Hello?
More on talking ducks, priests and rabbis…
Rereading the post below about my vacation memo it’s possible to imagine that
this was a plea not to send me notes. No, that’s exactly the opposite of
what I was getting at. Have you ever noticed that almost everyone you
know talks to you on the phone with the same set of rules? Same pauses,
same volume, same conventions?
The word "hello" was invented by Thomas Edison as a gift for Alexander Graham Bell. Before "hello" there was no polite way to start a phone conversation (proper people were introduced, they didn’t just greet each other). Edison took an exclamation and gave it a whole new meaning.
Which gets to the whole email/blog/comments thing. We still haven’t figured it out yet. A lot of yellers out there. A lot of anonymous screamers. And some thoughtful, friendly, helpful folks as well. There are also well-meaning people who appear clueless to others because their particular approach to a medium doesn’t match the approach they use.
Not a lot to do about it, just something to bear in mind as we all figure it out.