{"id":45998,"date":"2018-07-17T22:30:45","date_gmt":"2018-07-18T02:30:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/totfc.net\/?p=45998"},"modified":"2020-08-07T22:30:57","modified_gmt":"2020-08-08T02:30:57","slug":"when-changing-the-terminology-makes-things-acceptable","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/totfc.net\/?p=45998","title":{"rendered":"When changing the terminology makes things acceptable"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Not long ago, my department at work sent out emails for people to sign up for the departmental Slack channel.\u00a0 Prior to starting working here, I\u2019d never even heard of Slack.\u00a0 I figured out quickly that it was a chat client, but the most substantial use for it that I\u2019d heard of it prior to receiving my own invitation to join was that people on campus had a specific channel that sent notifications if there were any free leftover food up for grabs anywhere on site.<\/span><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t feel that a chat client was remotely conducive to work productivity, so I ignored the invitation and didn\u2019t have any intention of signing up.\u00a0 Frankly, in my career, I\u2019d been admonished in the past and conditioned to think that chat clients were counterproductive in the workplace.\u00a0 Seeing as how I like my job these days, I decided to not join in on something that I thought would be counterproductive, so I just let the invitation go ignored.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then I got a follow-up email a few days later from management, that was sent directly to only the individuals who had not yet signed up for the departmental Slack channel, imploring them to do so.<\/span><\/p>\n

This was my reaction<\/a> to being told that I was supposed<\/em> to join Slack.<\/span><\/p>\n

Upon logging into the client, I started toggling around the work-sanctioned channels to see what all the fuss was all about.<\/span><\/p>\n

I saw more gifs than I did human-written words.<\/span><\/p>\n

I logged off Slack, and haven\u2019t opened it since.\u00a0 I do not feel at all that I\u2019ve missed out in any capacity of essential information or anything pertinent for me to do my job.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The thing is, Slack has grown and permeated the workplace industry to where I\u2019m seeing television commercials and hearing radio spots advertising the client to the masses.\u00a0 As I\u2019ve said before, chat clients are something that I\u2019ve personally faced repercussions for using in the workplace before.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been conditioned to think they\u2019re counterproductive in the workplace, and I\u2019ve been smart enough to do any external text communication through my personal cell phone instead.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the advertising for Slack cracks me up: where work happens<\/em>.\u00a0 It\u2019s a chat client.\u00a0 Where the vast majority of users use it as a place to vomit gifs and\/or memes, or use the direct message function to gossip amongst one another instead of actually being productive.\u00a0 The tagline should be more appropriately:<\/span><\/p>\n