{For Some, Voice Mail Is Losing Its Allure - NYTimes.com]

Thos who haved heard the message on my voice mail know the drill. I say, more or less, that I don’t listen to voice mail, and if a caller wants to reach me they should text me, email me, or twitter me instead.

Reserach shows that others are dropping voice mail, too.

‘Research shows that people take longer to reply to voice messages than other types of communication. Data from uReach Technologies, which operates the voice messaging systems of Verizon Wireless and other cellphone carriers, shows that over 30 percent of voice messages linger unheard for three days or longer and that more than 20 percent of people with messages in their mailboxes “rarely even dial in” to check them, said Saul Einbinder, senior vice president for marketing and business development for uReach, in an e-mail message.

By contrast, 91 percent of people under 30 respond to text messages within an hour, and they are four times more likely to respond to texts than to voice messages within minutes, according to a 2008 study for Sprint conducted by the Opinion Research Corporation. Even adults 30 and older are twice as likely to respond within minutes to a text than to a voice message, the study found.’

Death to vmail!