4 ms·
I do think the ability to do phone calls is waning, though. I've made 4 phone calls this year: to a buddy, to my wife, to an old friend, and to my fax/voicemai
by veidr 5y ago
I do think the ability to do phone calls is waning, though.
I've made 4 phone calls this year: to a buddy, to my wife, to an old friend, and to my fax/voicemail provider (JConnect) which decided to terminate voicemail service on the phone number I've used since the 1990s. (So I may be part of the problem I am describing — that number didn't ring any device, it only accepted voice messages and faxes, which it forwarded to me via email.)
Of those 4 phone 2021 phone calls:
1.) My buddy no longer has voicemail on his phone, and a recording just told me he was not available and to try again later. (Head kinda exploded.)
2.) My wife also no longer has voicemail! How tf did that happen? No idea but it was 2 months after the above call so I was less surprised.
3.) My old friend is old-school (hence the phone call), and still does have voicemail — but it was full. I assume because he never checks it.
4.) JConnect support's touch-tone B.S. support system did disconnect me a couple of times, requiring that I call them back... but it did eventually connect me to a support rep who helped me cancel my account. But: only because they are the kind of asshole company that engages in the common-but-should-be-illegal practice of letting you sign up on the web but only cancel by phone, as a method of retaining "customers" who no longer want their product.
So n=1 sample, might not be typical, etc. but I suspect the phone is getting less universal and less reliable over time.
- saurik 5y agoIs there anything that is getting more universal/reliable? (God it isn't Twitter, is it? I hope not.)
- marcosdumay 5y agoThose people are probably all accessible through some messaging app. But "universal" and "reliable" aren't the correct names for that. Twitter is getting more and more universal, but reliable does not apply. I guess no, we are living through a breaking of communications.
- orndorffgrant 5y agoYou should tell your old school friend that their voicemail is full. At least with my carrier, I can only have like ~20 voicemails sitting around. I listen to every voicemail I get but my voicemail inbox filled up and I didn't realize it was full for years (there was no notification or anything). To make space I had to actively go delete voicemails. Of course, deleting them just sent them to a "deleted" folder, which I had to go clear as well.
- buildsjets 5y agoYou should realize that some people intentionally allow or cause their voicemail to fill so that callers can't leave additional messages. I certainly do. I have no intention of EVER checking my voicemail, so why would I want to leave callers with a false impression that their message will be heard?
- hopesthoughts 5y agoI do this myself, but I have one person who insists on leaving messages if she can't talk to me right that second.
- distances 5y agoI agree that phone calls are waning, but I don't personally see the connection to voice mails. I never liked the concept so I've never left a voice mail, nor have I ever enabled it for myself. In my opinion voice calls can only get better if answering machines and voice mails die out.
- BlueTemplar 5y agoHmm, how do you deal with unknown numbers ? I never answer those on the first go - only if they left a voicemail or a text message...
- distances 5y agoI live in Germany and for whatever reason I have literally never received a spam call here. I can go months without receiving a single call these days. I'm not exactly sure if spam calls are not a thing here or if I've just been lucky. But yeah I see how that can lead to different preferences when it comes to voice mail.
- handrous 5y agoSpam's ruined phone calls, like it ruined email. No coincidence those are the two worst ways to reach me. Email's almost exclusively for receiving messages that I'm expecting from machines, now (password reset, order confirmation, whatever). It's not even any good for unexpected notices from machines, let alone communication with humans. Sure, I could migrate to another address and it'd be more usable for a while, or I could spend a Saturday crafting rules to fix my inbox, but why bother? 99% of what I care about comes in via WhatsApp or (less often) text. [EDIT] Except for work. My work email is still sorta useful. But in part that's because it's much newer. It's also getting more and more junked up with garbage, without active management and rule-setting.