The content of the call itself might not be recorded, but who you called, when, and for how long does get recorded. This is what people like Edward Snowden were talking about when they talk about metadata.
Yup. Digital communication is fine to set up real communication, but it's like fast food-- cheap, fast, convenient, but not very nourishing. Even us introverts need real conversations. Was talking to a bunch of people a year or two ago, and we were all complaining about this problem, so much that I started The Reconnection Challenge.
It's been great just talking to people. At first it seems slower, but there's actually so much more information transfer by voice (or in person). Who knew? ;)
As a fellow introvert I must disagree: I dread speaking to people. I have a strong preference for text communication. When I am forced into a video meeting I minimize the video, prefer to just listen.
YMMV, of course, but I thought I was the same way. Then I realized that I like having some conversations but not others. But I would get put into the conversations I didn't like, which made me retreat to recharge and not get as many of the conversations I do like. So I decided to be more proactive about having conversations with people I want to talk to, about stuff I want to talk about, and find I enjoy those conversations a lot.
I've taken to calling my friends on the phone over the past few months, after years of texting. I've let them know I'm going to try to do more of this and everyone I've mentioned it to has responded positively. We've decided that even if we just have a moment and want to share something funny or interesting, we're going to try to have a quick phone conversation.
This has helped me feel more connected to the people who I don't see in person frequently in a way that feels more "real" than texts or emails.
You just jogged memory, but I recall having a option to send by "text" message, a audio clip, on my phone.
That's a distant memory, despite owning a s10e ONly 9 weeks... I would have refused the consignment, if asked to inspect the ui/ux of current mobile phones, on approval for my business. Nit so flippantly is not any downloaded constantly updated software by definition a sake remote at distance so subject to distance selling rules?
You say "funny or interesting "
That's set me off on obe but please bear with me, the path to my point matters because it's a whole industry that vanished ironically silently...and I swear I can teach talkers to code better than vice versa and this matters profoundly to me. And anyone trying to settle a balance of payments FX deficit post Brexit....
A trillion dollar market vanished with the fading if synchrony of voice communications in business: directly published trade vertical and association msmagazines lived by smiling and dialling and provided countless routes into industry "by the back door " for young men and women who missed their job offer targets and similar that makes selling advertising in the field of your choice not retrograde af all. Not do much wrong spending a year talking with your future professions senior managers about what they're telling the world about. Couple hundred thousand magazines dobt have sales functions, effectively. This was my business. In '04 Google wrote off a whole load ABD quit trying to get ad pages to tradd online and shortly afterwards we ONKY didn't sell ourselves when my cofounder died tragically, and I realised that the scale we lacked meant if I argued they key man was more me bejbv baby sat than my partner being the key man in cold business terms, still we didn't know if we'd hit a different brick wall moment we gained scale. My hunch was correct. But you could have saved the industry in 04, less so now .
Ugly ugly politics trumped the logic and are the real obstacle to revival, not, or not any mire, the math of micromarkets that, plys some actually fun stuff, took me away for the years since then till late.
I'm deeply concerned actually how much we may be losing because just one salesman who I knew, any one, could make a party or conference gathering, electric and exchange immensely greater than ever that group would otherwise.
My life has been immersed in professionally invigorating conversation, until recently. I have just now realised it is by being absent, devastating ne mentally.
I did that, but I cannot go flagging every message. To me, it is quite clear that this is abuse, and the account should be banned without me having to sleuth about for more posts like this.
I honestly have to disagree. It does seem incoherent but if you read the intent behind each sentence he seems to be telling a story with some bitter moments from his past scattered between his profile and comments. I would usually be quick to point out weirdness but I can logically follow each of his comments. Please consider jmg2 may be sick or unwell.
Also have done this with my friend circle as I extracted myself from social media (instagram and facebook). I have a lot better relationship with my family and friends now that we catch up on the phone other than just clicking "like" on the scroll of everyone's photos.
You basically just have to make time for it. I call people when I'm walking the dog and when I'm commuting.
