this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
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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 😅
That wouldn't be the same exchange. The same exchange wold be 6 messages, which wold taka a lot longer than a simple call. All of Your argument are bullshit. Avery single one of them is a fault of Your stupidity, Your friends stupidity or being American. I don't get robocalls, nobody wastes my time when calling and I never had a problem with connection quality. When I need to as somebody something I call. I'm won't write them a message hoping that he'll read it and bother to response. I need information now so I call now.
Why are you bothering to lie to me?
That's a something I find worth mentioning.
When you text, you spend more of your time, but less of the recipient's.
When you call, you spend less of your time, but interrupt and take up more of their time.
So who's time do you value more?
The same exchange vie phonecall: "Dude, I'm ordering Chinese, want some? Nah" Would take 4 seconds, would be faster then typing. Where the fuck is the problem?
Did you not read my long and detailed comment explaining exactly where the fuck are the many problems with modern telephones, or do you just like your pizza boiled?
What does my taste in pizza has to do with this?
You removed one of the fifty or so problems by waving your hands and pretending to make everybody on the planet smarter about communicating and said "look I solved it".
You're all stupid. Just stupid. I lack the words to express how disappointed I am. Are you all to stupid to process spoken word so you need it written dawn?
Hey uh, are you alright?
I think that's valid, but you have to take into account that mostly everyone isn't as efficient on the phone as what you've described.
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.
I find that it's generally more helpful to practice grabbing the metaphorical bull by the horns. The more you avoid it, the less used you are to dealing with it, and the worse it makes you feel.
Because western individualist culture has permeated almost all countries and their semi/urban citizens' lifestyles, resulting in this sedentary isolationalist lifestyle killing people's social skills and public confidence.
I think it's an American thing. Calling someone isn't weird here in the civilised world. Maybe it's their problem with robocalls. Maybe their paying too much for calls.
Nah, it's a generational thing and an introvert thing.
Gen Z was born after the widespread adoption of cell phones with texting capability making old fashioned phone calls more or less obsolete outside of emergencies and the like and thus don't like the unnecessary hassle.
Meanwhile, some of us millenials and older are taking a cue from them and realising that we don't HAVE TO do phone calls all the time if we don't want to.
I live in Denmark and the only people who regularly call me are my boomer parents. Everyone else only call me if they need to get a hold of me immediately, as it should be.
I'm Gen X. I grew up with a landline and no caller ID, and if the phone rang you mostly just answered it, unless you were screening calls. Could be your best friend asking if you want to go to the mall, could be your least favorite aunt calling to whine at your mom for whatever her latest minor ailment is. In which case you're stuck making polite small talk until your mom is done drying her hair or whatever.
It sucked a lot.
Now I've got a cell and caller ID. Unless I'm expecting a call, I never answer the phone. If it's important, they'll leave a message. Usually it's not even a little bit important.
And my boomer mom just loves to call for a long pointless chat. If I see her name on the caller ID, I have to decide whether I have an hour minimum to waste because it's never shorter than that. 🙄
I hear you, but no need to feel bad for her. I visit her plenty, and even if I find them a drag, I still do have long phone calls with her. As does my sister, as do my aunts, etc. She just has a pretty limitless appetite for idle phone chats and I don't always have the time or patience.
Nah, calls only if you can't put it in a few sentences, is a thing here too.