
Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters - graupel
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-12-22/coca-cola-disconnects-voice-mail-at-headquarters.html
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mcculley
I'm a bit bemused by all of the voicemail hate on here. I'm 42, so I feel I'm
in the area between those that hate phone calls (younger, in general) and
those that hate texting (older, in general). I enjoy being reachable by people
(family, clients, employees, etc.) and I don't want them to have an obstacle
to sending me a message. Certainly voicemail is an annoyance but it's also
often the best option. Just last night I was driving to the hospital to visit
a friend and called another friend to let him know the status of my sick
friend. I left a voicemail and it was the best solution.

I've noticed that the texting only generation seems to have anxiety about
making or receiving phone calls and the real-time conversation that requires.
I think some of the voicemail hate is just a reaction to that discomfort.

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DanBC
I'm 45. I prefer sms texts or emails to voicemail. I prefer sms texts or email
to actuL voice calls too - it's just easier to share information. Of course
sometimes phone calls are for just chatting and voicemails fail for that too.

Currently iMessages are causing considerable problems with silent fails and no
option to send as SMS (which they used to have - not sure why that changed).
All the other messaging solutions have some fairly big flaws too.

Also: i really really fucking hate the way I'll get a notification with a
partial message, and then have to open the app to read the message. Opening
the app to read the message has a delay of maybe a minute before the message
downloads - why? Why can they show me a preview in a notification and then
take an age to give me that same text in their app? This is particularly bad
with Facebook's messenger app (so bad I'm tempted to delete the app and leave
different contact details on FB) but als happens on Whatsapp and others.

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MarkSweep
The "send as SMS option is now hidden. If message you sent does not say
"Delivered" under it, you can press and hold your message. There will be a
"Sens as SMS" option in the context menu.

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DanBC
No, this does not work. I get [copy][more]. Selecting more just leads to a
select & delete dialog, with no ability to send as SMS. This is to a contact
where I had previously sent messages as SMS before.

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sputknick
In my office voicemail as just used as proof you tried to get a hold of
someone. "They didn't answer my email, and when I called they didn't answer,
so I left a voicemail". Once you leave a voicemail you have satisfactorily
established to management that you have made every effort to reach someone. I
haven't listened to a voicemail in over 3 years.

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rocky1138
The first thing I do when I sit down at a new job is disconnect my landline or
VoIP phone and put it in a drawer. HipChat, Skype chat, Email, text, or FB
message, please. Voice is dead to me.

I'm looking forward to the day when you can buy a SIM card from a cell carrier
which offers only data and text, no voice call support.

Also, am I the only one that is mildly disappointed that Coke's headquarters
isn't shaped like a huge Coke can?

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ihsw
> Also, am I the only one that is mildly disappointed that Coke's headquarters
> isn't shaped like a huge Coke can?

This is absolutely ridiculous. Do you expect Subway's headquarters to be
shaped like a cold-cut sandwich?

In all seriousness, The Coca-Cola Company produces and distributes only their
syrup concentrate to franchisees, whom bottle it for sale. Yes they have a
subsidiary which oversees North American production and distribution of
beverages, however that is the only one they own and operate.

And, with that in mind, their headquarters should resemble a large bag of goo
instead of their trademark bottles.

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maxlybbert
But they have a trademark on the bottle design.

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gyc
But the person he was responding to wrote "coke can" not "coke bottle."

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maxlybbert
That's true, and I responded to a comment that even included the phrase
"trademarked bottles." I simply wanted to point out that Coca Cola owns more
than the formula.

That's not to suggest that I would want to work in a building shaped like a
bottle, a can, a newspaper, toilet bowl cleaner, or anything other than a
building.

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thiagoperes
I lived in the US and currently in Brazil, so it's great to see two different
aspects of the "voice mail culture".

Before cell phones were introduced here, almost every one in middle class had
someone bring them an answering machine. When cell phones started showing up,
thou, people didn't use voice mails that much.

Today, when you wanna talk to someone and they're not available, you just
leave a text or a WhatsApp message. If it's not that important, they'll just
see their missed calls and call you back.

This article made me remember that when I started working in the US, my boss
got mad many times because I NEVER checked my voice mails so I missed meetings
etc. Haha!

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fiatmoney
I believe part of it is that in Brazil, at least for cell phones, only the
caller pays, not the receiver of the call as well (as is the case in the US).
It's pretty common to leave a short message of the form "call me back", or
just a missed call - a longer message wastes your minutes.

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bostonpete
My voice mail message at work for the last few years has suggested that people
contact me through email and that I tend to ignore my voicemail blinking light
for weeks at a time. As a bonus (for me), I don't include my email address in
the message so the only people who typically leave me messages are vendors
cold-calling me.

