Why I Silence Calls Even When I'm Free

"This is [because] I am always on offense and never defense."

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/my-phone/2013/03/dave-mori...

w1ntermute 12 years ago | |

http://jesuschristsiliconvalley.tumblr.com/post/46539276780/...

brymaster 12 years ago | | |

Great tumblr. This could be contender for the "Fucked Company" of Web 2.0 if it was frequently updated.

gfodor 12 years ago | |

They need to re-make American Psycho but base it in SV, just so I can hear Christian Bale's inner monologue again saying ridiculous things like this (and everything else in that interview, for that matter.)

WalterSear 12 years ago | | |

I was going to take issue with your unfair characterization of silicon valley and then I followed the link to that interview.

hackula1 12 years ago | | |

Wow, I was going to choose a quote as a prime example of this guy's utter horrible nature, but I got to the end and could not decide which was most terrible. Here's one anyway:

"I have two iPhones, one for day and one for the night. When the day phone runs out, the night phone takes over. I never have to worry."

WalterSear 12 years ago | | |

It's very Austin Powers.

brymaster 12 years ago | |

Ah thanks for the good laugh. "It’s a custom-designed, one-of-a-kind bespoke app."

Think I'll side with Gruber's thoughts: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2013/03/29/dave-morin

MaysonL 12 years ago | |

The poor guy's just so insecure that he thinks every phone call is an attack that he's too weak to defend against.

autotravis 12 years ago | |

“I have two iPhones, one for day and one for the night. When the day phone runs out, the night phone takes over. I never have to worry.”

talk about wasteful...

bcoates 12 years ago | | |

At launch, an unsubsidized 32GB iPhone 4 cost $599, let's be pessimistic and say you get two years of use out of it and are unable to sell it for anything, that's $25/month. Not exactly an extravagant business expense.

autotravis 12 years ago | | |

Yeah, because this guy will sit by and use an iphone for two years while watching the new versions come out...

nyarlathotep 12 years ago | | |

I found that portion a little shocking. Is that at all common?

heyheyhey 12 years ago | | |

There is no way this is common and if it is, must only be common to iPhones.

I remember reading a thread on r/Android about smartphone use in Korea and someone mentioned people tend to carry around an extra battery when their main battery runs out. I presume Samsung dominates the market over there and their phones have removable batteries.

alan_cx 12 years ago |

Hmmmmm. A rant....

This might be culture, or just the people I know, but...

There seems to be an expectation that I'm supposed to respond immediately to any call or text, and if I don't, some how I'm an arse. I have a mobile, there for apparently I'm never possibly parted form it, have the instant ability to stop anything I might already be doing, and its damn rude not to answer with in 3 rings, or reply to a text the second I receive it.

As such, I have come to view my mobile as some sort of pocket Nazi, who insists I will do as told.

Well, no.

I didn't get a mobile phone so that others can dictate my life and it's schedule. So, no, I don't immediately pick up ever call or immediately respond to texts. I do so as and then I see fit. Obviously Im selective about it based on context, but there is no way Im going to allow that little pocket Nazi rule my life.

It really gets to me how I might be in the middle of something with another person, and any time their phone rings, what ever we are doing must be paused so they can take the call or respond to a text. Its like the phone has a priority over an actual person one might be with. Its just plain rude. I see it all over the place, and it appalls me.

Ahhhhhhhhhh HN therapy. :)

hackula1 12 years ago | |

Get new friends and/or coworkers. Seriously, reasonable people do not expect an immediate response.

WalterSear 12 years ago | |

There's a wide, wide gap between not being at everyone's beck and call and being so wound up in your own distractable, techno-depersonalized self as to be annoyed by pesky human contact.

read 12 years ago |

the new rules of engagement: Call only if truly necessary. Text first.

These new rules of engagement are also old rules of engagement. In older times people called only if truly necessary. They hand-wrote letters otherwise.

I wish people started writing letters again. There could be a startup idea waiting to be discovered around this.

johncagula 12 years ago | |

email?

yoyar 12 years ago |

I have unplugged my work phone. No one has noticed or mentioned it. Most messages are emails and texts on my cell. I don't answer the cell unless I know who is calling.