Personal anecdote... after a 77-year old lady who was a family friend lost her husband of 45 years, I called once a year on her birthday to check up on her. At first she seemed to really appreciate it. But in the 3rd year, it took 20+ rings which concerned me. When she finally answered, she said, "Oh it's you! Oh how are you!!! You know, you can just text me!"
I took the hint. Think about that... a 77-year old was lecturing me to use the newer fangled texting technology.
In addition to the convenience of multitasking, the issue is that robocalls have made everyone wary of answering their phones.
ETA: forgot to add some color context. My personal rule is to never call anybody and only text. I only made an exception for the 77-year friend because I thought she was "old school" and would prefer a real phone call. I was proven wrong. I still chuckle about not seeing how pervasive the norms can change.
My dad is he same way, and he's 81. He hates talking on the phone. He doesn't like to bother people unless its important and that way they can get back to him when it's convenient. This way too, he won't miss the message if he doesn't hear the phone.
Flip side, people expect on demand real time synchronous corresponding talk from their called party.
My mother's younger brother announced his alzheimer's had truly manifest, by freaking when, perfectly in character, my mother didn't need his calls. We had the proverbial phone in the shower/bath. Although it wasn't nece(till too late) for me to be present, I moved my office complete with redundant paths to go diverse exchange private copper pairs, to the apartment my mom wanted to be in and not sell, for a view is immune to the seasons, I later realized, and our telecom and related facilities were hilariously overkill. (Semi retirement sucks because of excessive choice. Azure Cognitive Services plus hobby time too easily could be a veritable busfor seniors attending. )
Anyhow alarm was unnecessarily raised and the British "elf an saiyftie" was still a dust cloud unsettled when a man appeared at the door asking innumerable questions about my mother. The social worker I greeted defrauded abused and all but killed my mother while protected from justice by countless departments of the bloated British government. With warrantless surveillance OPEN to social workers in the UK, I have lost business deals, sens startup with branding I habitually photographed from my wall/whiteboard, down to the da## pantone.
Sorry, getting all emotional there, but please think thru everything you rely on assumptively, as exhaustively as you would at least fuzz your code...
I am waiting for the 'ShowHN' post from open.ai or somewhere that shows their completely artificial forum users. The comments read a lot like a GaN trained on previous comments that is generating new comments based on the network.
Once such a tool is "good enough" it will no doubt be employed as a link seeding tool in forums everywhere.
I personally hate texting, and before this, IRC. I also don't do Facebook or have an account there.
I keep in touch with a handful of elderly relatives and friends via a phone call a few times a year.
If they were to tell me to text them or hit them up on Facebook instead and phone is simply unacceptable to them (unlikely and has never happened), then that's their choice and I respect it completely, and it certainly will be the end of our communication if they insist on that since I don't do Facebook and I don't text.
Snail mailed letters... I can and do do these for those who don't want phone calls.
I think there is value in a higher level interaction sometimes instead of texting, but videochat seems to be the far superior option?
"I abruptly asked one morning to stop messaging me about story ideas on our office’s chat platform, Slack. Instead, I said, let’s talk the ideas out over the phone."
Maybe people remember things a lot better than I do, but text based logs are super helpful. I also think writing often is a better medium to go over thoughts in a coherent way (I find people that disagree with this usually have trouble typing which makes it a lot harder).
for anything involving concrete deliverables and obligations, I really like having a written log. Like you say, it also forces communication to be more explicit. It's easy to handwave details away in voice.
OTOH something like story ideas sounds like the kind of thing that would benefit from voice. Situations where things aren't already spelled out nicely, where rapid feedback and iteration are valuable.
I think one of the oddest things is getting text about people who have passed away. In the past this seemed to be something so sacred you did it in personal, or at the worst, with a phone call. In the past few years I've gotten text about old roommates and liver failure or suicides and I'm guilty of forwarding on the information in the same medium.
I suspect it's because of two side effects of more efficient communication.