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jghn
I just moved my phone so I couldn't see the light when I'm sitting at my
computer. In the past I've taped an index card over it

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IgorPartola
I think this makes a lot of sense for a business. Sadly, I still get
occasional but important personal communication via phone calls and voicemail,
where otherwise I would not be able to get it. Specifiaclly, doctor's offices
don't use SMS or email. Their alternative is snail mail. Another source is
random one offs such as the oil delivery guy confirming my delivery, or a
relative trying to get directions to my house in realtime.

I get very few voicemails, but I don't see a point in disabling this feature
entirely, in on personal line.

~~~
_dark_matter_
All of our doctors contact us through email. I think they use Epic, and we get
all of our test results, appointment reminders, etc. there. With health care
regulations forcing electronic records, we'll probably see more of this.

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patio11
It's tricky with HIPAA, given that emailing almost anything interesting is a
violation, since they can't control whether your email provider discloses it
or not.

The right way to do it is to email people and inform them that a secure system
has Very Important Information for them and that they should sign in using
pre-arranged credentials to check it. Even _that_ email can be a HIPAA
violation if you do it wrong -- for example, "Hiya Jane Smith, Dr. Foo OBGYN
has important information for you" has been held to be a violation since Foo
should have reasonably anticipated that some patients would be living with
family and sharing email with them and disclosing a non-minor's pregnancy/etc
to their parents without their consent is a per se violation.

Ditto putting similar information into voicemails / SMSes / etc. Technical
violations of the rules are rampant and enforcement actions are comparatively
rare, particularly at smaller medical providers.

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r00fus
Well that's one nuance - another against voicemail for Doctors is that if you
truly have an emergency, then it's possible practitioners are liable if you
suffer while leaving a voicemail (or as a result of no one listening to that
voicemail in time).

Consequently, none of my doctors have a voicemail, so I'm forced to use their
app to communicate with them, even if I just want a "you and/or kids are
probably ok, come in if things get worse" confirmation.

Very few have an "answering service" that has a real person transcribe and
page the doctor (and advise you call 911 if it sounds like an emergency) but I
imagine this is too expensive for most.

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ghshephard
It's interesting - but I've noticed that, without any discussion whatsoever,
we stopped using Voicemail at my company somewhere in the last three years. I
haven't listened to any voicemail whatsoever in about two years.

A lot of my customers in the UAE and Singapore Region have switched to one of
calling directly, and expecting you will _always_ answer (Dubai), or
alternatively making extensive use of Whatsapp/Whatsapp groups (Singapore).

Voicemail though? Completely dead.

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debacle
It's too bad. Voicemail to email (with attempted transcription) is awesome
usability for the message sender and not bad for the receiver.

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Shivetya
Having to work with vendors a lot it would be difficult for me to give it up.
I know, they could simply email me, but the reason for the voice mail was the
immediacy of the situation. Likely if they leave one they will zip out an
email, but those take more time to write than leaving a voice message.

Now I can see the reason for ditching voice mail if this is how some people
are dodging responsibility. Seen that, where people will ignore calls and
pretend to not be present. Instant messengers only work if they are mandatory,
where I am you can simply leave it off so again your "not there". Many email
programs can block return receipts.

So what problem are they really trying to solve?

~~~
glesica
The problem is that voicemail is obnoxious to use and pretty pointless. The
last company I worked for, I didn't even have a phone number, let alone
voicemail. If someone needed something they could use an asynchronous form of
communication, like email or IM (we were required to use Hipchat).

The last job I had where I had voicemail I refused to check it. Not because I
was dodging work, but because listening to long, rambling voicemails is time-
consuming and irritating. I can skim through a rambling email very, very
quickly to get the information I need. I can also search my old emails quickly
and easily. Neither of those things is true for voicemail.

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falcolas
I have had a soft phone at my last two jobs, and it was never used. We used
Skype or Slack for our text communication, and Google Hangouts for more
personal communication. And it worked perfectly well for maintaining a good
flow of communication.

Voice mail is, like texting, an asynchronous method of communication, but it
requires more hardware and mental context switching to receive and respond to
voice messages.

I think the biggest hurdle to adopting something like this is going to be the
different perception of voice mail (and phone calls in general) between
generations.

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cissou
voice mail is asynchronous for the person sending it, but it's somewhat
synchronous when you're on the receiving end: you cannot skip through the
boring parts right to the interesting content, you have to linearly listen to
the entire message. I think this is the biggest problem with voicemail. If all
voicemail could turn speech into text, and it would end up in your e-mail
inbox or "voice mail" app on your phone, we'd have the best of both worlds.

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wtetzner
This is what I use Google Voice for. It translates the voice mail into text,
and will send it in an email. It's not perfect, but it's good enough to figure
out why the person called, and it does a good job capturing the phone number
the person leaves.

