An interesting article in USA Today today notes that with the rise of texting and chat applications, “voice mail” is being killed, just as voice mail in turn killed the home answering machine (who here remembers RecordaCall), and the home answering machine killed the answering service (made famous in Bells Are Ringing). The article notes that:
Vonage, an Internet phone company, says the number of voice-mail messages left on user accounts was down 8% in July from a year ago. Checking one’s voice mail seems to be considered an even a bigger chore than leaving a voice message. Retrieved voice mail fell 14% among Vonage users in the same period.
The article also noted that use of voice lines is down as well. As for me (and I’m one who grew up in the telephone age), I’ve grown to dislike the phone. It always seems to interrupt me, and I have no control over the call. I much prefer to get messages via email or text, and I really like the service we have at work where your voicemail gets delivered as an email message (although I wish the attached WAV file would play in something other than Lotus Notes; outside of Notes there are regular bursts of static).
So what do you think? Do you still like to call people up? Do you leave voice mail? Do you retrieve your voicemail? Do you prefer text and email? Are you finding this is a generational thing?
