Stuart Henshall Dave Pollard asks:
Skype was one of the Top Technologies of the Year in Business 2.0’s list, and it’s wonderful, and free, so why isn’t everyone using it to extend the relationships they develop on blogs?
and…
Why do so few people take up my (and others’, from what they tell me) invitations to call them, Skype them, IM them, to allow the iteration (back-and-forth) that is the essence of true conversation?
While I agree with Stuart’s Dave’s overall message in the post—that we need to find more seamless ways to interconnect our various communication tools (blogs, IM, email, etc)—I’m always surprised when I see people making these kinds of assumptions about what the “best” tools are for individual communication. And the “why aren’t people using Skype” question seems like a no-brainer to me.
Stuart Dave hasn’t actually invited me to call him (or Skype him), but if he did, I’d likely be one of those people who failed to take him up on the invitation. I don’t like voice communication in many contexts. I don’t listen to phone messages for weeks at a time. (This week I finally cleared out the 18 messages that had filled up my answering machine at work, most of which were 2-3 months old.) I don’t give out my cell phone number lightly, and I often don’t answer it unless it’s my family. I use IM, but I don’t have it on all the time, and I typically restrict access to people already on my buddy list.
The telephone and IM are interrupt-driven technologies. Voice and video chat require 100% of my attention, which means I can’t use them in public places, in classrooms while my students work, or while I’m watching TV with my kids. IM is a little better, but it still requires nearly all of my attention. I realize that’s the point in many cases—in fact, I suspect it’s what Stuart values about them. I do, too, but in limited quantities, and when it’s convenient for me. And with the crazy life I’ve been leading lately, that’s not often. Full-on attention goes to my family first, my students second, and the rest of the world plays a distant third.
Not all real-time online tools are interrupt-driven. IRC flips the equation around. I have to go to it, rather than having it intrude into the few quiet spaces in my day. I can get real-time interaction on my terms, often as background rather than foreground.
I don’t want to increase the interrupt-driven aspects of my life. I have two kids—that’s enough interrupts for any human being. Add to that a bevy of students, colleagues, family members, friends, and obligations, and a general preference for having the time and space to think through my professional communication and choose the right words, and you end up with someone who doesn’t find Skype to be the “best” medium for…well…any of her current needs, really.
I’m certainly not alone in this. I’d strongly encourage Stuart, and others thinking in this space, to consider what danah has to say context about nuance and mediation. There will never be one “best” tool for communication. But smoother transitions between and among media may make it less jarring for those who prefer one mode to interact with those who prefer others.
As a side note, Stuart goes on to say:
And why, when we do make that transition, and meet someone who’s become a ‘friend’ through our blogs, is the first meeting or conversation in aother medium so awkward, even jarring?
Funny thing is, that seldom happens to me these days. Between Emerging Tech, SXSW, and my trip to Asia, I’ve met an astonishing number of people recently who I’d previously known only online. And in almost no case was that encounter particularly jarring. I think perhaps that’s as much a function of experience as interaction media. After 20 years of using computer-mediated communication (I met both my husbands online, after all…), I think I’ve gotten better at reducing my tendency to create elaborate internal constructions of online friends. That, combined with the easy access to photos of online friends (one of the most powerful aspects of Friendster, Orkut, et al), it’s become much easier for me to transition from online acquaintance to real-world interaction. For me, at least, it’s not the voice that causes the jarring, it’s the image.
Update: Mea culpa. It was Dave Pollard, not Stuart Henshall. See what happens when I start reading content in context-free aggregator environments? :P
1. Dorothea Salo on March 28, 2004 5:16 PM writes...
Bingo. Bing-fricking-o. Interruptibility is exactly it. Well said.
Dare one suggest that there might be a gender divide here? Or are you and I unusual women in our desire not to be inter-DANG-IT-rupted all the time?
Permalink to Comment2. Caterina Fake on March 28, 2004 9:04 PM writes...
I'll third that one.
I don't answer the phone at home *at all*, because, unlike my cell phone, I can't easily turn it off. Back in the days before my cell phone became my primary number, I was notorious for turning off the ringer on my home phone as a way of avoiding interruption. Sometimes I'd forget and leave it off for weeks.
And I've long wished for an away message on my cell phone that could say: "Working, urgent only" like my IM message does. I hate that it is limited to a binary On/Off mode and I can't, as I can in IM, indicate that I only want to talk to people who can make me laugh, or am in meetings all day, please email instead or show that I am playing ZZTop on iTunes and therefore welcoming cries of execration from fellow indie rock aficionados.
As for transitioning from online to offline acquaintanceships, I've never found there to be much weirdness either, and have often commented on how well you can get to know someone through their online persona -- meeting offline doesn't seem jarring, but part of a natural progression, like you "get to know someone better" IRL.
Permalink to Comment3. Steve Pomeroy on March 29, 2004 7:45 AM writes...
One very common form of communication wasn't mentioned here, but is still (IMO) interesting: email. It's interesting as it's event-driven, but the events are buffered. You can respond to the events at what ever pace suits you and no one generally cares. Respond in 1 minute, you'll have them astounded; 1 hour and beyond is about normal. The ball is, like IRC, in your court, but unlike IRC , all the conversation in consolidated to a single window.
The only real difference between IRC's private-message functionality and most instant-messenging systems is user interface; PMs are generally less UI-intrusive than IMs are. If you had an IM client that didn't take over the computer's focus, you'd have a system just like email, but centralized and without the ability to send messages irregardless of online status (ok, Jabber's an exception to both of these).
So, what it really gets down to is that IRC is not interrupt-free: it's soft-interrupt driven. The interrupts are buffered and managed on your own time, like email, but they're still there. I believe the real point you're trying to make about IRC is that it's a medium that you can easily log out of -- a medium you can escape without persecution. Turn off your cell and family gets annoyed, turn off IM and friends get annoyed, turn off IRC and most people don't really notice (and you suddenly have oodles of free time) :-)
Permalink to Comment4. Bill Seitz on March 29, 2004 8:23 AM writes...
Don't rush to play that gender card!
IM needs a whole new interrupt model - where you *request* a conversation - maybe a practice of summarizing your agenda and its urgency - with it being acceptable to respond with "pass it over to email, and I'll catch up with you later".
Perhaps VoIP tech will get integrated with IM in such a way that this model can be used across media...
Permalink to Comment5. Dave Pollard on March 29, 2004 6:16 PM writes...
Liz: Although I'm flattered to be mistaken for the much handsomer and more erudite Stuart Henshall, just in case readers are confused, I should note that this article was mine, not Stuart's.
Interruptibility is part of the accelerating conflict between accessibility and privacy. Call display and call waiting were salvos in the telephony world. The key to whether I answer the phone or IM or Skype call, or just let it 'go to recording', is the identity of the requester and the relationship and/or reputation they have with me. If the requester is Liz or Stuart or David W or someone else on my blogroll, I don't mind being interrupted. And as the value of person-to-person advice gets properly valued, you may even be able to automatically 'meter' your replies to requests for conversations, so that (a) callers who want to talk to you enough to pay for the privilege can do so, and (b) those of us whose living comes from giving expert advice can make a buck or two online. Of course, we'll need a mechanism to 'turn off the meter' for friends and peers, and turn it on for customers.
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