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cissou
damn, I'm not in the US but that sounds very cool. Is it US only? I'm sure
that's why 97% of our generation dropped voice mail. It's just not as
convenient as text.

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rab_oof
Voice mail is too often used by windbags to hear themselves talk instead of
getting to the point. In protest of those that seek to waste your time and
mine on unnecessary formalities, I purposely don't leave nor listen to any
voicemail. Period. It's just too slow and infringes on other people's time,
like that step uncle everyone always dreads seeing at the holidays.

Instead, send a very short email with the content in the title and <EOM>.
You're done.

(And no, Google Voice transcription isn't good enough.)

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tracker1
So, does this mean that everyone's personal phone will now be inundated with
SMS messages from work at all hours? Will all of their internal extensions now
have an SMS endpoint to receive text messages?

I know so many people that will only text and not hold an actual voice
conversation. It's really irritating to say the least. In general if it's a
short "I'm running late, eta 20 min" or "heading to the store, let me know if
you need anything" I'll text (the store list is even better that way, it's
written down... But anything more than that and a one-two minute conversation
is better.

I've been a rabbid google voice (formerly grand central) user for several
years now.. I love the voicemail transcription. The only annoyance is I have
to "press 1" to answer, and that's harder to do while driving... no idea why
it isn't "press one, or say 'answer' to answer". Just the same, getting rid of
it altogether is ridiculous. Having GV-like integration with their desktop and
phone platforms would have been a better move all around.

My two issues come down to.. A) Keeping work time and personal time
separated.. and B) From the outside how are you supposed to reach anyone?

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SixSigma
I think the main problem with voicemail is that, for the most part, it is
disconnected from the Internet.

We run Asterisk, when I get a voicemail it is as an mp3 in my email. I know
the caller ID, when it was left and how long it is before I choose to listen
to it.

It is totally useful.

It has always boggled me that I can't choose "send audio message" from my
smart phone's contacts without a third party app - a feature that I use on
watsapp regularly.

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elecboy
Since my company has a PBX I recently change the settings that all voice mails
left on the phones are emailed to them, directly, that saves space in the
phone server. I rarely listen to the VM I get, I prefer calling first, if no
answer then I listen to them.

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jessaustin
_I rarely listen to the VM I get, I prefer calling first..._

My goodness, that's annoying. b^) You're certainly not the only one. At least
once a week I leave someone a several-minute voicemail with specific detailed
information, questions, or instructions. Then ten minutes later they call
back, "what did you want?" MFW...

Keep in mind, these are people whom I would gladly send an email, if they
would read their email more than occasionally.

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ludicast
Voicemail is dead, and it's because of the significant minority that leave
giant messages, as well as anybody you never met who "just wanted to touch
base with you". It's a shame too, because there are times and topics for which
texting/emailing is an incorrect alternative.

Unfortunately people don't realize the 3rd rule of Dr. Luther Waxling: "Just
because it happened to you doesn't make it interesting" (at 1:24
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGfc2zZ2PQI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGfc2zZ2PQI))

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hobs
The worst part of voicemail was not even the monologues, but the fact that the
important bit of information may be hidden deep within the various boring
screed.

The issue is that most people have no idea how to communicate and voicemail is
a very painful method to be forced to endure from someone who cant get to the
point.

Email generally takes more effort to produce (since its not as much of a train
of "thought") and its way easier to summarize as the consumer, so you can just
hunt out the golden info in the pile of crap.

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misingnoglic
At my internship this summer I actually had a sticky note on top of my phone
to tell me what buttons to press in order to listen to my voicemail. It was
like 3 different menus you had to go through, and then you had to listen to
all the voicemail metadata (including the second that the voicemail was sent)
just to listen to the 10 second voicemail of your boss telling you to call her
back. If coke was anything like this place, they made a good decision.

~~~
tracker1
Just because the interface is bad, doesn't mean the concept is bad... I've
used Google Voice since it was Grand Central, love it... I never call in or
press buttons... it's an app on my phone, and a website ui I can use... easy
peasy.

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protomyth
Corporate voice mail is a nightmare with the press 7 and 9 systems. If it was
like a modern smartphone (e.g. Visual Voicemail) then it would be ok. At this
point, I am trying to figure out what to replace the college's current
Nortel[1] system. I think the mp3 e-mail voice mail would probably make people
a bit happier.

1) why yes, the words "current" and "Nortel" should never be associated, but
that's where we are

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UhUhUhUh
Any medium will create pseudo-communication. How many times did I get POed by
endless email exchanges (particularly the "Thank you" kind). So the problem is
pseudo-communication not the medium. I suspect that CC thing has more to do
with time management than technology. The 100K/year mentioned probably refers
to hardware and maintenance. Now if you factor in the wasted minutes you might
get a different number.