A) It is effectively painless to instantly check with me whether or not I am free at any hour of any day with smartphones, so not doing so becomes less understandable
B) I am in touch with many many more people over the internet even in my local area than I could ever hope to hang out with
(or want to, as somewhat of an introvert workaholic)
I like to be intentional and plan out my social activities with a calendar, ideally a few days in advance, but I also don't mind meeting up on short notice. But any amount of notice is necessary to even make sure I am home, much less wanting to be social.
I actually feel smartphones have made me more active socially because instead of sitting around , we can plan things the day before while waiting for the bus, walking, etc.
Remember when friends and family visited each other unannounced?
I remember when it was considered rude, yes. I don't know where that guy grew up, but Mom's in the middle of making supper, Dad's in the garage, I'm working on homework, and we're just supposed to drop everything because you can't pick up a phone first? No, unlike the video, when I'm in my underwear with unkempt hair, covered in Cheetos dust from a CoD marathon, I am not jumping for joy if the doorbell rings.
Before mobile phones, exceptions were made. "Hey, I live two towns over, but was in the neighborhood unexpectedly...I hope now is not a bad time." But one made note of the fact that it is an unannounced visit.
As I kid I was excited about the doorbell. As I got older I realized how much of a chore it is. I feel like facetime calls are in the realm of a doorbell now.
I'm an old guy, but I don't remember a time when this was generally welcomed. It was done, but it was always considered rude. How rude depends on the circumstances.
I prefer a phone call at some point - there becomes a point in any conversation that the bandwidth offered by text is insufficient for the task at hand, whenever that happens I move it to the telephone
Make appointments if you need to interact for reasons other than to stay in touch with family and close friends. Technology makes this easy. Otherwise, phone calls should be a backup if scheduled interactions fail.
I think this is being framed incorrectly. It's not about voice vs text, it's about sync vs async.
By default, phone calls (and face-to-face conversations) are synchronous. You call someone, they have to stop what they're doing and have a conversation in real-time. They also can't judge the importance until they're already interrupted and have started the conversation anyway.
Text messages, email, chat and even voicemail are asynchronous. You send a message, the person can respond when able, and likewise. They can also see the initial query, and this can help them decide whether to respond immediately or later.
Async communication has the benefit of being able to work synchronously, if you want, but it doesn't have to. You might annoy people by not responding fast enough, but not in the same way that you would if you were to just put down the phone and walk away for a few minutes/hours.
I think the real problem is misuse of async vs synchronous styles of communication, and knowing when to switch between them.
I personally prefer async communication by default, but if we're going to do near-real-time async anyway, I'd rather have a 5 minute phone call than spend half an hour texting back and forth. I hate unexpected phone calls (and in fact, pretty much don't answer my phone), but I have absolutely no issue with a scheduled call -- that that is usually arranged asynchronously.
Agree with this 100% - Synchronous (IMO) is best when urgent details need to be exchanged quickly where the importance of certain aspects of reaction can be conveyed,to guide small segments of the conversation. There's an immediate feedback mechanism.
For in-depth technical exchanges, where conveying the complete picture is necessary before someone makes a return assessment, async provides better results.
But most importantly they differ in how the mind utilizes them.
My life was better IMO when it was common to call people. We had conventions like voice mail if you were on another call, or saying "now is not a good time" but I talked to way more people.
I mean I fully agree with your assessment of async vs sync but conversely I'm less connected to people than I was before. I used to call and chat with friends several times a day. Now almost never.
Another way to look at it, maybe at some point some new tech will come out so thet we don't even talk to people in the same house/building/office. I mean why talk to my sister/mom/dad/wife/son/daughter, they might be in the middle of a thought. I should choose some async method and just never talk to another human directly.
Of course that's ridiculous but if you had told me in 1995 that I'd talk less than a few hours a year on a phone because everyone just messages each other I'd have thought you were describing a dystpoia. Who's to say some new tech won't take it even further.
In Mexico, it's really common to send voice messages through WhatsApp instead of typing, so that it becomes an async walkie-talkie. It probably has to do with functional literacy rates, because the only people that I know that hate texting are either really slow readers or slow typists.
