A Thought on Communication

Most people I know prefer texting to talking on the phone. It's easier to multitask or defer your response. Video communication is even more invasive than audio. I seriously doubt that <i>communicating with your peers by text is now considered archaic</i> will hold true (at least compared to video).

I've read a book by Niel Postman where he points out that the medium your working in changes how you craft a message. I believe he was right in stating that a text-based medium promotes reasoning to a greater degree.<p>The same sort of idea is present in the receiving of a message as well. Your input is going to be processed differently based on the medium your in. Think of ebooks versus paper based books. When you use ebooks you have a better searching and storing experience, but paper based books have an edge when taking notes.<p>What I'm trying to get across here is that switching from one medium to another doesn't mean were going to be put at an advantage or disadvantage necessarily. We could be putting everyone at a disadvantage by switching to a medium that isn't as good, which means those of us who weren't using the new medium from birth are at advantage over those of us who were.<p>To make this point in another way, imagine Hacker News in a futuristic video world. Note that now that your dealing with video you have new biases being put in. For example, you might not be able to hear all the comments at the same time or the pretty girl is being upvoted despite a not so compelling content contribution. It becomes a pretty different site. So different that I would say, "I'm glad I got to have the text-based Hacker News" instead of "I think those of us who aren't use to video comments are at a disadvantage."

We've already shown that remote and non-present communication works, but the difference between delayed and instant communication is huge. It's not so much text vs. video but that text gives you the ability to think and write/rewrite, while audio or video forces you to be real-time. IM, text, email, letters, and comments have more in common with each other than the issues of presence or remoteness, as do telephony and video.<p>Text-based communication won't disappear. Video may replace audio-only, but they're intrinsically different and each has their advantages and purposes. The medium or means may change, but we'll always have a delayed and an instant method of communication.

Regarding "the inevitable future": why the heck would we bother? The post itself gives precisely the reason that this won't happen:<p>&#62; This world of pervasive video necessitates beauty. It values physical poise, wardrobe, and the tenor of one’s voice.<p>I can answer the phone in my underwear. I can't video-call someone in my underwear. That's a reason to avoid video-calling, not a reason to get dressed.<p>The kinds of new technologies that see instant adoption are the kinds that make ordinary life <i>easier</i> and <i>more comfortable</i>. Video calling is <i>harder</i> and <i>more formal</i> than voice-calling (which is itself harder and more formal than textual communication.) It won't get used in the majority of situations, where the informational content just needs to be efficiently pushed to another person with as little personal effort expended as possible.<p>The one use it <i>will</i> have is in <i>status signaling</i>, in situations where one needs to show they really care and are expending a lot of energy on the call (calling your wife, calling your grandparents, doing a phone job interview in a suit.)

There isn't much room for half-commitment while on a video call and the interpersonal aspects of the job come to the front. This changes the way one works.<p>But it isn't quite that novel. Face-to-face interaction we have in the real world can be viewed as high-quality "video communications". Technology is merely making it affordable to do the same at a distance and without losing much of the quality.<p>So, most of the old etiquette simply migrates to the new medium. For example, if you don't go to work in pyjamas you probably won't take a video call at home while in your pyjamas either.

I find it novel that the stereotype of the person who will benefit least from this transition is also the stereotype of the person who will comment on HN.

Hm, this might explain something. In old B&#38;W videos people's impromptu speech seems much more eloquent than today. I wonder if the luxury of instant text communication has something to do with it.

Video communication would also solve the biggest issue with tablet computers: text production is just too cumbersome.