Page 11 - PT-Spring-2021

A VIEW FROM THE HIGH STREET

Gethin Russell-Jones

n 2016, I began a course of online helplessly as a cat before District on mute and no one can see you. It’s
study using a little known video Judge Roy Ferguson. ‘I’m not a cat, your first meeting on Zoom with
Iplatform called ‘Zoom’. At the judge,’ he floundered to a laughing people you barely know and you spend
time it was dwarfed by larger and court room. the session blushing and fumbling
cheaper competitors. I remember Or the Handforth Parish Council with your dodgy laptop.
that the picture quality was very disintegrating into chaos, saved And just when you’ve got the hang
good and it was easier to use than only by the cool and collected Jackie of it, your image freezes and you can
its rivals. But I thought to myself, Weaver. I also fondly recall a parish hear people snorting with laughter
it’s too niche. It will never take off, priest whose wife changed the Zoom at your expense. Your broadband has
I reasoned. Fast forward five years filters whilst he was celebrating the collapsed and the only solution is to
and Zoom rules the waves. But let’s eucharist. Another cat I believe. close your machine and go through
pause before we go any further. One of my favourite stories the whole sorry experience all
involved an earnest prayer over again.
Despite my agnostic position, this meeting, with members in zealous Zoom fatigue is even worse.
company was hugely successful at its intercession. Somehow, yet again, You only develop this malaise after
launch, valuing $1 billion on the New one of those pesky filters was achieving a level of competence.
York Stock Exchange in 2011. activated and the meeting dissolved I know several people who spend
But the pandemic has gifted into sundry farmyard animals ten hours each day in Zoom meetings.
extraordinary growth to Zoom appearing on everyone’s heads. Those clever people in Stanford
Video Communications, Inc. It has Fun there may have been, but identified four aspects of Zoom
become the global go-to platform Zoom (and other platforms) has fatigue: the constant need for eye
for businesses, churches and even enabled tens of millions of employees contact; the ability to see one’s own
courts of law. So ubiquitous is its to work from home and probably face on screen during meetings;
influence, it has now become a verb. changed the work environment for the need to sit still for long periods;
Tell someone you’ll ‘Zoom them later’ ever. But it’s come at quite a price. and the difficulty in interpreting or
and it’s self-explanatory, rather like a Researchers at Stanford communicating via body language.
declaration that you’ve googled such University, California have identified Jeremy Bailenson, founding
and such a subject. At the height of the phenomenon known as ‘Zoom director of the Stanford Virtual
the global pandemic in October 2020, Fatigue’. Even before reading their Human Interaction Lab, said: ‘In
Zoom was valued at $140 billion. findings, I instinctively knew it to be the real world, if somebody was
And it’s afforded priceless true. You know the kind of thing. You following you around with a mirror
moments. Who will forget US eventually work out the meeting ID constantly – so that while you were
attorney Rod Ponton adorned and password before realizing you’re talking to people, making decisions,
giving feedback, getting feedback,
you were seeing yourself in a mirror,
that would just be crazy. No one
would ever consider that.’ (The Times,
February 28, 2021). This is just one of
the four phases of Zoom fatigue but
it’s probably the most aggravating.
Having to look at yourself while
speaking to others who are all looking
at you whilst also viewing themselves
is mind bending.
But as we have all kept saying
to each other for 12 months, it’s all
we’ve got and it’s better than the
alternative. Keep on Zooming and
don’t mute yourself.
Photo Credit: Chris Montgomery

Find us online at www.plain-truth.org.uk Spring 2021 The Plain Truth 11