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Don't leave a message after the beep.

Technology's ceaseless pursuit of efficiency appears to be claiming another victim: voice mail.

With the rise of texting, instant chat and transcription apps, more people are ditching the venerable tool that once revolutionized the telephone business.

The behavioral shift is occurring in tandem with the irreversible fading of voice calls in general.

Vonage, an Internet phone company, says the number of voice-mail messages left on user accounts was down 8% in July from a year ago.

"They hate the whole voice-mail introduction, prompts, having to listen to them in chronological order," says Michael Tempora, senior vice president at Vonage. One response by the company to the trend is a new voice-mail transcription service that converts voice messages for delivery as e-mail or text.

"Voice transcription isn't perfect," Tempora says. "But they understand who called and what the message is about."

The transcription tools make skimming through messages easier for on-the-go users such as Dmitri Leonov, an executive at SaneBox, a maker of e-mail inbox management software. "E-mail (etiquette) says to respect your friends' time," says Leonov, who rarely listens to messages. "And I should stop leaving voice mail, as well. Practice what you preach."

As with most declining technology, the exodus is led by younger, more impatient users who are quicker to embrace alternatives — someone such as Neveen Moghazy, 33, who rarely leaves messages but juggles texting, chat app WhatsApp and Google Voice.

"If my friends call and I'm busy, I text them asking if it's urgent, or I just call them back later without checking voice mail," says the designer for an ad company in Atlanta. "It's just one less thing for me to go through." 

Notes and Vocabulary
ceaseless adj.
happening for a long time without stopping

pursuit n.
when someone tries to get, achieve, or find something in a determined way

ditch v.
to stop having something because you no longer want it

venerable adj.
a venerable person or thing is respected because of their great age, experience etc - often used humorously

tandem  n.
1 a bicycle built for two riders sitting one behind the other
in tandem: doing something together or at the same time as someone or something else

irreversible adj. you can't go back
1 irreversible damage, change etc is so serious or so great that you cannot change something back to how it was before [≠ reversible]
2 if an illness or bad physical condition is irreversible, it will continue to exist and cannot be cured

fade v.
to gradually disappear; slowly goes away

prompt

chronological 
arranged according to when things happened or were made;
person's chronological age is how old they actually are, rather than how old their mind or body seems

skim v.
to remove something from the surface of a liquid, especially floating fat, solids, or oil

Practice what you preach.
to do the things that you advise other people to do:

- She didn't always practise what she preached.

exodus n.

a situation in which a lot of people leave a particular place at the same time

embrace v.

1 to put your arms around someone and hold them in a friendly or loving way [= hug]

2 to eagerly accept a new idea, opinion, religion etc

3 to include something as part of a subject, discussion etc

juggle v.

to change things or arrange them in the way you want, or in a way that makes it possible for you to do something

Discussion Questions
- Is voice mail helpful, or a waste of time? Explain.

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