logoalt Hacker News

rapnieyesterday at 7:37 PM1 replyview on HN

It depends on the context and situation. You are right for some random public channel. I am talking about for instance chatrooms where a small remote team joins for the express purpose to collaborate closely, and I often find these weird deviations from how you would behave offline in similar setting to be very detrimental for communication and productivity killers. Part of it is about setting expectations and fostering the 'room culture', and that can help improve things. But there is an overall behavior change to the online world. Comparable perhaps (but different in the details) to "road rage", a general behavior shift people have once they step into a car and are insulated from others by their hotrods window screens. And 'commandeering' never works well, btw.


Replies

Aurornisyesterday at 10:18 PM

> I am talking about for instance chatrooms where a small remote team joins for the express purpose to collaborate closely

I am too.

A chat room is not equivalent to a face to face conversation. You’re not in an always-on social engagement with those people.

If you need to switch to having face to face conversational norms, you need to request a time for that.

It’s not reasonable to expect that someone’s online indicator means you are entitled to request that they drop what they’re doing and respond to you. Online does not mean not busy.