This really depends on a lot of things, like the person I'm talking to, when we're talking, time of day, etc. I have one or maybe two friends now that I call, and even then it's sporadic. We spend most of our time texting.
There are other situations when I'm frustrated with texting and would prefer a phone call. One example is when my girlfriend is out and she'll text me something like, "Hey, I decided to stop for coffee on the way home. Do you want something?" This can go a number of ways. First, I won't see the text at all, and she'll come home and say, "Well, I tried to text you!" Then I'll look at my phone and it'll say something like, "Anything? I'm the next one in line. Let me know ASAP." The second way this can go is a back and forth. They don't have that option. Anything else you want? Yeah, they're all out of that.
Any situation where you need to know something right away, like the right kinds of nuts and bolts to grab from a hardware store or if your friends are making a food run, etc. don't text.
It's harder to talk on the phone now. Voice quality is terrible with VoIP. Noise rejection is poor with flat phone microphones. One person I talk to regularly is too much into hands-free, and calls are mostly background noise. Something the compression algorithms handle badly.
Most inbound phone calls are telemarketing now, anyway. When I answer my phone, and it's an unknown number, I say nothing and wait. If it's a human, they'll eventually say something. Autodial systems will time out after 5 seconds without something that sounds vaguely like "Hello".
The voice quality issue is real. Before cell phones, audio quality was fine. However, cell phones brought a serious reduction in audio quality, and it has never improved.
I was//am an early adopter for Ooma. I still have one and I use it, albeit the "2.0" hardware version now.
Neither I or the other person on the line have experienced voice quality issues. My ISP is Comcast. I have been on hours-long conversations during otherwise high-usage internet usages. The other people have been on landlines, Magic Jack, cell phones over "your favourite carrier".
I don't do any special QOS router//modem configurations other than how I physically wire the hardware together.
I am curious as to what situations others are involved in so much that they are experiencing voice quality issues. Skype? Smart phone over wireless? Dialpad from 2001?
I have always (well, post-teenage years) hated talking on the phone. Before cellphones, though, there was no other option. When the ability to communicate with people while escaping the tyranny of phone calls came around, it was a serious and dramatic improvement.
> Smartphones feel terrible to hold to your ear for more than a few minutes, but they make up for poor ergonomic design with one key feature: speakerphone.
Especially not this. When I'm talking to someone on the phone, if they're using a speakerphone the whole experience is an order of magnitude worse.
* insert a long article about the importance of face-to-face communication *
Seriously, though, every technology has a time and a place.
It's a sliding scale that goes like this: video calls, voice calls, IM/texts, group/forum posts, emails.
One one end you get synchronous communication which has the full attention of both parties. On the other - go at your own pace asynchronous information transfer.
I love calling my grandparents on Skype. But I need to be alone in a room for that to work. (Screens and speakers still suck outdoor).
I rarely call my parents on Skype, because my mom doesn't like looking bad on camera, and she just wants to chill after work sans make up and what not. So I call her on the phone. But I know her schedule, and I know that I won't be taking here away from something - and that she'll be happy to give me full attention.
IM and texts are great when you need to get some information across, but you don't want to take the other party away from whatever setting they are in.
While IM/texts work great to talk to many people at once, there is still a sense of immediacy to the conversation. If you want to organize an event, the relevant information will get lost in flurry of messages after a day or two. FB groups / events, and similar, work better for that: communicating in groups, with a latency that spans days.
Finally, emails work best when you want to take time to compose a message or a response (sometimes, days), and be able to go back to it a long time afterwards. I have long email threads with some of my friends, months passing between responses sometimes.
And obviously, some methods work better than others depending on whether the other party is next door or 7000 miles away, whether they speak your language fluently, etc.
I hate video calls. I'd rather just talk on the phone than say "What?" over each other and look at their facial reactions 2 seconds delayed. Low latency video destroys all the benefits of face-to-face interaction and then some.
At least in my line of work, the utility of the telephone is one-sided and the utility is not on my side. It allows any random jackass to force me to drop whatever I was doing and remotely stand over my shoulder breathing into my ear while they wait for me to look into their problem.
