It was last Tuesday
Was that it?
A phone call allows people to hold a conversation. All the others are just correspondence.
Yes. And some people prefer correspondence, that's ok.
For me, it's autism.
9999 Teams
No no, teams is number 1
Because it is only on my work computer that I shutdown when I'm done
Calling is 10 times faster for 90 percent of my issues in my job. And my job is dealing with issues for 30 different people happening simultaneously. So yea, I like to cut back time when I can.
Yeah
It completely depends on this. Do you need a conversation, or do you need a response.
People don't know how to do the one they need to do, so they hit every fastener with the hammer they got.
How is skywriting so low on the list?
It's not very good at night
IKR?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=742rwnKJaqE
Because I take no joy in small talk, waste of time. I type basically as fast or even faster than I talk. I can maintaine multiple conversations at once. And I can answer when I want instead of being locked up with one person that gets its way.
Was the "its" a typo or do you think of people on the phone like objects that need to be moved aside?
Typo, but when you put it that way - yes ?
Not having to be available at the ready for people is great.
If you arrange for a call, through another asynchronous mechanism, then it's fine. If you cold-call me to ask about the weather (or, more seriously, anything that could have been a text message), I'll leave decapitated horse head in your fridge.
I say this as an autist who used to fucking loathe talking on the phone: Its that the phone takes up too much mental energy and time, yet has a time limit on your own responses. Its hellishly stressful when you are socially incompetent, and now a lot of even non-autistic people are becoming socially incompetent.
Now its funny, I hated phone calls back when everyone liked them. Now I'm pretty OK at them because I worked at a call center for a year and now it seems like everyone now hates phone calls. I kinda recognize that the one nice thing about phone calls is there is no "set up your account before ordering your food" type bullshit. There is a consistency to phone calls.
There’s also a faster sense of done-ness with a phone call: the conversation is almost always over at the end of the call, whereas with something like text it can take ages because it’s so spread out.
That… and my insecurity as to what a sane-and-polite-but-not-overdone phrasing would be fades quicker than when that phrasing has been immortalised through writing. It’s just over sooner (provided you actually manage to get through to someone)
I think I'm fairly neurotypical but I don't like calls either (though I recognize some things are better on a call). for me it's just that it's feels unnatural that you're supposed to be talking to someone just as you would normally but there's no visual component. it's awkward. imagine two people in the same room having a conversation but they're looking at the wall instead of each other.
why there are no dots after the last numbers
Ran outta dots I imagine.
Two words for me. Read. Receipts. I have found that someone will inevitably text me and say, "why didn't you respond?" Fucker. You texted me. Want me to actually engage with you? Call me. Otherwise you're now at my mercy.
I prefer calling because it's easy to silence and just let it go to VM if I am busy. Call back immediately and that's usually a sign of being needed.
For me, calls interrupt my workflow with things that don’t need immediate attention anyway. So it draws focus away unnecessarily.
I also prefer to have a written record of things if they’re important. That way you can always refer back to it. A phone call just annoys me at best and divides my attention. So it’s in their interest as well that I can respond when I’ve got time.
Majority scam
Why do 98, 99 and 100 have no dots?
Because they aren't items on the list
Then why list them?
to show that they are not an option :)
My biggest reason for not liking calls is that I often very much struggle to actually hear what's being said. I'll take talking in person over a call. Text mediums also have the benefit of being able to be referred back to. Great to double check something, or to cover your ass. I'll take a paper trail any day of the week.
That said though, in my professional life I have encountered a surprisingly huge number of people who just cannot write clearly. It baffles me. Ultimately, to each their own, and I'll try to meet people where they're at. But I much prefer written formats.
How did voicemail (or voice message) make it above skywriting?
I don't want to talk.
The paranoid narcissim in this thread in incredible. I have no idea how some people function at all if the idea of a phone call unravels them.
I have never liked to talk on the phone. I hate talking to someone when I can't see their face... which is weird because I did VO for years and often did it with someone directing me remotely, but somehow that was different.
When I need to solve a problem I use the fastest method. Talking about the problem. Anyone who thinks they can do that as quickly through texts or emails is just not interested in quickly resolving it. No way anyone can solve a problem faster with anything less than a conversation.
Has anyone ever actually thought otherwise? I know plenty of people who even say "I know it's faster to call" before sending a text or something. I feel like you created a scenario that really doesn't exist. People don't dispute what is quicker just that they don't wanna do it that way.
There are people in this thread trying to say its faster through text.
I'm really tired of this self imposed bullshit.
I'm sure the same people who post this are also top contributors in anti work. Just miserable people being miserable. Worst part, they'll call on self identified autism or neurodivergence making it slap to the face for those actually affected by it.
I'll forever fight for those on the spectrum and I've got no patience for pretend victims.
Triggered? Why? I guess you feel problems are solved quicker by slow back and forth text.
Oh and by the way what does me being on the spectrum have to do with anything? You sure you are commenting on the right thread? Since it seems like you read a lot in to my post and pulled autism out of it. Outside my job I rarely answer the phone. I haven't had voicemail set up on a phone in years. But when its a job you have to communicate.
Don't you sound like a peach!
Jaded by years of people undervaluing my best Dev and just blatant discrimination. Some times there's place for crumbling.