And I'm just as annoyed when someone keeps sending me texts when a 5 minute call would have been far more efficient. If we have sent more than 3 back and forths in text, it's time to switch to a call.

For me, the twenty-somethings are terrible about this. They are just absolutely allergic to voice communication.

This isn't universally true. I (unfortunately, for me, since I hate it personally) know plenty of people who prefer voice or video calls. I even have people who will reply with voice recordings to my text messages.

Many people prefer voice or video.

I prefer text because of two main reasons:

1. Its asynchronous. I can reply as needed while not being disturbed if I happen to be in the middle of something.

2. Its not real time. That is, I can take my time to form my response. I can proof read, edit, clearly form my thoughts etc. In a voice/video recording, editing is difficult, in a live setting, I'm under more time pressure to finish my sentences rather than thinking about them more.

I don't prefer text because of technology reasons, except those that make text more asynchronous and easier to proof read and edit.

But many people I know or have interacted with hate text and prefer voice or video.

same here.

really dislike how people essentially just ramble on and on for what could have been one sentece or a few words.

so it costs the recipient a lot of time and concentration to get the gist of the message.

maybe a cultural thing because my wife and here friends use voice msg a lot.

I don't know you of course but I really doubt that text chat would ever surpass the effectiveness of face to face communication.

Text is a terrible way to communicate compared to video (or better, in person). The ability to ad-hoc illustrate (picture worth a thousand words), rephrase/clarify, and use context-specific language necessitates some sort of face to face interaction.

Try dating using only text messages, it's pointless. Humans require most than literal communication to coordinate in groups.

I experience very much the same issues. While I do occasionally have great conversations over IM with select few people, most are similar to what you describe, write a long letter and only receive a few sentences or less. I myself though do still prefer in person conversation, too much inflection, tones and meaning is lost in text based conversation, it is even taken the wrong way a lot as a result.

I think this is true to an extent, but I think messaging isn't as simple "get this text to this person." Different communications channels have different contexts, implied importance, etc. Making them too unified papers over and confuses those social differences. For instance, it would be super weird if a coworker texted me instead of IM'd me about some everyday work thing.

Text messaging is a lazy way to have a conversation; this is a perfect fit. If you want to have a real conversation, call me, or meet me for lunch. Or do the former to arrange the latter (novel!).

Oh really? Could you elaborate on that? I, as a high-tech professional in my early 30s, keep in touch with my pals in a group text. It's never failed.

There certainly is.

All of the same rules of social anxiety apply.

If you need to do a beer or two (or similar, for your favorite drug) to start a conversation by sending a goofy, ball-busting text or voice memo to your friend, so be it.

Just care less about the content — it's informal, not informational.

The information you're trying to convey is that you're thinking of them. Or are interested in what they have to say. Or their continued success/existence.

> This is so true. I have a good friend who is, in my opinion, really bad at this.

I don't think it's true at all. Most people, I can perfectly well talk to online and can occasionally have an easier time talking to than in person. The person I'd classify as my best friend, for example, I literally speak to 1-2 times a year, the rest is text conversations (at least once a week we have a longer chat I'd estimate).

But I also know some people that are or were close to me who are terrible at texting. I can't seem to help them improve, either. If I'd believe that not everything can be learned to some extent, I'd say this is apparently something innate. They don't come across rude at all, in my case, but just no conversation flow whatsoever. It's a bit comparable to doing one of those interviews where you have to coax every word out of the interviewee.

(There is also the category of people that only ever text on a phone (slow) or just can't type at a conversational speed in the first place (50wpm/250cpm maybe? Just a guess), or have dyslexia and find reading more than half a phone screen's worth of text a significant hurdle. That's different and not what I mean about being bad at texting.)

Maybe you and the author are not people who are good at texting, and that's why you feel it is 'so true' that a lot is lost in text messages? Or maybe most of my friends and I are the outliers, that honestly wouldn't surprise me either, but either way, this thing portrayed as universal truth is far from it

I find text based instant messaging to be shallow and vapid and I have very little interest in them. Texting is best used (for me at least) to coordinate real life plans (I'll be in front of X at Y o'clock) or quick task-oriented notes (Hey babe, can you grab some sliced turkey if you're still at the store). If you want to actually talk to me, call me or let's meet in person.

This attachment to one's messaging archive is IMO a symptom of data hoarding. 99.9% of text conversations won't be interesting in the future because they weren't interesting when they were happening.

That said I do like enjoy the feature where all of the photos from a given conversation are easily accessible.

Hi, this is me. I can communicate better over text due to my being autistic. I prefer text for this reason. I type at 150wpm.

I don't mind it. It's easier to do half-blind and just sanity check your results.

But more importantly, it's been a thing I use to move some longer form interactions to email. I won't have a long form conversation via text anymore, I go to a proper keyboard.

You had a keyboard for that, too. Nothing is quite so annoying as trying to have a conversation with someone when one party is on a keyboard and the other is on a phone.

I'm just... "not online" a lot of the time now. Stuff will get to me when it gets to me, and if I've gone a couple days without being really on the various messengers, that's fine. Expectation is that if you need something critical, call, otherwise I'll get back to you eventually.

It's hardly the same though, it's not like the other commenter's expressing a preference for a call or text where the other would be equally possible. It's exceedingly unlikely that someone with the capacity to have a preference for Facebook messaging is unable to call or text; the reverse isn't true.

Saying 'I would rather we texted' vs. email or whatever is not the same as 'I would rather you sign up for this service and use it to contact me'.

I skip that negotiation entirely by letting them know that if they want to talk to me, the options are SMS and email.

"I guess I usually just assume that it's probably not that important if you didn't text me, and you didn't send me a message on Facebook"

"So for them if a voice mail isn't practical — which most of the time it isn't — and there's a more practical way of delivering the same information, they're gonna go for that."

This is pretty much the whole ballgame. And a textbook-sounding example of Darwinism. A person can only do a maximum of N things in time t. There are an ever-growing (probably exponentially growing) number of way to communicate. Spending an outsize amount of time on a low-information-dense medium makes increasingly little sense. There are almost certainly other ways to accomplish whatever the allure is.

Honestly though then it seems like there is no effective way to really reach you then?

I like to think there aren't many of you out there since Americans are typically personable and are very open to talking. But the numbers show that participation is still very low...just not as low when no outreach was done. It is a depressing state of affairs.