I've just got off the phone. I've been plastered to it for the last hour or so. Unfortunately this is no longer a rare occurrence. Last year my all time record for longest telephone conversation probably would've come to just a few minutes. I'm generally not the super-chatty type face-to-face, and I tend to be even more laconic on the phone; however I am becoming acquainted with the benefits of this nifty device. Occasionally you do need to have good old powwow with someone, and email or even IM won't suffice. Of course, talking to them in person is always preferable, but not always possible.
If you were to pick one machine that has changed more peoples lives than any other, you'd be hard pressed to pass up the telephone. Dear Mr Bell probably had no idea how much this invention would revolutionize society. It allowed the popularization of remote communication - hitherto the exclusive domain of those who understood special signals (smoke, flags, Morse). Post-phone however, anyone who knows how to talk and can fiddle with a few basic dials/buttons can converse (real time) with Aunt Josephine on the other side of the Atlantic. (Why one would want to is an entirely different matter) It has brought us closer together and also (ironically) driven us further apart. Where before we might've made the effort to pop down to such'n'suches place to discuss whatever, we now just hop on the phone. Easy, convenient, - and slightly impersonal. This can (and if it can, it will {humans!}) be pushed to an extreme. I know one guy who, when picking someone up, would call the person at their house while sitting in his car in their driveway! And while it hasn't made us the socially dead robotic clones that early scientifiction writers warned against, the telephone is as dangerous (and as worthy, despite its familiarity, of our careful respect) as any other machine. Perhaps more.
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4 comments:
When I received an 'actual' letter this week, I really thought how strange it was. This is the first real letter I've got in over three years.
You can write actual thoughts in a letter, things which somehow you can't express on the telephone or through e-mail. When someone replies to a letter, they must think about it first. Even with e-mail, you can still send a response basically amounting to "Uh-huh" or "Whatever".
A phone makes things more impersonal largely because we don't have the visual cues of another face or even the sense of their immediate presence. And, anyhow, who wants to say anything of great importance through a piece of technology?
Oh how the mighty have fallen. You do know that this will be held against you. Especially when your sister accuses me of talking to long on the phone :P
And, anyhow, who wants to say anything of great importance through a piece of technology?
That's right. Not if you don't have to.
...what is it that you guys are doing with your blogs?!
Erm... touchè.
Writing however (digital or otherwise) does allow a greater depth of communication than the telephone, which is both 'on the spot' and remote.
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