&gt; <i>The shift to online communication, textual interactions separated from accompanying physical practices, has had a persistent and egregious warping effect on language</i><p>The phone was the first change. To this day I hate speaking to people on a phone because if I don&#x27;t see their eyes and body posture I have a very hard time understanding what they mean.<p>Usually, in a normal, face to face conversation, I have a rough idea of what someone is going to say next, which eases the cognitive burden of the conversation.<p>But somehow that doesn&#x27;t really work over the phone, so I have to wait for people to say things, parse what they&#x27;re saying, run it against various possible interpretations, and then think of an answer. It&#x27;s exhausting, (not to mention error prone).<p>Edit -- conversation is like a dance, (or a game of chess). There are rules, within the rules, an infinite number of moves, and a limited number of &quot;usual&quot; moves. You normally just follow the usual moves, and sometimes you invent a new one, or place a usual move in an unusual context.<p>To me, talking over the phone is like trying to dance over the phone by describing to the other person what you&#x27;re doing. It&#x27;s not impossible, just extremely difficult.