Chat is King, Phones are Dead

Over the last decade people have become used to the idea that multitasking is an activity that everyone must excel at. Between answering the work phone, chatting on instant messenger clients and juggling paper work people are learning to accomplish more with the time they are given, and to allow this efficiency, contacting people via phone is slowly dying off. Email, Online chat and text messages have dramatically reduced the need to call somebody directly, these technologies have almost made conventional conversational phone conversations somewhat of a nuisance.

The revolution started off when email became mainstream for businesses and students. Why fax, or bring documents/papers directly to your boss or teacher when you could simply email them a copy of the document and save everybody time? It is convenient for you because you don’t have to print out paper and carry it around and its convenient for the person you are sending the documents to because they don’t have to waste precious storage space in their office or sit around waiting to receive a fax. The email arrives in their email box and it is ready to print or be read at their convenience. To make things even easier, you don’t have to deal directly with somebody’s emotions if you are delivering bad news.

Soon after email became mainstream, instant messaging and chat started to become the new standard in socializing for teens and businesses who wanted to provide support to numerous customers via one service representative. Teens started using online chat to talk to multiple people at one time while simultaneously being able to listen to music or surf the net. Businesses started reducing customer service phone representatives and started offering more online support via instant messaging. IRC, MSN Messenger, AIM, ICQ , Yahoo! Messenger and various forms of Java chat clients became the new party line. As things evolved social networks like Facebook and Myspace started offering a venue for people to chat, and while teens have flocked to these services, many businesses still rely on java based clients to interact with their clientele.

Finally, in the last few years with nearly every person in North America carrying cell phones, SMS text messaging has become the huge hit. Why bother calling somebody when you can simply send them off a simple text message. No time is wasted babbling on about useless banter; text messages are straight and to the point. I have a simple question, text messages will provide me a simple answer. Not only are text messaging services fantastic for communicating with others via their cell phone, but these days, many cell phones also have the ability to communicate via all three of the above venues. Cell phones are capable of connecting to the internet, emailing, IM chatting as well as sending out text messages.

The next decade will unfold dozens of new technologies that should make talking to somebody on the phone even more obsolete. Will phone conversations ever completely die? It is doubtful, but one thing is certain, people and businesses alike are spending much less time talking on the phone and much more time communicating through electronic means to allow much higher productivity.

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