Why are people afraid of calls these days?
I'm not afraid of phone calls. I hate phone calls. Same way I hate boiled pizza. Makes me judge your parents for the decisions you make.
Let's walk through the average phone call, as the technology is currently implemented and people interact with it, because my username checks the fuckout.
Phone might ring. Who fucking knows? There's one volume rocker on the side of the phone and it controls like nine different and independent volume sliders depending on what app is in control of it this specific nanosecond, so trying to turn Tom Scott down while trying to fall asleep to Something You Mighte Naught Have Knowne, you also turned your ringer off. Shrodinger's fucking ringtone.
Phone actually rings. It's a number from your area code you don't recognize, which means it's either the local Republican wanting money, or a criminal in India.
Phone actually rings, it's someone on your contacts list for once, so you pick up the phone. Apple patented the horizontal slide, so real phones can't use it. Instead sometimes it's a button and sometimes it's a touch-here-and-slide-in-any-direction. When the phone was new you set up a "gesture" where an upward motion and placing the screen near your face would automatically answer the call...that feature might have been deprecated. Did you set it up where pushing the power button would answer the call? Nope. That just hung up on them.
Phone rings again, you do the stupid slide gesture. "Hello?" Silence. Silence. Silence. Line goes dead. Okay, this is one in three phone calls that just don't work.
Phone rings again, stupid slide gesture. It doesn't recognize it, you try it again, it works. "Hello?" "Hello?" "Hello?" "Ah, can you hear me?" three second pause "Yeah I can year you." (audio quality that resembles a 90's McDonald's drive thru speaker that's only been pissed in once this week)
I don't know why I haven't started answering the phone "what the PITY FUCK did you call me for?" Because I don't think anything more subtle will get people to get. to. the. POINT!!!
"What's up, Bob?" "Hey Greg, it's uh. It's Bob." I knew this before I answered the phone because caller ID has been a standard feature on phones since I had my first handjob, but the lead in your synapses has prevented you from internalizing this concept. We'll try and let it soak in for another 20 years I guess. "What's. up. Bob?" "Uh, well, nothin much, what about you?" "WHAT'S UP BOB?" "Well uh, me and uh, me and Cindy are gonna go to the uh, the uh Chinese place and get some, like, takeout or whatever? You want anything?"
"No thanks."
"Uh well, uh, you sure, I mean like, we can get you somethin."
"I'm sure."
"Well uh, okay then I guess. You been doing okay?"
"Bob I've got something on the stove, I've got to go."
"Oh alright, well, uh, I guess I'll let you go then, talk to ya later"
take phone away from face, wait for the screen to light up again to see where the end call button is because it's not a fucking button anymore because the amoeba that ate Steve Jobs' brain escaped and multiplied to the rest of the tech industry, by the time you find it, the other party hung up.
===
The same exchange via SMS:
"hey wer gettin chinese want some"
"nah. thx."
"k"
You're the person who tells the best stories at a party, aren't you?
And I don't mean that as a slight against you, I greatly enjoyed reading that.
This was hilarious to read. And so accurate, thank you 😅
I wouldn't say we're afraid. I don't particularly like speaking on the phone though, but it's alright, I even worked call center for a while so it doesn't bother me much these days.
Anyways, essentially texting is just more efficient. I can't speak for everyone else, but for instance at work, I hate it when I have a question or need assistance on a specific topic, ask on my team chat and have a couple of people saying "quick call?".
If it's something really complex, fine... that's fair. Other than that? It's just so inefficient. I can be working on something else and just reply during my off time between tasks, same with whoever I ask help from. Also, most of the time I'm listening to music, or I have my TV with ambience sound on the background. So then I have to turn everything off just so I can go for a 5minute call for something that could be done over chat on the same amount of time.
Sorry this comment turned out way longer than I thought it would.
So asynchronous communication can be more efficient for certain types of communication, but in other scenarios synchronous communication will be more efficient. Learning to identify which type of communication fits which type of mode is a valuable skill to have, one I recommend that everyone develops.
I get what you mean. Overall, if it's not urgent I'd rather not make/receive calls.
I do miss that magic period of early cheap VoIP where my friends and I would have a call going more or less in the background while all doing our own things. A lower-cost impromptu hangout before we all had cars.
That was never about efficient transfer of information though. Calling with demands is just intrusive.
Not that I ever turn my ringer on. Dang robocallers.
Because I'm doing something else and I'm not going to just drop everything to receive information synchronously which could be sent asynchronously.
It's alright to press the red button, you know.
It's easier to weigh the relative importance and time sensitivity of the incoming message against the importance of what you're doing via text rather than a call.
Because anything not important can be sent through a text. Most people call because it's something important or a big deal and at a lot of the times it's not a good call. So that's why people don't like phone calls because the thing that's on the other end is most likely non-desirable.
My family and my girlfriend are basically the only people allowed to do this. Everyone else - if you're calling me directly I will assume it's an emergency and will get annoyed if it's not.
Calls are fine. Unscheduled calls are not. Text me to set up a time to call that works for both. I am okay with giving you my undivided attention - just not necessarily right now.
What I did to cut that out was to moan and answer like they just woke me up. Talk very slowly, take three seconds of "uuuuhhhhh" to answer every question and be as useless as possible. It isn't long before they hang up and send me the text they should have sent in the first place.
I work remotely and one of my favourite things is how people message to ask if you're free for a call.
"Whomst the fuck?" (C) Wizord, 2023
I just don't answer the phone at all if they can't bother to text (unless it's someone important to me).
I already blocked the number of my internet provider because they keep calling me for an appointment I had called off via email weeks ago by now.
Because I hate typing on mobile devices I don't like texting.
If you try to have a conversation with me over text Imma either call you if it's important or start giving you one word answers to everything.
Thankfully most people know better than to try and communicate with me in general!
Ok
Thing is that you can have a chat protocol and be asynchronous in communicating with text messages. That's something you can't have with voice calls.
Ohh, I'm fully aware.
I love messaging even I have a physical keyboard infront of me.
It's specifically the mobile keyboards I hate.
Are you able to use voice type?
Text to call. I also really like calls, but scheduled. Calling randomly to chat means you're taking my undivided attention for however long you want whenever you want and that's super disrespectful of my time
I need an AI phone agent to whine at CSRs more nicely than I am capable of doing any longer.
That is what I need.
Personally I’ve enjoyed taking calls from friends and family. I used to be scared to death of it.
