101–110 of 112 posts
I'm a bit bemused by all of the voicemail hate on here. I'm 42, so I feel I'm in the area between those that hate phone calls (younger, in general) and those that hate texting (older, in general). I enjoy being reachable by people (family, clients, employees, etc.) and I don't want them to have an obstacle to sending me a message. Certainly voicemail is an annoyance but it's also often the best option. Just last nigh…
I know so many people that will only text and not hold an actual voice conversation. It's really irritating to say the least. In general if it's a short "I'm running late, eta 20 min" or "heading to the store, let me know if you need anything" I'll text (the store list is even better that way, it's written down... But anything more than that and a one-two minute conversation is better.
I've been a rabbid google voice (formerly grand central) user for several years now.. I love the voicemail transcription. The only annoyance is I have to "press 1" to answer, and that's harder to do while driving... no idea why it isn't "press one, or say 'answer' to answer". Just the same, getting rid of it altogether is ridiculous. Having GV-like integration with their desktop and phone platforms would have been a better move all around.
My two issues come down to.. A) Keeping work time and personal time separated.. and B) From the outside how are you supposed to reach anyone?
I'm a bit bemused by all of the voicemail hate on here. I'm 42, so I feel I'm in the area between those that hate phone calls (younger, in general) and those that hate texting (older, in general). I enjoy being reachable by people (family, clients, employees, etc.) and I don't want them to have an obstacle to sending me a message. Certainly voicemail is an annoyance but it's also often the best option. Just last nigh…
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I can check my voicemail via my computer or an app on my phone. They also transcribe the voicemails, as well as offering blackout times, and buckets for different calling numbers. If it's from a cell phone, I can directly reply via text.
During the day, at work, I pretty much ignore my phone, and send all calls to voicemail... being able to quickly see and reply is useful (though sometimes the transcriptions are particularly bad).
There are/were other similar services to this out there, not sure what's available in the UK, but you may want to look into it.
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I also prefer SMS and email, for most conversations. I'm just surprised so many state that they would rather force someone else to send an SMS or email because they hate voicemail so much.
No one is being forced to send a message. If it feels like a big burden to type up 140 chars or a few lines of an email to send a message, maybe that message isn't important enough to bother someone with. (talking internal business here, not personal or external) The reason I dislike voicemail for internal business - not sales, support, biz dev or personal calls - is because it often implies that a call wasn't planne…
Your dislike of voicemail makes no sense... Are you saying you want to get rid of phones altogether? Because that's what it sounds like.. voicemail is a fallback from a phone call.
I'm a bit bemused by all of the voicemail hate on here. I'm 42, so I feel I'm in the area between those that hate phone calls (younger, in general) and those that hate texting (older, in general). I enjoy being reachable by people (family, clients, employees, etc.) and I don't want them to have an obstacle to sending me a message. Certainly voicemail is an annoyance but it's also often the best option. Just last nigh…
Also depends on the voicemail interface; American iOS users get a fancy voicemail interface in most cases, whereas many of us elsewhere have to go through pure voice and dial, which takes forever.
It gives you integrated voicemail, with automated (though sometimes bad) transcription. It makes dealing with VM as easy as SMS, and if it came from a cell, you can reply with SMS right there. The hangouts integration has gotten better as well.
I've been using it since it grand central before google bought it... There are other similar services as well.
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>> HipChat, Skype chat, Email, text, or FB message, please. I do not want people having that many ways to contact (interrupt) me.
The beauty of these channels is that they're all asynchronous by default. If you're busy, answer that IM later. If you're getting distracted, it's because you're letting it happen.
At my internship this summer I actually had a sticky note on top of my phone to tell me what buttons to press in order to listen to my voicemail. It was like 3 different menus you had to go through, and then you had to listen to all the voicemail metadata (including the second that the voicemail was sent) just to listen to the 10 second voicemail of your boss telling you to call her back. If coke was anything like th…
Any medium will create pseudo-communication. How many times did I get POed by endless email exchanges (particularly the "Thank you" kind). So the problem is pseudo-communication not the medium. I suspect that CC thing has more to do with time management than technology. The 100K/year mentioned probably refers to hardware and maintenance. Now if you factor in the wasted minutes you might get a different number.
Emails, I see many... Some I bucket off and group delete daily.. others I have to spend half an hour a day to sift through... it's a pain. Especially reply chains... Though I'd just as soon use IRC, getting people to use slack hasn't been so bad (there are hipchat and others)... I'm not a huge fan of IM either though.
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I've been using Google Voice (formerly Grand Central) for my primary contact number for years. The integration with hangouts is mostly complete now, and not a bad way to interact. I can check my voicemail via my computer or an app on my phone. They also transcribe the voicemails, as well as offering blackout times, and buckets for different calling numbers. If it's from a cell phone, I can directly reply via text. Du…
I'm a bit bemused by all of the voicemail hate on here. I'm 42, so I feel I'm in the area between those that hate phone calls (younger, in general) and those that hate texting (older, in general). I enjoy being reachable by people (family, clients, employees, etc.) and I don't want them to have an obstacle to sending me a message. Certainly voicemail is an annoyance but it's also often the best option. Just last nigh…
I'm 45. I prefer sms texts or emails to voicemail. I prefer sms texts or email to actuL voice calls too - it's just easier to share information. Of course sometimes phone calls are for just chatting and voicemails fail for that too. Currently iMessages are causing considerable problems with silent fails and no option to send as SMS (which they used to have - not sure why that changed). All the other messaging solutio…