this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2024
103 points (88.7% liked)

Technology

35121 readers
48 users here now

This is the official technology community of Lemmy.ml for all news related to creation and use of technology, and to facilitate civil, meaningful discussion around it.


Ask in DM before posting product reviews or ads. All such posts otherwise are subject to removal.


Rules:

1: All Lemmy rules apply

2: Do not post low effort posts

3: NEVER post naziped*gore stuff

4: Always post article URLs or their archived version URLs as sources, NOT screenshots. Help the blind users.

5: personal rants of Big Tech CEOs like Elon Musk are unwelcome (does not include posts about their companies affecting wide range of people)

6: no advertisement posts unless verified as legitimate and non-exploitative/non-consumerist

7: crypto related posts, unless essential, are disallowed

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 90 points 3 months ago (4 children)

I don't think anyone answers the phone now, unless they recognize the number.

Most of the calls I get are

  • spam
  • spam
  • someone sent me a time sensitive message, so they ring me once to respond faster
  • spam
[–] [email protected] 48 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Yeah, I'm early gen-x and I only answer the phone if its a member of my immediate family and even then it's 50/50. Capitalism ruins everything. Need to talk to me? Leave a message and I'll decide if and when to call you back.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 months ago (3 children)

Everyone I want to talk to knows not to call me; I feel exactly the same. Phones used to be useful, but the sheer volume of telemarketers and scams have reduced it to uselessness. If it wasn't for 2FA occasionally requiring a phone number, I wouldn't even have one at this point.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago

You don’t always have a choice as it is dictated by the service provider, but whenever possible, disable SMS based MFA and enable TOTP or something else. SMS based MFA is susceptible to SS7 MitM attack.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 months ago (2 children)

American? I'm from The Netherlands and I get maybe 1 spam call every other month or so. And I've been using the same number for almost 25 years.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Must be nice to a functional telecommunications agency that has the tools to punish soammers.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

Canada, we face the same issues as the US for telecom stuff

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Settings>Do not disturb>exceptions>Caller in contacts

alt: Set default ringtone to silent, no vibration, Set people in contacts to custom ringtones.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 81 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 31 points 3 months ago (3 children)

This is part of the problem for me. I can't dismiss the popup unless I hang up, and I don't want to do that in case my number gets marked as "active".

So I sit there and wait till I can use it again.

Also I appreciate the detailed alt text :)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

at least on iphone you can swipe away the notification without hanging up.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago (2 children)

This is soo me! Declining the call would pull more attention. I play dead.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Let it ring. Robocall centers only work when they maximize volume, the more time they spend not getting an answer the more money they're not making. If you wanna get real saucy, wait as long as you can, accept the call, say nothing or mute your mic. They wont spend more than 5-10 seconds before they hang up on you though because they know it too.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

Letting it ring has no impact. They have autodiallers that call, and when someone picks up, only then is that call assigned to someone in the call centre.

You can often tell this because there is a marked delay in the response to your initial "Hello?". Long enough that you can reliably just hang up if you don't hear a response in two seconds.

If it's a real person who actually wants to call you and they you call again straight away, you can just shrug off your hang-up as a network issue.

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 56 points 3 months ago (4 children)

I am Gen X (1970 give or take a couple of years) and I don't answer shit. I look up numbers and rarely listen to Voicemails. If you know me and I want to talk to you, you will know how to reach me. Everyone else can get fucked.

I think it's less generational and more fuck all this spam and scams.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

I'm the same generation. My flowchart is: known contact, answer. Unknown contact, voicemail. Automatic VM transcriptions are great.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] [email protected] 46 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (5 children)

"A voice note is just like talking on the phone but better," says Susie Jones, a 19-year-old student. "You get the benefits of hearing your friend's voice but comes with no pressures so it's a more polite way of communicating".

Gross, voice notes are the worst of both worlds.

Text for things that are information critical, voice for things that are time critical.

Email for business (and keep the original chain going instead of starting a new one every time you think of something else to add!), text messages for associates, chat apps for friends and family.

Anyone who disagrees is wrong.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (2 children)

Yeah, voice notes are the “your solution to your problem is somewhere in the middle of this 20 minute long YouTube video that could have been a short forum post with some screenshots instead” of the communication world.

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (4 replies)
[–] [email protected] 45 points 3 months ago

A recent survey found a quarter of people aged 18 to 34 never answer the phone - respondents say they ignore the ringing, respond via text or search the number online if they don't recognise it.

As they should.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Both phone calls and emails are so full of ad-ridden garbage that they are useless for communication.

Texts are better signal-to-noise ratio, for me it is more like only 1% con artist identity thieves compared to the 99% coming via phone call.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I don't know if phone call spam is only an American thing or something. In my country (and most of Europe) that stuff is effectively banned and doesn't really happen.

Still hate getting calls though.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 33 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Spam has destroyed the phonecall. I screen everything and people know to text me first.

Besides its rude to think you can just interrupt someone in the middle of what they are doing without asking via text first anyway.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago

I view phoning someone like popping over to their house and knocking on the door to chat with no prior warning. No one likes that.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

I've been nervous of phoning people since long before cellphones were invented, precisely because it always seemed rude to make someone's phone ring and demand a conversation when they're in the middle of whatever they're doing. It's interesting to see more people coming to see it like this.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I would flat out ignore the pony express rider when he came galloping up with all that noise and dust. Who does he think he is?

