16 ms·

I already hate group chat. For my use case, it's demonstrably worse than email. I imagine for many (possibly the vast majority) this is the case. The thing is,

I already hate group chat. For my use case, it's demonstrably worse than email. I imagine for many (possibly the vast majority) this is the case. The thing is, as I've seen in this, group chat has a "cuteness" to it. Just like IRC back in the day (or today depending on if you still use it), people are much less formal in group chat and there seems to be less expectation of formality. There is cat pictures and funny emoticons. This isn't a tool challenge; both email and group chat can be equally informal and cute. I contend that email /still/ is a better mechanism given the non-realtime nature of it. But then again, the realtime nature of group chat is what some like. It's precisely what I don't like. I like 1-1 chat quite a bit, though I very quickly default to video in these cases as well (higher fidelity, quicker, less prone to written miscommunication). Hipchat/Slack/IRC are great for some use cases that require the type of communication (specifically I think of operations, incidents or things along those lines). I feel other general team communication in these mechanisms is, well, overblown. My gut tells me PRs are better for much of what group chat serves, and if not PRs, email/ML are still great. And don't forget getting everyone into a room or video hangout. I don't particularly like email, but I don't hate it either. I do, however, very much dislike group chat.

dbot 11y ago
The objectives of office communication are usually either (1) spreading awareness (of ideas, news, task updates...) or (2) making records. For example, an in-person meeting spreads awareness, and writing minutes creates the records. But not every meeting requires minutes. If most of your office communication is about spreading awareness, email is pretty terrible. It requires every person to manually handle each individual message. Most users struggle with this badly. It's a huge waste of time when the effects are propagated throughout an office - everyone is receiving and filing exact copies of the same messages. That's the advantage of team chat - it spreads awareness without the mental overhead applied to each worker. If you need to make a record, email is great. I've found that response expectations are far less affected by the medium (email or team chat) than by the office culture. One is simply easier to manage and respond to.
- fingerprinter 11y ago
  I don't see the difference in your #1 between email and group chat in spreading awareness other than 1. ease of absorption (email is easier) and 2. ability to respond (again, email is easier). Imagine trying to read backscroll of a chat conversation and then trying to "redo" this in chat vs the same in email. The chances (not saying it doesn't happen, but the likelihood) is higher that you can have an effective email exchange. If you aren't right there for the chat, it's over. Some people love this, some people hate it. It's certainly not efficient for group settings. And dear god, please don't make and announce decisions this way. It's about shelf life. Both group chats and emails have a shelf life. Emails have a longer shelf life (probably up to 48 hours in responding and staying relevant in many cases) whereas group chat's have shelf lives measured in minutes. Chat is great for quick one off's, maybe even a few key people on hand, but not for extended groups. In fact, it's rather terrible. Nothing beats meetings with all the right folks, though. Meetings are much better than both group chat or email for spreading awareness. Actually, now that I write this, this might be a use of chat; a virtual meeting via chat. Though, I argue the utility is in having all the parties present and not the protocol.
  - pavel_lishin 11y ago
    I disagree with you on both points; I think that it's easier to communicate by blurting out questions into a chatroom, and it's easier to respond in the same.
- daxelrod 11y ago
  I disagree that email is a great record. It only exists in the inboxes of people who received it at the time. Over time, they leave the company or switch roles, and new people no longer have access. You want forums, or newsgroups, or wikis, or even listservs for any sort of permanence.
  - fingerprinter 11y ago
    This is one huge advantage to GMail for business. When I joined a group/company I could go and read the entire engineering@ or bd@ ML (called Google Groups, I believe) from start to finish. I don't know if other email systems do this but it's something I kinda can't live without anymore. Doesn't help when people send to non-ML or individual emails, but it works wonders for ML and distribution lists.
vacri 11y ago
Group chat also suffers from the same spam issues as email (well, not phishing, but unsolicited). It's particularly bad in Slack, because every message consumes tons of space, even in compact modes (which most people don't use) them: put notification X in channel! me: okay, but let's keep it targetted and filter for important issues only them: you worry too much them: since we're doing X notifications, let's do Y! People need to know Y. me: okay, it's getting spammy now, need to rein this in them: yeah, you're right them: so, we're putting Z notifications in now, and expanding X and Y me: please, the horror. everyone will move to another channel them: but people need to know these things! me: does EVERYONE need to know that dev Foo changed status on jira ticket Bar? them: you're missing the point them: let's add more projects, and we tick this 'send notifications' box, right? me: no them: sure we do, that's what we do for other projects et al. In short order, a new channel is made for chat to avoid the spam, and the old channel become an unvisited dumping-ground for notifications. Then someone starts 'perhaps if we also put just the important notifications in the new channel'...
pavel_lishin 11y ago
> people are much less formal in group chat and there seems to be less expectation of formality. There is cat pictures and funny emoticons Every company chat system should have at least two rooms - #business and #offtopic. Cutesey garbage goes into #offtopic; business goes to #business.
CodeWriter23 11y ago
I tried HipChat for a project last year. It was an improvement over email because all the attachments were right there in the thread. The downside, after several thousand lines of chat, it got difficult to find things. The fact that chat message appear at one size, then expand when the content is downloaded doesn't help. It's hard to read when everything is bouncing around like that. Easier than email, but I still hate it about as much as email. I've started using Trello and you know what, it's task-oriented paradigm of segmenting chats by breaking them into cards really works. It cuts the noise because each card is a topic. The topics can be rearranged in any logical form you choose. And when a task is done, well you might archive the card but it is essentially discarded from the collective thought stream. Maybe I'll end up hating it just as much as email. I haven't gotten there yet.

