If there’s any one component of the modern smartphone that hasn’t yet caught up with the “smart” designation of the rest of the experience, it’s certainly the phone itself. While users transition from SMS to instant messaging, from pre-downloading to streaming videos and music, and from websites to dedicated apps, the dialer app remains the most stagnant part of the equation today. In an age of usernames and nearly everything being indexed by corporations, what kind of sense does it make that we’re expected to memorize the ten-digit telephone numbers of our contacts and call them through satellites? Of course, if they don’t “answer the phone” in an arbitrary amount of time, we’re directed to leave them voicemail messages, which they can later access by calling their provider. Sound crazy? That’s because it is. The system just doesn’t make sense for the way we use these devices today. And that’s the premise of Ray Ozzie’s new startup company “Talko.”
Ray Ozzie, known for creating Lotus Notes and being Microsoft’s Chief Technology Architect from 2005-2010, has a thesis that states while we’re talking more today than in the early days of computing, we’re saying less. People now find it more natural to type in Instant Messaging (IM) conversations with their friends and coworkers than to call or email them. If you’re under 30, calling probably isn’t your go-to communication protocol, and you might even find a call from an unknown number rude. The problem is, according to Ozzie, it’s almost impossible to convey a wide spectrum of emotions and tones over text without something getting lost in translation. Vocal communication is still a key facet of human interaction, so we shouldn’t be trying to design technology that works around, or in lieu, of it.
This is where Ozzie’s company Talko fits in. The app is designed to integrate IM, photo sharing, and voice in a way that hasn’t been done before. There are chatrooms with multiple members, as with any IM app, but users can send each other voice messages that get inserted conversation timeline, and even start voice conversations with other members of the chat that get logged for later revisitation. Users can choose to engage in an ongoing conversation between other group members, or replay the recorded conversation later. Think of it as an ongoing timeline of all communications with one or more parties that gets archived and can be revisited at any time.
Of course, the privacy concerns based just on that premise would be innumerable, as every bit of dialogue between parties is saved on Talko’s servers. But Ozzie was mindful of this, and users of the app will be able to retroactively delete everything ever sent from them, including portions of voice conversations that they’re involved in, or even just the conversation entirely. In addition to communications being deletable, conversations are deleted automatically from Talko’s servers and the app unless the user opts to download them (or if they choose to pay for unlimited storage of communications).
The applications of Talko’s product are immediately apparent to business users: recording of meetings, bookmarking specific places where topics were discussed, and searchable exchanges of information between people could be a huge leap forward for productivity in the workplace. The app also has its uses for students: archived discussions on collaborative projects, always-active chatrooms for study groups, and late-night calls to multiple classmates for help with homework could be made easy with the widespread adoption of Talko. Currently, the app is iPhone-only, but the company plans to bring it to Android and desktop as a web app in the coming months. Technology analysts and futurists have been calling for the death of the phone call (Get it? Calling?) for years now, but Talko wants to metamorphose the medium so that it makes sense in a modern context.
If they’re successful, it could mean the death of the phone call, but also the birth of something greater.
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