This post has actually been in the works for days. It started on the the “e-mail sucks” meme. With posts from BBS on how e-mail is broken, and two posts on e-mail bankruptcy (Lifehacker and Web Worker Daily), but yesterday morning Mark pinged me with his article Communications 101. Mark and I must have been in some kind of mental sync.
Like Mark I'm a part of b5media, I'm also a part of One By One Media, and maybe most importantly I've been a telecommuter for seven years. Distant communications? Talking on the phone? Yeah, been there. I snuck Yahoo Messenger into Glaxo so I could keep connected to people I worked with (especially when I was on dial up and only had one phone line).
But like Mark, I see the flaws in all of these different and disparate forms of communication. One huge flaw is the temptation to do more than one at once … talk on the phone, have someone in your office, with three IM windows open, and looking at e-mail (let's not even get Twitter into this). Frankly I've done that. And it taxes even my ADD brain.
What is the right balance? Are any of these forms of communication out dated? No, of course not. The key, as Mark outlines, is using each to its strengths. Now, I think writing a long e-mail to someone when a conversation might be faster is a good solution when you want a record of it and if you maybe want some distance. I've done it when sometimes writing is better, it gives you time to focus and synthesize your thoughts.
We are at an interesting confluence of communication mediums. How long do you think it will be before we have all these things on our cell phones … really it's now isn't it?
As humans we are driven to communicate. We want to express, share, convey. We have stories and tales to be told. It is one of the key ways we connect to each other. And while the more distant forms help bridge gaps … we must always be cognizant of the weakness of all forms.
