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The first minute of every phone call is torture now

theatlantic.com

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Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#121

Post by dr_dshiv »

vineyardmike wrote: post #117
dr_dshiv wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Receiver anxiety” should crawl off into the forest. It’s a youth-millennial thing that inhibits waaaay too much authentic social action. People are just too scared to be human. Just call me! I might pick up I might not. For that matter, if I don’t respond to your email in a day, treat it like a phone call and just try again. Don’t assume I’m ignoring you. It’s just e-mail.

My mother had no issues calling someone but her parents were upset when she started listening to that damn rock and roll. The youth thing inhibits way too much authentic music. People are just scared to listen to the oldies. /s Différent generations have different norms and it’s not right or wrong.

While I didn’t understand the analogy, I will happily admit that, yes, I’m making the case that some norms are better and some are worse.

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#123

Post by gausswho »

jiggawatts wrote: post #107
jeroenhd wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What phone are you using? That sounds like a terrible experience, I'll need to make sure I avoid it. For what it's worth, you can install a new dialer from the Play Store. Or you can grab an open source one from F-Droid. The Simple apps are quite popular because they just do one thing and do it well, i.e. https://f-droid.org/packages/com.simplemobiletools.dialer/

Or just use an iPhone. This is the problem with Stockholm Syndrome. You think you're on the right side the entire time.

The things two prisoners whisper through the gates...

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#124

Post by tsol »

pavlov wrote: post #55
y7 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the idea, but it will never take off. People are fundamentally lazy when it comes to these things. Look at the surging popularity of voice messages in some circles, shifting the burden of communication fully to the receiver. Even if you had the feature, I'd wager most subject lines would stay empty, or just contain the bare minimum like "hi".

That’s ok. Metadata improves context but isn’t mandatory. Some people want it, others don’t bother. It’s like sending a calendar invite. Sure, you can send an invite with nothing but your email address and a date+time. But many people would find an empty invite a bit rude. It’s just polite to include some context about the meeting. The phone call should evolve in that direction.

If it's not mandatory, then what's the point? You can already send text messages if the message is important. And since it's optional, both spammers and your lazy family will leave it blank making it useless to filter out spam.

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#125

Post by wildrhythms »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #82
thereisnospork wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Besides, how would you handle calls from landlines and such? Direct to voicemail, of course, with a message saying 'text me' for automatic transcription. As they say, its a feature not a bug [to not be interrupted]. In a perfect world I'd have a secretary or AI to screen calls on my behalf, but I don't.

Ironically, you almost do. Last week I updated my S22 to Android 13, and one of the new features Samsung claims to have implemented[0] is to have Bixby pick the call for you, transcribe what the caller says, and display it on screen, giving you a choice to pick up the call, or type/select a reply that Bixby will then say to the caller. With spam call detection being an established feature for years already, the ingre…

Pixel phones have call screen feature today, and anecdotally it works great. I haven't picked up to a telemarketer in over a year.

https://support.google.com/assistant/answer/9118387?hl=en

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#126

Post by Gigachad »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #105
pavlov wrote: post #22

Phone calls should have a subject line, just like emails. It’s crazy that anyone can force a full-screen interrupt on my personal device with no context. If call metadata included a subject line, software could automatically screen out calls where the subject is empty or spammy, just like with email. It would be very helpful for missed calls. “Why did my wife call twice in the last 5 minutes, did something happen, sh…

“Receiver anxiety” should crawl off into the forest. It’s a youth-millennial thing that inhibits waaaay too much authentic social action. People are just too scared to be human. Just call me! I might pick up I might not. For that matter, if I don’t respond to your email in a day, treat it like a phone call and just try again. Don’t assume I’m ignoring you. It’s just e-mail.

I don't have a problem with phone calls but if someone unexpected engages with me on the street or in a hallway I kind of freeze for long enough that we have walked past each other and then realize that was a bit rude but its too late now.

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#127

Post by wildrhythms »

dzink wrote: post #57

There needs to be a Big(O) table for UX. Number of user interactions and decisions to get to each functionality in each screen size. Then comes prioritization. You can only fit so many buttons and boxes close to the hottest zones of user interaction, especially on Mobile, and even less of them in advertising-powered products. When someone prioritizes the wrong use case on premium real estate and pushes back buttons t…

I work in UX and I can tell you the people managing these design teams have never even heard the term 'Big-O' much less understand it; in my sphere I find they are mostly interested in boosting engagement metrics on whatever new feature will get them sooner promoted before they exit to the next company and do the same thing.

I love this idea, but my outlook is grim.

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#128

Post by silveroriole »

gary_0 wrote: post #12

Because phones aren't allowed to have bezels anymore for some reason, I'm constantly hanging up on people because there's no room for a proximity sensor to turn off the screen so my cheek presses the "hang up" button. It tries to use the front camera as a makeshift sensor, but it doesn't work very well. Recently I reacted with incredulity when the people on the other end could properly hear me through a newly-connect…

Same happens to me with the mute button. It also seems hard on newer phones to find a position where the speaker is clear - shift it by a millimetre and now you can’t hear anything. The phone is so big that holding it completely still for a long call is uncomfortable. People ask why everyone holds the phone out and uses the loudspeaker now, well…

Re: The first minute of every phone call is torture now

#130

Post by ksec »

gary_0 wrote: post #12

Because phones aren't allowed to have bezels anymore for some reason, I'm constantly hanging up on people because there's no room for a proximity sensor to turn off the screen so my cheek presses the "hang up" button. It tries to use the front camera as a makeshift sensor, but it doesn't work very well. Recently I reacted with incredulity when the people on the other end could properly hear me through a newly-connect…

Yes. It is either Hang up, Mute, or Worst, suddenly on speaker phone so the sound would blow up my ear.

There are many other aspect of "calling" that has gotten worst, including call quality, codec and signal etc. My thinking is that no one calls anymore and no one gives a damn about phone calling.

I still remember I used to buy Motorola Phone just because of their Crystal talk.

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