Why I Silence Calls Even When I'm Free | Hacker News Reader

Why I Silence Calls Even When I'm Free

nytimes.com

42 pointsbglenn0947 comments

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

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

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

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

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.)

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

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."

It's very Austin Powers.

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

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

“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...

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.

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

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

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.

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. :)

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

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.

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.

email?

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.

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

I remember feeling like that. Sigh.

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...

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.

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

"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.

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".

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.

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.

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.

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

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

The self-absorbed.

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

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.

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?

Cousin, not sister.

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

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

Even when a relative calls?

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

Even more so...

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.

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.

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

> Last Download: Mailbox.

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

Well, only 129 to go.

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

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.

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