dbot 11y ago

The objectives of office communication are usually either (1) spreading awareness (of ideas, news, task updates...) or (2) making records. For example, an in-person meeting spreads awareness, and writing minutes creates the records. But not every meeting requires minutes. If most of your office communication is about spreading awareness, email is pretty terrible. It requires every person to manually handle each individual message. Most users struggle with this badly. It's a huge waste of time when the effects are propagated throughout an office - everyone is receiving and filing exact copies of the same messages. That's the advantage of team chat - it spreads awareness without the mental overhead applied to each worker. If you need to make a record, email is great. I've found that response expectations are far less affected by the medium (email or team chat) than by the office culture. One is simply easier to manage and respond to.

fingerprinter 11y ago
I don't see the difference in your #1 between email and group chat in spreading awareness other than 1. ease of absorption (email is easier) and 2. ability to respond (again, email is easier). Imagine trying to read backscroll of a chat conversation and then trying to "redo" this in chat vs the same in email. The chances (not saying it doesn't happen, but the likelihood) is higher that you can have an effective email exchange. If you aren't right there for the chat, it's over. Some people love this, some people hate it. It's certainly not efficient for group settings. And dear god, please don't make and announce decisions this way. It's about shelf life. Both group chats and emails have a shelf life. Emails have a longer shelf life (probably up to 48 hours in responding and staying relevant in many cases) whereas group chat's have shelf lives measured in minutes. Chat is great for quick one off's, maybe even a few key people on hand, but not for extended groups. In fact, it's rather terrible. Nothing beats meetings with all the right folks, though. Meetings are much better than both group chat or email for spreading awareness. Actually, now that I write this, this might be a use of chat; a virtual meeting via chat. Though, I argue the utility is in having all the parties present and not the protocol.
- pavel_lishin 11y ago
  I disagree with you on both points; I think that it's easier to communicate by blurting out questions into a chatroom, and it's easier to respond in the same.
daxelrod 11y ago
I disagree that email is a great record. It only exists in the inboxes of people who received it at the time. Over time, they leave the company or switch roles, and new people no longer have access. You want forums, or newsgroups, or wikis, or even listservs for any sort of permanence.
- fingerprinter 11y ago
  This is one huge advantage to GMail for business. When I joined a group/company I could go and read the entire engineering@ or bd@ ML (called Google Groups, I believe) from start to finish. I don't know if other email systems do this but it's something I kinda can't live without anymore. Doesn't help when people send to non-ML or individual emails, but it works wonders for ML and distribution lists.

vacri 11y ago

Group chat also suffers from the same spam issues as email (well, not phishing, but unsolicited). It's particularly bad in Slack, because every message consumes tons of space, even in compact modes (which most people don't use) them: put notification X in channel! me: okay, but let's keep it targetted and filter for important issues only them: you worry too much them: since we're doing X notifications, let's do Y! People need to know Y. me: okay, it's getting spammy now, need to rein this in them: yeah, you're right them: so, we're putting Z notifications in now, and expanding X and Y me: please, the horror. everyone will move to another channel them: but people need to know these things! me: does EVERYONE need to know that dev Foo changed status on jira ticket Bar? them: you're missing the point them: let's add more projects, and we tick this 'send notifications' box, right? me: no them: sure we do, that's what we do for other projects et al. In short order, a new channel is made for chat to avoid the spam, and the old channel become an unvisited dumping-ground for notifications. Then someone starts 'perhaps if we also put just the important notifications in the new channel'...

pavel_lishin 11y ago

> people are much less formal in group chat and there seems to be less expectation of formality. There is cat pictures and funny emoticons Every company chat system should have at least two rooms - #business and #offtopic. Cutesey garbage goes into #offtopic; business goes to #business.

CodeWriter23 11y ago

I tried HipChat for a project last year. It was an improvement over email because all the attachments were right there in the thread. The downside, after several thousand lines of chat, it got difficult to find things. The fact that chat message appear at one size, then expand when the content is downloaded doesn't help. It's hard to read when everything is bouncing around like that. Easier than email, but I still hate it about as much as email. I've started using Trello and you know what, it's task-oriented paradigm of segmenting chats by breaking them into cards really works. It cuts the noise because each card is a topic. The topics can be rearranged in any logical form you choose. And when a task is done, well you might archive the card but it is essentially discarded from the collective thought stream. Maybe I'll end up hating it just as much as email. I haven't gotten there yet.