Do any of the following terms ring a bell?
Dial Tone
Rotary Phone
Voice Mail
But Jane, you say, voice mail? Everyone knows what voice mail is. Moreover, it's not all that old. It was only introduced in the 1980s, designed to replace the answering machine (remember those?). At the time, voice mail was considered a revolutionary workplace productivity tool.
But those were the days before the Internet, before cell phones, and before the phenomenon of texting.
Twenty-something years later, we are well-ensconced in an age of instantaneous communication. As a result, voice mail is becoming a dinosaur, especially among those of a younger generation.
After all, voice mail takes so long to retrieve. It's a scientific fact that, for most people, it is faster to read a message than to listen to it. Then there's the matter of all of those darned prompts. Punch #, punch *, say "#?*!*".
Of course, if the deliverer of said message speaks in garbled tongue, or leaves his number too quickly, the voice mail must be replayed over and over and over again, until the message is fully digested. Mercy, that might take all of one minute. On the other hand, if someone sends a text, a tweet or an e-mail, it's full frontal on your screen with the stroke of one key.
According to information provided by uReach Technologies, which operates voice messaging systems for several cell phone services, not only does it takes longer to listen to a voice mail, but it takes users longer to reply to one. The data shows that nearly one-third of all voice mails are not listened to for three days, while text messages are usually followed up within hours. According to a 2008 study for Sprint, more than 90 percent of people under 30 respond to text messages within an hour. Voice mail...not so much. In fact, many in Generation Y are dispensing with voice mail altogether. Some don't even bother setting up their voice mail systems. If they do, the message may well say, "Don't leave a voicemail. Text or e-mail me instead."
Text messaging has increased more than tenfold during the last three years, according to CTIA -- the Wireless Association. According to Nielsen Mobile, the younger the crowd, the greater the text-to-telephone ratio. According to Jane, younger colleagues rarely seem to bother to listen to her eloquent voice messages. Instead, when they see Jane's number pop up on their phones, they call back without checking the voice mail first.
Given this new generation of non-listeners, the newest trend in messaging technology is already on its way. It's called voice-to-text transcription and those in the know expect it to be the norm in just a couple of years.
Jane wonders though, can a transcription really convey a complete message? After all, human communication requires the ability to transmit and discern inflection or tone. Unless one is a brilliant writer like Jane, it is difficult to convey inflection in an e-mail or a text. After all, how many times have you, dear reader, sent out an e-mail and then worried that the tone of said missive might be misperceived by the recipient? In this new age of communication by technology, with real friends being replaced by Facebook friends, with conversations being replaced by IM, with emoticons replacing emotions, aren't we losing a bit of humanity in the process? If a voice mail falls in a forest of people under 30, does it make a sound? Dear reader, Jane welcomes your thoughts, written or spoken.
