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Text-Messaging Behind the Wheel
theodp writes "TIME interviews 21-year-old Taylor Leming, creator of the 600-member Facebook group I Text Message People While Driving and I Haven't Crashed Yet! While Alaska and Louisiana just became the latest states to pass laws banning text-messaging behind the wheel, Virginia resident Leming is still happily texting away while driving despite some near-accidents. 'Sometimes it just seems easier to text 'Be there in 5' instead of calling,' explains Taylor."
In my experience, this is how people carry out such short conversations.
Party 'B': Hello, B speaking.
Party 'A': Hello, it's me.
Party 'B': Hello, A.
Party 'A': Whereabouts are you?
Party 'B': I'm just walking past the music shop opposite the church. Where are you?
Party 'A':I'm walking past the hotel. I'll meet you at the swimming pool.
Party 'B': OK, see you later. Goodbye.
Those using pirated Tinysoft signatures(TM) are a real threat to society and should all be thrown in jail.
Did ANY of you actually RTFA (including the person who submitted it???)? Clearly, the group was created as a joke and she said in the article that she supports the law even if it would be hard to enforce. She says that although she does do it sometimes, she realizes it's stupid and dangerous and would follow the law if it were to become one.
If you'd RTFA, you'd know that "this guy" is actually a girl.
I say we take off and nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure...
I agree. I just don't have time for text messages. It can take an hour of back and forth to have a two minute conversation. I can barely put up with IM, but it is required in our office so that people can interrupt your train of thought if you accidentally get on a productive streak.
I have no "text plan" on my phone, so incoming texts that I didn't ask to receive cost me 15 cents. Outgoing don't cost me anything because I don't do them. I don't have time. Life is too short for text messaging. Call up, get your conversation done and move on.
As you honestly don't seem to understand the use of text messages, I'll explain why I find them useful: for communicating small amounts of information that don't require conversation, and out of respect for the other person's time.
Let's face it, most people don't want to be interrupted whenever they're doing something. You might be out shopping for groceries, visiting a friend's house, or eating a restaurant, and you probably have your phone with you in case there's an emergency and/or you need to call somebody, but you don't want somebody to call you and suddenly want to have a conversation. Heck, at least in those situations you can talk if you want to; you can't exactly answer your phone and have a conversation at all if, say, you're watching a presentation at work, or if you're already on the phone with somebody else.
When you get a text message, rather than answering your phone immediately, you can view it at your leisure, and it only takes a second of your time to read it. I can tell my girlfriend, "working late tonight, I'll be home in an hour," or my D&D buddies, "On my way, be there 30 minutes," or a couple of my coworkers, "Meet for lunch at Rudy's BBQ", and it only takes ten seconds of my time and effectively none of theirs. I can even send the same message to half a dozen people at once, and that's much faster than calling half a dozen people and repeating the same conversation every time. If, for some reason, they need to answer the message, they can also do so without disturbing any people around them who don't want to listen to somebody chatting on their cell phone.
Does that make more sense? Yes, text messages are a horribly inefficient way of having a conversation, but they're not for conversing, they're for disseminating information.
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
Higher cognitive load.
Carrying on a conversation is more mentally taxing than turning a radio dial, and isn't as interruptable, since you're only in control of half of it. See, for example, this research:
"the Carnegie Mellon study, for the first time, used brain imaging to document that listening alone reduces by 37 percent the amount of brain activity associated with driving. This can cause drivers to weave out of their lane, based on the performance of subjects using a driving simulator."