They won't pick up because of all the spam calls people get.
Some people don't even check their voicemail these days because their phone has a scary number next to the icon, and they don't want to listen to all of it.
70 comments
[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 129 ms ] threadWe have Slack, etc - but hearing a regular voice attached to someone really does program the brain different, at least it feels that way to me.
Text doesn't convey as much information and the synchronous aspect makes it much more interesting.
We're a Mumble crew though but that's down to personal preference more than anything else.
A benefit that many people don't seem to recognize as if total continuous surveillance and a permanent record is always preferable.
ADDED (from the same article):
> "There’s no record of it (unless your conversation partner is secretly recording it, in which case you have deeper problems)."
It's been great just talking to people. At first it seems slower, but there's actually so much more information transfer by voice (or in person). Who knew? ;)
(https://www.mimiran.com/the-reconnection-challenge)
This has helped me feel more connected to the people who I don't see in person frequently in a way that feels more "real" than texts or emails.
That's a distant memory, despite owning a s10e ONly 9 weeks... I would have refused the consignment, if asked to inspect the ui/ux of current mobile phones, on approval for my business. Nit so flippantly is not any downloaded constantly updated software by definition a sake remote at distance so subject to distance selling rules?
You say "funny or interesting "
That's set me off on obe but please bear with me, the path to my point matters because it's a whole industry that vanished ironically silently...and I swear I can teach talkers to code better than vice versa and this matters profoundly to me. And anyone trying to settle a balance of payments FX deficit post Brexit....
A trillion dollar market vanished with the fading if synchrony of voice communications in business: directly published trade vertical and association msmagazines lived by smiling and dialling and provided countless routes into industry "by the back door " for young men and women who missed their job offer targets and similar that makes selling advertising in the field of your choice not retrograde af all. Not do much wrong spending a year talking with your future professions senior managers about what they're telling the world about. Couple hundred thousand magazines dobt have sales functions, effectively. This was my business. In '04 Google wrote off a whole load ABD quit trying to get ad pages to tradd online and shortly afterwards we ONKY didn't sell ourselves when my cofounder died tragically, and I realised that the scale we lacked meant if I argued they key man was more me bejbv baby sat than my partner being the key man in cold business terms, still we didn't know if we'd hit a different brick wall moment we gained scale. My hunch was correct. But you could have saved the industry in 04, less so now .
Ugly ugly politics trumped the logic and are the real obstacle to revival, not, or not any mire, the math of micromarkets that, plys some actually fun stuff, took me away for the years since then till late.
I'm deeply concerned actually how much we may be losing because just one salesman who I knew, any one, could make a party or conference gathering, electric and exchange immensely greater than ever that group would otherwise.
My life has been immersed in professionally invigorating conversation, until recently. I have just now realised it is by being absent, devastating ne mentally.
You basically just have to make time for it. I call people when I'm walking the dog and when I'm commuting.
I took the hint. Think about that... a 77-year old was lecturing me to use the newer fangled texting technology.
In addition to the convenience of multitasking, the issue is that robocalls have made everyone wary of answering their phones.
ETA: forgot to add some color context. My personal rule is to never call anybody and only text. I only made an exception for the 77-year friend because I thought she was "old school" and would prefer a real phone call. I was proven wrong. I still chuckle about not seeing how pervasive the norms can change.
My mother's younger brother announced his alzheimer's had truly manifest, by freaking when, perfectly in character, my mother didn't need his calls. We had the proverbial phone in the shower/bath. Although it wasn't nece(till too late) for me to be present, I moved my office complete with redundant paths to go diverse exchange private copper pairs, to the apartment my mom wanted to be in and not sell, for a view is immune to the seasons, I later realized, and our telecom and related facilities were hilariously overkill. (Semi retirement sucks because of excessive choice. Azure Cognitive Services plus hobby time too easily could be a veritable busfor seniors attending. )
Anyhow alarm was unnecessarily raised and the British "elf an saiyftie" was still a dust cloud unsettled when a man appeared at the door asking innumerable questions about my mother. The social worker I greeted defrauded abused and all but killed my mother while protected from justice by countless departments of the bloated British government. With warrantless surveillance OPEN to social workers in the UK, I have lost business deals, sens startup with branding I habitually photographed from my wall/whiteboard, down to the da## pantone.
