Cell phones make sense. No matter how annoying they might be to some people and regardless of the quirks of the early technology, they are an irrefutably logical step in personal communication. It simply doesn’t make sense to have a phone number associated with a building. We don’t call buildings – we call people.
We have good cell phone coverage where I live and the pricing of cell phones vs. land lines make a home phone line unnecessary. So, I have a cell phone, and as of next month, no phone line at home. The only trouble with this is that I don’t need, or want, to take most phone calls while I’m driving or waiting in line at the grocery store. My options are quite simple; I can turn off my phone or not answer it. I have an answering service and caller ID (even if I don’t pick up), so I can quickly return calls when appropriate.
Now, part of the reason I have a cell phone in the first place is to take time-sensitive calls for work in emergencies. When the server room is on fire (note to clients, this is just an example), it doesn’t matter that I’m at the grocery store.
The solution follows quite naturally from the problem. We need (I realize I’m abusing the term ‘need’ here) a way to gauge the priority of individual communications. Priority could be based on two factors. First, my ranking of the caller – I can give certain callers a higher priority letting some into my ‘inner-circle’. This isn’t enough though. Sometimes a caller I’ve deemed ‘important’ might be calling for an unimportant reason, or vice-versa. The caller themselves also needs the ability to rank the importance of a call.
There are at least two different key factors of an ‘important’ communication. First, how important is it? Are you asking me to go to the movies or are you telling me that a family member is ill? Second, how time-sensitive is it? Can I finish brushing my teeth, or will that be too late?
Right now, in order to vary the demand placed on the recipient we need to vary the medium of communication. If I have a query for someone but don’t need the answer immediately, I courteously give them control over the timeline of our exchange by sending them an email. They will receive it, and have the freedom to reply when they want, without me waiting on the line for them. This is a courtesy.
If I want something faster, and the medium is available to me, I use instant messaging. This way, I can know that they received my request immediately and they know that I’m waiting for an answer. Still, they have the freedom to reply or not too, but there is more social pressure for a reply, since they know that I know that they know I’m waiting (say that again).
If I need something immediately, I phone. I’m on the phone with them and they need to either reply to my request or tell me why they won’t. This is an imposition and I only do it when I need to (or, of course, when I want to chat with someone or hear the sound of their voice).
I would like the ability to choose my level of imposition, the level of demand for immediate reply, regardless of the medium. I want to be able to tell my technology that I’m really enjoying this album and that I don’t want to be interrupted, unless one of the people that I know understand when I do and don’t want to be interrupted has good reason to interrupt me.
We’re getting used to the idea that we don’t always have to meet in the same location in physical space. We’ll also get used to the idea that we don’t always need to meet at the same location in time. Friends of mine run a business that involves frequent short and simple phone calls. A move to email allowed them to cut the cord, so to speak. Rather than having to be near the phone all day, constantly interrupting their activity, they are able to choose time to respond. The most important factor is that the customer still has control. If they need an immediate response, they can still call. However, most don’t need an immediate response and are quite happy with an email. Sounds simple, but it can make a big difference in how you spend your day.
People hate cell phones because jack-asses talk loudly and obnoxiously while in the line at the grocery store but mobile personal communication is a good thing. Skeptics often ask, why do we need to be able to check out stock prices when we’re on the beach? We don’t – and I won’t. But I do want the freedom to be able to be contacted and to contact when and where I want to. The key is control. I want more precise control over my privacy than being in my house and not being in my house.
I’m sure smarter people than me are working on this somewhere, but here’s a brief summary of what I want from my communications technology:
- The ability to broadcast my status – so you can tell if I’m sitting next to my computer/phone or if I’m indisposed (in the shower).
- The ability to override status – “I don’t care if you’re busy – your house is on fire.”
- The ability to provide different levels of access (to myself) to trusted individuals. This requires each person to have their own device or some other means of being uniquely identified.
- Control, control, control. Ability to control wh0 knows what about my presence and status. Ability to ignore people without them knowing I’m being ignored (and, by extension, the possibility of being ignored and to knowing I’m being ignored).
A few simple examples of steps in the right direction:
- Instant messaging status (If I’m away from the computer for a few minutes, you’ll know not to expect an immediate response).
- Instant messaging user groups (My mom sees I’m online, but my boss doesn’t).
- Caller ID – changed the way I used the telephone.
Dag gum it… I had many of the same ideas for Family Radio Service (FRS) radios a few years ago. Too funny.
Are there ways that the phone is used now that accomplish much of what you want?
I deny Pavlov. When it rings and I am busy, I do not answer it. Turn the ringer down. I know if it is an emergency like my mother is caught on the roof…again, jeesh…it will ring 27 times or more until I pick up. Everyone else bails after 4 rings. [When else have you let it ring 10 times like the nice telephone people used to say?] The 20+ ring function is the emergency function.
