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Comment by sdcfgy | Hacker News Reader

I barely interact with people online. It’s here and email. And that’s it. I don’t have a web site, don’t have a blog and don’t have any interest in social media. 99% of the time I don't even have a brower open if I'm using the computer.

Turns out when you live that life there’s a lot of people out there who do the same. It’s easy to forget there is a completely offline world if you’re online all the time. I spend most of my time with them. In fact I’m about to go out to lunch with four people (age range 29-55) who are similarly offline. We arranged lunch over the phone.

I’d go as far as saying that the online world, past essentials, is actually the minority.

Going offline is returning to normality.

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I had an unforgettable near-death experience one time where it was like tunnel-vision or something after everything suddenly went dark with my internet service.

You don't really know if you're going to wake up from it, but I seem to remember visions of what the offterlife holds, and it is heavenly with that deep sense of salvation so many people have been longing for more than ever.

Still can't quite figure out where I was at the end of the tunnel but it was like a fleeting glimpse of paradise.

It all seemed so real.

It's all like a dream now and I don't make a big deal about it, people wouldn't believe it anyway, but I no longer have the same fear of the end times that still haunts so many :)

I've had that actually happen to me. I was without internet and phone service for 3 months. Was bliss.

I was between contracts so just sat and read books and did some gardening.

But weirdly you are on hackernews, an online community. I also don't see how the phone can be better than online apps. Phone calls are really intrusive, it forces you to talk with someone when they want as opposed to being an asynchronous method of communication like Whatsapp.

> Phone calls are really intrusive

I'm generally introverted but somehow prefer phone calls over the alternatives. I don't want to play the "lets discuss where to have lunch over the next two days, waiting for the person to reply / remember to reply" game many people using IM seems to like to play.

Instead, we do a two minute call, hear each other's voice, say everything that needs to be said, save the rest for when we meet. Done and done, then move on with the rest of life.

I don't see it as intrusive at all, even though again I'm introverted, instead I see it as something personal and efficient. Yes, it forces both of us to take time to talk to the other person, I don't necessarily see this as something negative, either way.

The calls are intrusive because a lots are not actually needed. You can send all the context needed in the first message and then I can reply with the exact answer later on.

I don’t mind if it’s something urgent or you need an answer now. Or just want to do small talk (very close friends). But if it could be a message, just send one.

I see phone calls as intrusive because the person calling you has no idea what you're doing and yet they're interrupting you. I stopped taking phone calls years ago when I realized that anything important enough to warrant an actual interruption can be expressed in a voicemail. 99% of calls I recieve, though, are terminated with no voicemail at all. That's when I realized I can just stop taking phone calls.

Of course your opinion is valid, but I feel like you're only talking about calls with people that are close friends, which is a tiny minority of calls I get.

In any case, the people I chat with tend to respond in minutes, not days, so I don't have any anxiety about the conversation going on for a long time when we were trying to arrange something simple.

> I see phone calls as intrusive because the person calling you has no idea what you're doing and yet they're interrupting you.

Not my fault you enable and allow this interruption. When I don't want to receive calls, I put my phone on total silence and ignore what's happening around me, until I feel I can be interrupted. Of course, there are situations where this isn't possible, but then I feel a text message is as disturbing as a phone call.

> but I feel like you're only talking about calls with people that are close friends, which is a tiny minority of calls I get.

I think maybe we use "silence mode" differently on our phones. When I'm sitting and programming I turn off all notifications and generally "close myself in" in some way, so interruption isn't possible, instead of asking others to not disturb me I make it not possible in the first place. I still receive calls from others who aren't close friends, but I don't notice those until I'm ready to be a part of the AFK world again, and if it's important they'll call again.

> Not my fault you enable and allow this interruption

The point of my post was that I don't.

How on earth are they interrupting you then? How is it a problem they don't know what you're doing? You can't both "not allowing this interruption" and also "they're interrupting me", or am I missing something?

I think we're talking past one another. If I'm genuinely getting your point, it's essentially that you block out your day such that, at certain times you accept calls (and chats), and at other times you do not (do not disturb). Makes sense, and I agree.

My only addition to that point was that before I adopted a policy of not taking calls during certain times, I found the interruption annoying, especially since folks didn't have any context on my situation when they were calling. I solved this by first using "do not disturb" features, and then just stopped taking incoming calls entirely (wife and kids excepted). To my surprise, and why I thought it was worth writing about here, is that this worked better than I expected.

> I see phone calls as intrusive because the person calling you has no idea what you're doing and yet they're interrupting you

I love calls. The trick is you don't have to take it.

The habit in my social circle is to preclear phone calls. Usually, a call comes out of a text exchange because the text exchange is becoming an impediment, but if that's not the case, then a phone call happens after the text "Can I call?" is answered.

I think that's a great compromise.

The actual reason for this is because a phone call out of the blue is interpreted as an emergency in progress, so the "preclear" is just letting people know it's not.

Yeah, this seems pretty ideal.

I did note that anomaly.

You’re not wrong on phone calls. But you gain so more. A friend calls in tears - can you really feel that on WhatsApp?

I will note that we use WhatsApp for group calls.

I do actually miss having a desk phone and having the policy that calls are always urgent and emails are not. A bit of respect between people forms then.

>Phone calls are really intrusive,

There are a lot of things in life that feel negative but have a host of benefits.

Today's capitalist/productivity focused grindset mindset has people removing "friction" wherever they possibly can.

A phone call, like exercise, has benefits. Doing the "most frictionless" thing often harms us in the long run. Hearing someone's voice is very important, not only for you to understand what they're saying but for you to learn how to interpret how they say it. Social skills are a muscle that need to be worked. Shooting a text atrophies those skills.

Think of how often people refuse to make phone calls simply because they've convinced themselves that phone calls are bad. It perpetuates itself.

Fixating on efficiency and hustling is a great way to get left behind, not only socially, but in experience and exploration.

I know way too many folks who fixate on efficiency and getting stuff done that they aren't living a real life.

Phone calls are not bad because they force me to talk. Phone calls are bad because they force me to interrupt what I'm doing to pick up the phone. A text that requires an immediate answer is also annoying. It's not about the medium, it's about being able to disconnect and make myself available whenever I want not whenever other people want

And there are many benefits to being interrupted.

Again, you cited removing friction as your reasoning.

Ya think maybe the problem perpetuates itself? You feel inconvenienced by an interruption so you avoid that interruption, thereby never learning to deal with it. Meanwhile, there are benefits you are willfully giving up, such as being able to be interrupted without getting upset or annoyed or the happiness of hearing someone's voice or the random stuff that comes up on phone calls.

Ya ever have a random tangent conversation with someone on the phone cuz someone heard something in the others voice? Or a phrase came up that sparked a different topic? Those moments are AWESOME and they only happen outside our comfort zones.

Easy isn't better.

But I would rather make the time to meet people in person (when both parties agree to dedicate time together). You get those moments too

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