Sorry, getting all emotional there, but please think thru everything you rely on assumptively, as exhaustively as you would at least fuzz your code...
Once such a tool is "good enough" it will no doubt be employed as a link seeding tool in forums everywhere.
I keep in touch with a handful of elderly relatives and friends via a phone call a few times a year.
If they were to tell me to text them or hit them up on Facebook instead and phone is simply unacceptable to them (unlikely and has never happened), then that's their choice and I respect it completely, and it certainly will be the end of our communication if they insist on that since I don't do Facebook and I don't text.
Snail mailed letters... I can and do do these for those who don't want phone calls.
I think there is value in a higher level interaction sometimes instead of texting, but videochat seems to be the far superior option?
"I abruptly asked one morning to stop messaging me about story ideas on our office’s chat platform, Slack. Instead, I said, let’s talk the ideas out over the phone."
Maybe people remember things a lot better than I do, but text based logs are super helpful. I also think writing often is a better medium to go over thoughts in a coherent way (I find people that disagree with this usually have trouble typing which makes it a lot harder).
OTOH something like story ideas sounds like the kind of thing that would benefit from voice. Situations where things aren't already spelled out nicely, where rapid feedback and iteration are valuable.
I just kinda accept it, but maybe I shouldn't ...
We did it with boomers, so why not millennials?
That would keep things async but would allow me to read people’s expressions and their tone of voice.
Or just sending videos via SMS instead of text.
Remember when friends and family visited each other unannounced? Why did that used to be welcomed[1], but today it's not?
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Swzvm-gXHg
A) It is effectively painless to instantly check with me whether or not I am free at any hour of any day with smartphones, so not doing so becomes less understandable
B) I am in touch with many many more people over the internet even in my local area than I could ever hope to hang out with (or want to, as somewhat of an introvert workaholic)
I like to be intentional and plan out my social activities with a calendar, ideally a few days in advance, but I also don't mind meeting up on short notice. But any amount of notice is necessary to even make sure I am home, much less wanting to be social.
I actually feel smartphones have made me more active socially because instead of sitting around , we can plan things the day before while waiting for the bus, walking, etc.
I remember when it was considered rude, yes. I don't know where that guy grew up, but Mom's in the middle of making supper, Dad's in the garage, I'm working on homework, and we're just supposed to drop everything because you can't pick up a phone first? No, unlike the video, when I'm in my underwear with unkempt hair, covered in Cheetos dust from a CoD marathon, I am not jumping for joy if the doorbell rings.
Before mobile phones, exceptions were made. "Hey, I live two towns over, but was in the neighborhood unexpectedly...I hope now is not a bad time." But one made note of the fact that it is an unannounced visit.
By default, phone calls (and face-to-face conversations) are synchronous. You call someone, they have to stop what they're doing and have a conversation in real-time. They also can't judge the importance until they're already interrupted and have started the conversation anyway.
Text messages, email, chat and even voicemail are asynchronous. You send a message, the person can respond when able, and likewise. They can also see the initial query, and this can help them decide whether to respond immediately or later.
Async communication has the benefit of being able to work synchronously, if you want, but it doesn't have to. You might annoy people by not responding fast enough, but not in the same way that you would if you were to just put down the phone and walk away for a few minutes/hours.
I think the real problem is misuse of async vs synchronous styles of communication, and knowing when to switch between them.
I personally prefer async communication by default, but if we're going to do near-real-time async anyway, I'd rather have a 5 minute phone call than spend half an hour texting back and forth. I hate unexpected phone calls (and in fact, pretty much don't answer my phone), but I have absolutely no issue with a scheduled call -- that that is usually arranged asynchronously.
For in-depth technical exchanges, where conveying the complete picture is necessary before someone makes a return assessment, async provides better results.
