Wednesday 28 September 2005

Imposing assumption

Some people refuse to check email based on the idea that if it was really important, you'd call. I wonder how people would react if you said you refuse to answer your phone because if it was really important you'd come in person?

I understand the temptation. In these days of information overload, it would certainly be nice to say "no" and just close off one of the most polluted information streams coming my way, but I can't. I rely too much on it. To pare it down to a useful trickle rather than a river of refuse, I just need a reliable way to indicate what is actually interesting to me so I can ignore the rest.

Now if only I could do the same with my phone.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I already refuse to answer "Private Number" calls.
PPS - If you don't want me to know who you are, I don't want to hear from you.

2 comments:

Erin Marie said...

My family has a private home phone number, for various reasons. Does this mean that if I ever call you from their house you won't answer?

John said...

Well, usually it depends what kind of a mood I'm in. If you call at a less-than-convenient time for me and I see that it's a private number, I'm likely to just cancel the call without answering. If I've got nothing to do just then, I might answer.

You'd do better to use your mobile.