I use caller ID. If the little screen says unknown caller unknown number, they get to leave a message. If I know but do not want to pick up for whatevery reason, I don’t.
I use my cell phone as a one way…out…car phone. I achieve this by having failed to memorize my cell phone number, an intentional and actual lapse of memory which I have maintained for 4 years.
I confirm unimportance is rampant. If anyone really feels they need me, they will call more than once and if I see the same caller ID, I will interrupt and take the chance. If it is not a matter of much emergency, I will politely excuse myself from the call.
I guide all my important discussions to digital text: e-mail, intranets, blogs and set those systems up to allow worldly access through the internet and also prioritize through use of different structures. The folks I need for different purposes know me through different tools on the internet.
I don’t want a hip hugging cell and, while Steve has that messaging need relating to the incessant billows of smoke and sparks from the old coal fired server room, that function could be accomplished by a pager. We do not need better cell phones so much as unified wireless pagers, e-mail and text and phone gadgets so that we can receive a flow of notices rather than having to engage in real time conversations we do not need. I am impressed by the apparent usefulness of the new device Rogers advertises around here and also by the fact that it does not operate on PEI. Once again: “nope, we don’t have that on PEI.” Fortunately, I am spending the weekend in Maine to find out what is happening in the 21st century – cheese in spray cans?
Like Alan, I use many of the same tactics to make existing technology conform to my needs. Caller ID is a godsend. What I would like to see is a universal IM-like status indicator across phones/e-mail/AIM/MSN/etc. Set your status as “unavailable” on your cell and it toggles the same status on Yahoo IM. Give me that and the ability to declare different status indicators for different groups (friends see one, family another, etc.) and I’d be happy.
SU: Exactly! That’s basically what I was trying to get at in my long rambling post.
A related idea: why not have a presence status at the operating system level. Rather than telling ICQ and MSN that I’m going to be ‘away’ for a few minutes, I could tell my computer that I’m going to be away. Any application could then make use of that status (ICQ, AIM, Outlook, MSN, etc.).
Have you guys seen the upcoming product from Danger? You might be quite interested in it’s impact upon your ideas on the digital communications future: and more importantly, it may be the first such product to actually succeed.
http://danger.com/
There’s a very good flash-based feature tour of the proudct availible there. Worth the wait on my 28k connection. (my version of “two thumbs up”) I want one *if* it costs US$200 or less and service isn’t more than US$40 a month (all inclusive: email, IM, alpha-numeric paging, except for #minutes of calling, which should be 400 anytime/ unltd. night and weekend @ that price point). Maybe I’m dreaming, but those rates would spell acceptance, in my opinion.
I could easily see broadcasting availibility (away) status over the network with it.
Besides, if Steve Wozniak likes it, it must be good.
~bc: Yeah, the Danger device looks really interesting. What caught my interest was Jakob Nielsen’s positive review (he doesn’t give many positive reviews). He even mentions that some of the problems in his innitial review have since been fixed.
Bring it on.
I don’t like the idea of tying my status to a single computer. Instead, my status should reside on the network in a “status cloud” hosted on my ISP or some other hosting party. The protocol for broadcasting status should be open and standardized—something like Jabber, but across cell phone and paging services, too.
That Danger thing looks primitive compared with some of the phones due out soon, e.g. the Nokia 7650.
As for centralising your status, that’s likely to be the kind of area Microsoft will be pushing Passport into…
I took a look at the Nokia, and there’s no way that phone would sell for US$200, plus I much prefer the form factor of the Danger device, along with a bigger screen. Plus, personally, since the cell nets here stateside are so far behind Euro and Asian nets, I doubt it will be availible here (most cool phones like that aren’t). SMS is practically non existant here. I have a feeling that AIM will soon fill that gap, though, as AOL has been testing AIM on cells for the better part of two years now. I agree with the need for an open standard on the away status: maybe something like a web service could do it, like an XML- or SOAP thing.
In the UK and Ireland, just for a local example, there has been an explosion in the ownership and usage of mobile (or cellular) phones over the last three years or so, mainly due to the introduction of pay-as-you-go packages. Simultaneously, there has been a significant shift in the usage paradigm: driven initially by the fact that it’s cheaper than making an actual call, SMS is more popular than talking. A LOT more popular. So popular, in fact, that it has resulted in a whole new language of abbreviations (adopted somewhat from the Internet) to compensate for the 150-character limit that SMS allows.
Personally, though, I can do without bells and whistles. I still have the same phone I bought almost three years ago, and I don’t need a new one. I don’t need WAP capability or mobile internet access. I don’t need downloadable ringtones. I don’t need fancy colour screens or Bluetooth or whatever. Then again, I do come from one of those nations where the telecoms charge for local calls.