But most importantly they differ in how the mind utilizes them.
I mean I fully agree with your assessment of async vs sync but conversely I'm less connected to people than I was before. I used to call and chat with friends several times a day. Now almost never.
Another way to look at it, maybe at some point some new tech will come out so thet we don't even talk to people in the same house/building/office. I mean why talk to my sister/mom/dad/wife/son/daughter, they might be in the middle of a thought. I should choose some async method and just never talk to another human directly.
Of course that's ridiculous but if you had told me in 1995 that I'd talk less than a few hours a year on a phone because everyone just messages each other I'd have thought you were describing a dystpoia. Who's to say some new tech won't take it even further.
There are other situations when I'm frustrated with texting and would prefer a phone call. One example is when my girlfriend is out and she'll text me something like, "Hey, I decided to stop for coffee on the way home. Do you want something?" This can go a number of ways. First, I won't see the text at all, and she'll come home and say, "Well, I tried to text you!" Then I'll look at my phone and it'll say something like, "Anything? I'm the next one in line. Let me know ASAP." The second way this can go is a back and forth. They don't have that option. Anything else you want? Yeah, they're all out of that.
Any situation where you need to know something right away, like the right kinds of nuts and bolts to grab from a hardware store or if your friends are making a food run, etc. don't text.
JUST. CALL. ME.
Most inbound phone calls are telemarketing now, anyway. When I answer my phone, and it's an unknown number, I say nothing and wait. If it's a human, they'll eventually say something. Autodial systems will time out after 5 seconds without something that sounds vaguely like "Hello".
I was//am an early adopter for Ooma. I still have one and I use it, albeit the "2.0" hardware version now.
Neither I or the other person on the line have experienced voice quality issues. My ISP is Comcast. I have been on hours-long conversations during otherwise high-usage internet usages. The other people have been on landlines, Magic Jack, cell phones over "your favourite carrier".
I don't do any special QOS router//modem configurations other than how I physically wire the hardware together.
I am curious as to what situations others are involved in so much that they are experiencing voice quality issues. Skype? Smart phone over wireless? Dialpad from 2001?
I have always (well, post-teenage years) hated talking on the phone. Before cellphones, though, there was no other option. When the ability to communicate with people while escaping the tyranny of phone calls came around, it was a serious and dramatic improvement.
> Smartphones feel terrible to hold to your ear for more than a few minutes, but they make up for poor ergonomic design with one key feature: speakerphone.
Especially not this. When I'm talking to someone on the phone, if they're using a speakerphone the whole experience is an order of magnitude worse.
Skype/Facetime/videocall them.
* insert a long article about the importance of face-to-face communication *
Seriously, though, every technology has a time and a place.
It's a sliding scale that goes like this: video calls, voice calls, IM/texts, group/forum posts, emails.
One one end you get synchronous communication which has the full attention of both parties. On the other - go at your own pace asynchronous information transfer.
I love calling my grandparents on Skype. But I need to be alone in a room for that to work. (Screens and speakers still suck outdoor).
I rarely call my parents on Skype, because my mom doesn't like looking bad on camera, and she just wants to chill after work sans make up and what not. So I call her on the phone. But I know her schedule, and I know that I won't be taking here away from something - and that she'll be happy to give me full attention.
IM and texts are great when you need to get some information across, but you don't want to take the other party away from whatever setting they are in.
While IM/texts work great to talk to many people at once, there is still a sense of immediacy to the conversation. If you want to organize an event, the relevant information will get lost in flurry of messages after a day or two. FB groups / events, and similar, work better for that: communicating in groups, with a latency that spans days.
Finally, emails work best when you want to take time to compose a message or a response (sometimes, days), and be able to go back to it a long time afterwards. I have long email threads with some of my friends, months passing between responses sometimes.
And obviously, some methods work better than others depending on whether the other party is next door or 7000 miles away, whether they speak your language fluently, etc.
Some people don't even check their voicemail these days because their phone has a scary number next to the icon, and they don't want to listen to all of it.