LordHumungous 12 years ago |

I always pick up because I'm excited that someone wants to talk to me.

MartinCron 12 years ago | |

I remember feeling like that. Sigh.

ngoel36 12 years ago |

It's funny, I'm often exactly the opposite. Sometimes I'll just call people up...without warning, without scheduling. It'll catch them off guard at first, but I find it hands-down more efficient. Often times five minutes on the phone can garner a resolution easier than eight hours on an email chain (only to end up scheduling a call for the next day).

I really wish that people were more open to this; it's strange because it's how most of the world operated 10 years ago, but the thought of just calling someone up is almost ludicrous now...

LogicX 12 years ago | |

Wish they understood that in the USA South. Just recently moved here.. In the north, yes -- people understood not to call. I get so annoyed as everyone calls me for the most silly reasons in the south! NEVER is there a text first.

ngoel36 12 years ago | | |

I'm from Alabama...this might explain it :)

mmahemoff 12 years ago |

"And yet, I watched the call come in without touching my phone."

Pro tip: Hit the volume rocker to mute the ringer without cancelling the call. Works on at least iOS and most Androids.

keyle 12 years ago | |

The top button on iphone will mute the ringing and let it "ring out" as if you're away.

I feel sneaky using it as opposed to declining the call, but Italy's best rule for warfare as always been "the best defense is to not be there".

mmahemoff 12 years ago | | |

It can be sneaky or considerate, depends when you use it. The problem with the abrupt "hanging up" button is it's binary like a car horn - there's no way to do it nicely. If you're in a meeting where you can't take the call, it's a gentle way to let the caller down.

bradleyland 12 years ago | | |

I think you're confused about the function of the sleep button on the iPhone. When an iPhone is ringing, pressing the sleep button one time silences the ringing and vibration, but does not "hang up" the call. Pressing again, however, will "hang up" the call.

ra88it 12 years ago | | |

No, he agrees with you. He thinks pretending like it rang and rang without you noticing it could be considered a considerate gesture under certain circumstances.

gotrecruit 12 years ago | |

on many android phones, you can also simply flip the phone over to face down and it will stop ringing.

sergiotapia 12 years ago |

This kind of sickens me, who treats their family like that?

WalterSear 12 years ago | |

The self-absorbed.

That was just a wordy introspection by someone marveling at her discovery of a new way to be inconsiderate to others.

RDeckard 12 years ago | |

She's a horrible excuse for a relative. Yea, I get the point that "nobody picks up the phone these days", but it was her own sister calling.

FireBeyond 12 years ago | | |

You forgot “and then wasn’t even bothered to listen to the voicemail”.

Why would you even want to talk to her, with that monumental level of disdain?

colmvp 12 years ago | | |

Cousin, not sister.

adamconroy 12 years ago |

It is only proper that I refuse to read the article.

a3voices 12 years ago |

I have a habit of doing this too, actually. Talking on the phone just feels too much like work.

RDeckard 12 years ago | |

Even when a relative calls?

a3voices 12 years ago | | |

When my mom calls, I always pick up. :)

alan_cx 12 years ago | | |

Even more so...

hawkharris 12 years ago |

We should all turn off our phones until a Bruce Springsteen song makes us burst out crying: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HbYScltf1c

I'm joking, of course, but Louis makes some insightful points that go along with the author's argument.

john_w_t_b 12 years ago |

I think this is a side effect of the Internet. Smartphones give you unlimited information at your fingertips. With all the distractions online, it's easy to become detached from your friends and family. I have the same problem.

WalterSear 12 years ago | |

It's a side effect of being an inconsiderate person.

Zecc 12 years ago |

> Last Download: Mailbox.

> “I use [it] to keep things at ‘inbox zero.’

Well, only 129 to go.

wordplay 12 years ago |

I think this is more about the control you lose with a phone conversation vs. a text conversation.

TruthElixirX 12 years ago |

Sounds like a developing anxiety complex. I know three people who started out like this and justified it in different ways, then going straight to no pretense, just hating the phone, then eventually a full blown anxiety disorder.

This was the first of a few symptoms.