Thoughts on group chats

Today’s tip from bunch_HQ about replacing group chats with voice messages made me think whether the problem with chats being hard to use for meaningful discussions lies in the medium they use.

I’ve seen multiple times an advice to jump on a call if you feel that your written discussion leads nowhere or does not conclude. Personally I find it useful too: a days-long debate in GitHub comments often can be replaced with a 10 min call, but why?

The first thing that comes to my mind is that written text is limited. You don’t have the same signal level when the tone of voice and facial expression is lacking. But is it the only one? What’s so different between written messages and an in-person conversation?

Then I thought, is this always the case that a conversation can resolve a problem. I wish it was! What makes a meeting successful? Planning and structure! So maybe this is the problem with chats? They are like a market square on Sunday: too many people are talking about too many things at the same time!