More Facebook c***ery

[Amor de Cosmos]

La Signora uses What's app every day to talk to family, in the US, UK, France and Spain. I use our landline as we get overseas calls for nothing and the reception rarely, if ever, fails.

[ursus arctos]

She uses it for voice calls?

[Amor de Cosmos]

Sometimes. If the image stalls, as it often does after an hour or so(!) she moves to voice only. AFAIC there's no virtue in people being able to look up my nostrils at 7:00am

[ursus arctos]

It must be an old guy thing because I have never seen the point either

My therapist is a strong advocate of video calls, and I can sort of see some advantage in a counseling or educational context, but just chat, nah.

[Amor de Cosmos]

I concur. I don't quite understand why, but there seems to be more pressure to say something — anything — with people staring at you.

[Sam]

Generally speaking if I'm going to have a video call with family it'll be on either Skype or Zoom, but if it's with my best mate while watching a football match 'together' it'll be on WhatsApp because he doesn't have a TV so will be using the computer for the game (I must confess I have no idea whether he has a Skype account, and I've known him 21 years). Most of the rest of the time, of course, I'd prefer to see a nice big image of the person I'm talking to, and they'd prefer to see me the same way, so Skype on the laptop is the way to go. WhatsApp has been great for keeping in touch with him, though. Messaging or a quick email before was fine, but since WhatsApp became a thing (a few years after I moved here) it's been really nice to just be able to text each other again like we would have done when I lived in England.

On local WhatsApp usage peculiarities, the big outlier here is apparently that Argentines are (according to non-Argentine people I know) the only people in the world who will regularly use the voice message feature. To the point where a couple of years ago when a long-time Hand Of Pod listener was coming down here for his second visit to Argentina he tweeted from Heathrow that he could tell he was boarding a flight to Argentina because suddenly he was surrounded by people sending WhatsApp voice messages instead of just texting silently. Until I read this tweet I had no idea this was unusual behaviour in the rest of the world, but he got enough responses that it was clear it was definitely A Thing and not his imagination. I've certainly noticed it since. My girlfriend has friends who will send voice messages that are five or six minutes long (I do as well, but they don't tend to do so to me because I tend to respond along the lines of 'yeah, I'm not listening to all that').

[ad hoc]

I have friends who send voice messages too. Thinking about it none of them are Argentinian but all are South American

[ad hoc]

Here's a piece from 2015 identifying this very thing in BA https://www.vice.com/en/article/kbzj...voice-memo-now

[Sam]

That is nice.

It also reminded me that there's a guy who uses voice messages people forward him and makes animations to go alongside them. I've never seen one that's got anything personally identifying, though I confess I rather doubt, in this culture, that he has full permission from everyone involved. Some of them are hilarious, though. It rather goes without saying that for almost all of them you'll need to be very fluent in Rioplatense Spanish, but the one embedded below gives a good idea even if you're not, I'd say. It's from a voice message recorded and sent during Argentina's penalty shootout win over Colombia in this year's Copa América semi-final.

[ursus arctos]

[Most of the rest of the time, of course, I'd prefer to see a nice big image of the person I'm talking to, and they'd prefer to see me the same way, so Skype on the laptop is the way to go

I may be an outlier in this respect as well, as I have no particular interest in seeing the people with whom I'm talking. Perhaps that has its roots in the fact that the vast majority of my calls were for work, and often with people that I did particularly like.

[Snake Plissken]

I assume there is a "not" missing at the end there?

Video calling is generally a bad idea. As evidenced by me putting myself on mute in a meeting a few minutes ago in order to shout "fuck off, you lying twat" at someone else in the meeting. (No, I didn't have the camera on.)

[ursus arctos]

Yes, I missed out a "not"

And you have identified a strong reason for avoiding video calls

[DCI Harry Batt]

apparently that Argentines are (according to non-Argentine people I know) the only people in the world who will regularly use the voice message feature

Italians do, I'm told. And also an Irish guy sent me one once. I was a bit taken aback.

[pebblethefish]

I just had a Skype job interview. My Skype didn't work. Which probably didn't make me look great, but at least I could take my tie off.

[Sporting]

Lots of people here use the voice feature.

[Jon]

That video is ace, Sam. I will definitely be sharing it.

And I'm with ursus. I have no need to see the face of the person I'm talking to and I prefer not to. And I still prefer to talk on my landline than my mobile.

[Hot Pepsi]

I don't use any Facebook products any more.

I am the 2021 version of this guy.
https://www.theonion.com/area-man-co...isi-1819565469

[Antepli Ejderha]

My wife uses the voice message a lot. She's Turkish but uses it mostly for her mum friends, it's quicker I guess.

[Sporting]

The voice feature is annoying if, say, you're on a bus with no headphones and need to access a message without half the bus hearing it.

[Antepli Ejderha]

Exactly, I've asked my wife to stop sending me voice messages as I always have to ask is it important, wait for the answer and get stressed because she doesn't normally leave a voice message. It's then rarely important just more convenient.

She also has a habit of covering the mic so you cannot hear it.

[Sam]

I would remind those of you saying you don't want to see the faces of people you're calling that I was talking specifically about video calls with my family and my best mate.

Italians do, I'm told. And also an Irish guy sent me one once. I was a bit taken aback.

Yet more evidence for my and the Liquidator's theory that Italy and Argentina are in fact the same country.

[ad hoc]

Whatsapp seems to be down again (or at least not functioning to any degree)

[Lang Spoon]

No it's not.

[ad hoc]

Hmmm. It is here

[Nocturnal Submission]

I don't send voice messages very often but they're handy if (a) you need to deliver complex information which the recipient might want to refer back to, more information than you'd care to type out (b) as a substitute for voicemail, for those people who rarely answer calls and (c) when you want to drop a bit of bad news on someone but don't feel up to hearing their anger or disappointment during an actual conversation.