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] [email protected] 33 points 3 months ago

I can't speak for others but as an older millennial, I grew up liking spending time on the phone with friends and loved ones. However in my adult life, I spent being anxious waiting for phone calls regarding job interviews and outcomes of them, and even being interviewed on some of them, including those without much notice. I also had to make calls to follow up things urgently or if I'm in trouble. As a result, I started to equate phone calls as mostly negative experiences.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 3 months ago (1 children)

If you call me and don't leave a voice mail message or text... Your effectively spam.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

You’re* effectively spam

[–] [email protected] 28 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It's pretty obvious why lol.

90% of the calls I receive are spam.

Calling demands that I pick up the phone RIGHT THE FUCK NOW. Bitch, if it ain't a life threatening emergency I'm not dropping everything I'm working on for you.

Texting allows me to respond when it's convenient for me.

Text generally takes 3 seconds to get the point across instead of having a whole conversation about it

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago

God, or worse, a conversation around the conversation you're actually speaking in order to have

[–] [email protected] 27 points 3 months ago (1 children)

99% of phone calls is typically a capitalistic company forcing employees to sell us something.

So yes... I'm not gonna pick up. Leave a voicemail 👍

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

99% of phone calls is typically a capitalistic company ~~forcing employees~~ using chatbots to sell us something.

employees are so 2010, FIFY

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Everyone I need to talk to is in my contacts. If you're not in my contacts, my phone doesn't even ring. You go straight to voicemail.

I was fine with phone calls when I was younger. Now it's mostly spam robocalls or scammers or both. Nobody seems interested in solving those problems.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I am interested in solving them. Here's how: if you get any phone call that makes you even the slightest bit irritated, you hit a button and receive a quarter paid by the caller. This is traced through carriers. If the trace cannot continue for any reason or exits US jurisdiction, the most recent carrier foots the bill. I guarantee that spam calls will suddenly cease to exist overnight.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago

I like the way you think.

This kind of approach solves so many problems, as the vendors have a vested interest

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

honestly i think this is due to unplanned voice calls essentially being broken technology now.

imagine we had 2020s email spammers while mail servers had 1990s spam filters, that's basically where we're at now with unplanned voice.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Meanwhile, boomers will spend hours talking to a ChatGPT script that has convinced them its the real Oprah Winfrey.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 16 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Texting is also damn convenient, I can deal with several conversations at once without having to pause the movie I'm watching.

Speaking on the phone doesn't just tie your line, it ties your whole life too.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I'm an older millennial. I enjoyed talking on the phone until I was something like 12. Texting wasn't a big thing yet then, but messengers on the internet were. So I realized there were better ways of communicating.

When I was in college, I was hit by a car. I was poor and had no health insurance. That led to endless calls from debt collectors. That led to anxiety related to the sound of a phone ringing. I have not answered the phone to unknown numbers since then. My life is better for it.

I only occasionally listen to voicemail, and most of the time, it's a doctor's appointment automated reminder. The rest of the time, it's usually spam. No point listening.

Anyone who knows me and needs or wants to get in touch with me knows how to do so and knows not to do so by phone call. Anyone else is unimportant.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 months ago (2 children)

There is a setting in iphone that i enabled to silence unknown caller. Havent turn it off since i enable it. I usually ignore anyone who isnt in my contacts.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Eh. Gen-x here. I still have an hour long phonecall over signal with my best friend over signal two times a week or so.

In my teens I wasn't too happy about making phonecalls either, but working on a helpdesk for a while sure cured that.

On the other hand, I live in a country with consumer protection, so robocalls are not a thing. And I'd strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger (and GDPR) those companies who attempt to poison and destroy my personal attention.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago (7 children)

The US has a do not call list. The vast majority of robocalls are illegal scams which originate from outside of the country.

load more comments (7 replies)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I always answer the phone.

Because if you're not in my contacts my phone doesn't even ring.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

I can't trust phone calls these days. Even if it's a number that I recognize, there's still a chance it could be a scammer spoofing the number. That happened to me once where someone spoofed my credit union's number to try give them my money to protect my account.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

People answer phones?

It's a meme among people that know me that you pretty much have to leave a message if a text won't do. I genuinely can't remember the last phone call I answered. Thinking back, it was when my dad was having surgery, and they give calls with updates. That was maybe three years ago?

But I've been doing that since I got my first answering machine back in the nineties. I fucking hate talking on the phone. Even as a teenager, if it wasn't someone I was having sex with, it wasn't going to be a long call. The only exceptions were my two best friends, and my grandmother. One grandmother just didn't call to chat. The other only called rarely, and you don't fucking ignore your grandmother. Neither grandfather was going to call either. My mom's dad would drive over if he wanted to talk about something with one of us. The other was dead.

There are two people I would answer a call from, my wife and my best friend. But they'd never call outside of an emergency because they know I hate phones for talking. I probably would for my dad, but he hates phones almost as much as I do.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago

If: you're a starred contact and call twice within 10 minutes and I happen to have the phone at hand and I'm pretty sure you have something important to say I'll probably pick it up.

That happens about once or twice a year. We invented voicemail so we can speak when it works well for both parties.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

I literally don't set up my voicemail, and I typically don't listen to recorded audio that gets messaged to me. Texting is functional and doesn't leave me some anxiety-provoking message that I have to sit through and digest without saying anything. If a conversation needs to happen in voice, text to say that and see if it's a good time.

Wild that people just ring a personal phone number unprompted in 2024 without that being an established routine.

That said, I also remember when it wasn't at all weird to show up to someone's house and knock on their door. Things have really changed.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago

"It's the anxiety associated with real-time conversations, potential awkwardness, not having the answers and the pressure to respond immediately" - this hits the nail on the head for me about not wanting to be on the phone/teams call in the work place. Being pulled into a call with no context is my biggest nightmare.

load more comments
view more: next ›