[zapzupnz]

You may mock, but making good old fashioned phone calls is still the standard is business.

Do you really think every businessperson from every business on the planet is adding each other to each others' Skype lists or Facebook friends?

[chrisseaton]

> Do you really think every businessperson from every business on the planet is adding each other to each others' Skype lists or Facebook friends?

No I think they email each other.

[zapzupnz]

> No I think they email each other.

You never thought that some information needs to be received or conveyed in real time for efficiency?

I only check my email once an hour, maybe every couple of hours. If people need to get a hold of me instantly, they call… like normal people.

Even if I did check my mails more frequently, there's no guarantee that (A) I'm going to bother reading/responding to _every_ mail I receive, nor that (B) I will reply immediately.

Does everybody here really live in such a techno-bubble that they fail to see how the real world works?

[hrktb]

> If people need to get a hold of me instantly, they call… like normal people.

Just as any communication mean phone calls are abused to no end. 95% of the calls I receive are spam, the rest are from VIP registered numbers (family, school etc.).

It’s anecdotal but I see more and more people just filtering all non VIP calls and checking every now and then voice mail or messages.

I’m not sure people heavily relying on phone are still “normal” people.

[zapzupnz]

> Phone calls are abused to no end

So are emails, but we don't say people have stopped using emails for certain types of communication.

> [...] I see more and more people just filtering all non VIP calls and checking every now and then voice mail or messages. I'm not sure people heavily relying on phone are still "normal" people.

Then I really think you need to look outside your usual circles, especially if there's a lot of technologically-inclined involved, because I'm not sure "normal" people even know what VIP numbers are, let alone know to filter them, nor that filtering is even possible.

[lotsofpulp]

Unless something is confidential, I don't use a phone. And luckily, I rarely need to be contacted instantly, as I don't like to be interrupted. I definitely never call my friends, we only speak to each other when we meet, and I read every email, but I never sign up for garbage emails.

Although I would still want my phone to have excellent call quality. My best experience is with Facetime Audio.

[zapzupnz]

I'm generally of the same opinion, though I like being called when somebody needs something immediately rather than mucking about. I also enjoy a good call when I want to catch up quickly, not spend hours typing out what should amount to about 10 minutes' worth of spoken conversation.

But these sound like _personal_ preferences for _personal_ accounts.

In my work, and I'm sure most others, I don't have a great deal of choice of interaction methods, what I must be signed up to by email, etc.

Our own preferences are great and all, but I think that when we extrapolate those to the greater population and assume everybody is of the same mind, the blinkers to reality kick in. They're a huge problem that is endemic to the technologically-inclined because we falsely (and sometimes smugly) assume that our opinions and choices are universal.

Whether we might prefer or not prefer phone calls is irrelevant to whether or not people still do phone calls in the real world, and people have smartphones these days, so nobody should be surprised that smartphones are still used, especially in business, to place and receive phone calls.

Sure, mightn't be the top use case for a smartphone, but one would be foolish to imagine it isn't a big deal for a lot of people.