~~~
tracker1
I actually find email exchanges far worse than voicemails.... I use google
voice, it's in one interface, and voicemails are few enough... 5-6 a day.

Emails, I see many... Some I bucket off and group delete daily.. others I have
to spend half an hour a day to sift through... it's a pain. Especially reply
chains... Though I'd just as soon use IRC, getting people to use slack hasn't
been so bad (there are hipchat and others)... I'm not a huge fan of IM either
though.

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mschip
Things like this is what leads to billion dollar valuations for companies like
Slack. Corporate communication is finally evolving from email and voicemail.

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euroclydon
Here's what I want to know: We have Cisco phones, and when I get a VM, the
phone's message light comes on. I also get an email with the MP3. If I delete
that email without opening it, the message light goes off on the phone within
a few seconds. We use gmail for our company email.

How on earth do they do that???

~~~
MyDogHasFleas
With SOFTWARE. It's the latest thing.

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gmoore
Why wouldn't you want to give your customers every opportunity available to
get in touch with you?

~~~
justincormack
Do you have a fax machine and a telex?

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valarauca1
In 2012 when I purchased my own phone I declined to set up a voice mail
account. If you call and it rings out, the caller is informed, "This customer
has not created a voice mail account."

I highly suggest you do the same. The only person who've noticed so far is my
mother.

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MyDogHasFleas
I'm old enough that I've lived through these stages:

1) There were no answering machines and no cordless phones, much less mobile.
If you called someone at home, and they didn't answer, you just tried later.
If you called someone at a business, everyone had a secretary who could pick
up if they didn't answer. She (and it was always "she") would write your
message on a message slip (they were generally pink) and put it on the
person's desk. Or, for smaller businesses, you called the main number, and the
operator would connect you, and take a message if no answer.

2) Home answering machines happened. They used cassette tapes, and you could
rewind and replay your messages. The outgoing greeting was on a second tape.
When you got home, or if you were screening your calls, you'd see a blinking
light indicating "new message", then hit buttons to rewind and play your
messages. When the tape got full you could put in a new tape or write over the
old messages. For businesses, phone systems became smarter and could take
voicemail, but this was expensive, many businesses still used the old people-
intensive way for messages, and many businesses preferred this because
customers liked talking to a real person to leave a message.

3) Mobile phones with SMS became available to consumers. (We are into the 90s
now). I don't recall this being especially popular at first, most people still
left voicemails, even on mobile phones. But SMS became more and more used over
the next decade plus (before smartphones when they exploded in popularity).

4) Fast forward to today. People born after 1980 or so, I find, really don't
do voicemail at all, text messaging is the thing. If you leave them a
voicemail, it doesn't get listened to. The best you can expect is a callback
or a text message because they saw you called, but the usual response is
nothing. For businesses, some form of instant messaging (IM) is prevalent
inside the company. The IM might say "Hey do you have a minute to talk OTP?"
but no one just calls someone else cold, much less leaves a voicemail and
expects a response.

IMO stage (1) actually worked fine, and now that we are at stage (4) that
works fine too (as long as you don't pretend voicemail is a thing and use
other means of communication). The intermediate stages were awkward at best.

I think Coca-Cola's action makes a ton of sense for any company. Maybe it was
fear of legal discovery that prompted it, maybe it was what they said
(streamlining operations), but it is a good thing, IMO.

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jedanbik
Voicemail doesn't seem as "on the record" as email. I wonder, does this
matter?

~~~
jpmattia
> Voicemail doesn't seem as "on the record" as email.

Funny, I had the opposite response. Since it was Coca Cola HQ that ditched VM,
I was guessing they didn't want those records around. (Sarbanes-Oxley requires
maintaining the VMs IIRC).

As many point out, there's more verbosity to a VM than email/text, and that
can work against you in bad situations, like an investigation.

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dankohn1
I recommend using Google Voice as your voicemail service, in that it converts
voicemails to text messages. They're often garbled text messages, but it's
enough context to decide how to respond.

~~~
jotux
It also makes dealing with voicemail a great deal better. I despise voicemail
at my work because I have to call a number, listen to the message and clear it
to make my phone stop blinking. On my cell phone it just pops up as a text
message, I can read most of it to get the gist and clear the notification
easily.

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jimbobimbo
I used to work at a company that had an office phone system with desk phones
and all. To this day I consider that kind of system a most confusing piece of
technology I tried to use.

~~~
justincormack
Not yet worked anywhere that doesnt... although I almost never use said
phones.

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xngzng
Is voice mail recording device at home still popular in US? Often seen in US
movies but such device has never caught on in Singapore/Malaysia.

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ghaff
I suspect they're increasingly rare. Even for those who want voicemail, it's
increasingly bundled as part of voice plans rather than requiring a dedicated
voicemail device at the receiving end.

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bensherman
Next, do email!

