One big achievement of the last century is perhaps the advancements in digital, written, communication.
We went from the closest electronic form of communication being the telegraph (at least I think so) to emails and from there further to instant messaging.
Those I’d say are the few big changes we’ve had in this period. But what else changed?
We went from telegraphs having to be sent and received by a professional to then be carried to you or sent by mail. Furthermore it was not available or normal for the everyday people.
After some time of mails being available and personal computers being widespread that was able to become a part of daily life even for the average people.
Then later with the introduction of instant messengers and social media that too became a notable addition that the average people could use.
But one thing changed rapidly on this step, the inclining speed of communication and the declining volume of content in the messages.
Instead of it being used for longer form communication, as how email substituted written mail, it instead just substituted sms and written dialogue.
That also brings it to being used in exchange of talking, by having both parties writing instant messages as if it were spoken which just makes the conversation more tedious and slower than the alternative of actually speaking.
Those were my initial thoughts on the topic, now I can come to the idea that I’ve came here to share.
I think it would be reasonable to have receive and send times for emails and instant messaging.
Due the volatility of those being different each with a fitting time.
- Receiving instant messages each day at 17:00 and sending own ones out at 18:00.
- Receiving and sending mails every 1. of the month or perhaps at the 1. and 15.
Here you should obviously exempt personal matters such as friends or family that are around you that could perhaps ask/tell you things relevant within the periods in which you’d be available (e.g. friend A asks you if you want to go eat lunch with them or friend B asks you for help on an assignment that you have to hand in at 15:00).
On the proposed way I imagine I’d much more consciously reply to messages and more importantly have a designated time for it without being stressed about it or waste to much time on it.
With instant messaging you occasionally fall into the trap of “wasting” hours and with designated times:
- People would get used to it and know until when to leave messages.
- They’d write something more than “Hello” because there won’t instantly be an answer to form a pseudo conversation.
Will spend some more time thinking on how to implement it, I do like the idea in theory.
I would also be interested in your thoughts, feel free to reach out to me at the mail here.