Teens and texting....

Several years ago in my small town a few citizens lodged a complaint against city council members and some city employees for texting during council meetings saying that they were strategizing via text to control the flow of the meeting and various parliamentary actions. They went so far as to file a public records request for phone records pertaining to meetings. Turns out the council members also had teenage kids and sitter issues, etc. (just like the rest of us) and were managing family issues during long meetings via text.
 
I think it's an addiction/sickness for some. Example, I was at a dance recital for my daughter this weekend and when the lights dimmed, probably close to half in attendance had there cell phones out texting,surfing,gaming,etc. Between scenes, phones light back up and it all began again. Sad in my opinion.
 
I have to ask people, "you do text, right?" Texting is soooo much easier than the phone calls (that I can barely hear the other person!) that makes no sense. Texting keeps the point focused (meet u @ 2 in cafeteria) No conversational b/s that only belongs in my social conversations. (how are you, what's going on, blah blah blah - I like that stuff with my friends - or when I physically rendzevous with the person at the other end of my texting. Age 40, and I average 400 texts per month.
 

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Typical texts:

"OMG"

"U R bad"

"Am not"

"LOL"

"Wha"?

"IDK"

"Sup"?

"IDK"

"Hez POS"

"YUP"!

"OMG"!

"YUP"

"BYE"

"C YA"

100 a day seems on the low side with that kind of communication going on........:)
 
I don't see any real difference between texting and the primary form of communication used back when I was employed - IMs. They do sort of allow you to multitask and give you a little more control over when to respond (vs. telephone conversations). Of course, since multitasking in general has been proven to decrease productivity it's probably not that great an idea. Personally, I think each form of "new" communication (email, IMs, texting) has made actual communication and productivity less effective, at least in the work environment. But then, I am a bit of a luddite myself.
 
harley said:
I don't see any real difference between texting and the primary form of communication used back when I was employed - IMs. They do sort of allow you to multitask and give you a little more control over when to respond (vs. telephone conversations). Of course, since multitasking in general has been proven to decrease productivity it's probably not that great an idea. Personally, I think each form of "new" communication (email, IMs, texting) has made actual communication and productivity less effective, at least in the work environment. But then, I am a bit of a luddite myself.
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Forty years ago we all probably figured the future was the 'picture phone'. Now kids are almost back to Morse Code. When do we get those flying cars?

-ERD50
 
Well, I technically don't "text" but I do "IM" my DH quite a bit (around 20x/day). Does that count? :blush:

I just find it much more convenient since if I phone him at work, someone usually drops by his desk and he has to hang up on me :mad:.
 
My older son texts all the time. We do have an unlimited text plan. Younger son texts a moderate amount. I occasionally text mostly when I want to tell DH something when he is at work but don't want to call him when he might be with other people and know he won't necessarily read emails
 
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ERD50 said:
Forty years ago we all probably figured the future was the 'picture phone'. Now kids are almost back to Morse Code. When do we get those flying cars?

-ERD50
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A couple of years ago, Letterman had two teens texting compete with two geezers sending morse code on his show. The morse code guys beat the texting kids by a wide margin. Definitely faster to use Morse.

When I communicate with other amateur radio hobbiests around the world with Morse, we send at about 150 characters per minute and use abbrevations similar to texting. Can't come anywhere near that speed pushing keys on my cell phone, especially when you throw in some numbers and punctuation.

Of course, it's a lot easier to carry a cell phone along than a whole shortwave radio station! ;)

This is one of my favorite telegraph keys from my small collection. Made briefly in Ohio during the 1960's.
 

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My slightly younger (but apparently hipper) SIL was talking to me one day, and she asked me if I got her text from the other day regarding an upcoming gathering or something. Not having a cell phone I ever use, I asked "What number did you send it to". She said she didn't know, just the number she has saved in her phone for me. She was texting to my land line. It doesn't receive texts. When I told her it was my landline number she said "You have a landline?!?!" like it was a shock. It's actually VOIP, but still. Makes me feel like an old Luddite.
 
although i was VERY anti text year back, and fought it tooth and nail, i find myself sending and receiving a lot. my reealtor texts me leads and codes to check out rehabs. my wife txts me when im at work as to not bug me. i text my employees with updates for start times and locations. i get texts from our online submission forms on our website. etc.

i actually use of 1000/mo...and about 300 of those are business related.


oh yeah, me an the wife also argue by text. it's pretty fun,
 
FUEGO said:
She was texting to my land line. It doesn't receive texts.
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Well, I'll be darned. I didn't know the system worked that way. You would think that a cell network would be smart enough to know not to try to send texts to land lines, and maybe even helpful enough to bounce an error message to the sender.

Our kid and I are going to have to experiment with her iPhone and our land line. I'll even pay for the texts!

I wonder how many of my cell-phone-owning friends have been texting me over the years and growing ever more annoyed with my non-responsiveness.* But then again, if they expressed their annoyance through a text message, how would I know?

Hey, this is going to make our Christmas card list a lot easier!

*[The same people who have no idea what my phone number is because it's stored in their phone under "Nords". These would be the same people who leave me voicemails saying "So call me, bye!" and don't leave their phone number because they assume I have caller ID.]
 
Nords said:
Well, I'll be darned. I didn't know the system worked that way. You would think that a cell network would be smart enough to know not to try to send texts to land lines, and maybe even helpful enough to bounce an error message to the sender.
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My cell service (Verizon) tells me if I try to text to a landline and offers the option to leave a voice mail for that person- never tried it to see what happens if they don't have voice mail. Seems like a useful feature though.
 
My son txt to our landline all the time, when the land line rings the txt comes in as a computer generated voice message stating who it's comming from. I thought this was common practice since he's been doing it for over a year. We don't normally have our cell phone turned on.
 
Nords said:
Well, I'll be darned. I didn't know the system worked that way. You would think that a cell network would be smart enough to know not to try to send texts to land lines, and maybe even helpful enough to bounce an error message to the sender.
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I assume my SIL got an error message bounced back to her, but probably didn't see it or something. One would hope that at least an error message would bounce back.
 
For iphone users try the free app called Dragon Dictation. It translates your voice into a text message to be sent. Avoids that pesky typing thing. I'm certain I could be beat morse coders with that.

BTW, if I completely understood the conversation held by FinanceDude in his earlier post does that mean my kids have totally corrupted me?
 
FUEGO said:
I assume my SIL got an error message bounced back to her, but probably didn't see it or something. One would hope that at least an error message would bounce back.
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Our kid tried texting our landline with her iPhone and it happily sent the message off, so I can see how someone could get fooled. Then about two minutes later it bounced back with an AT&T error message, which could easily be overlooked.
 
Nords said:
Our kid tried texting our landline with her iPhone and it happily sent the message off, so I can see how someone could get fooled. Then about two minutes later it bounced back with an AT&T error message, which could easily be overlooked.
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Yes, I imagine that is what happened. She typed in the msg, hit "send", it said "message sent", then she moved on to other things. 2 mins later, she got some mumbo jumbo text that she couldn't decipher and deleted it.
 
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