Zoom is ruining conversation because it's much harder to interrupt.

I'm reading "How the Zoom era has ruined conversation." (WaPo) Maybe you think it's better to disempower the interrupters. If so, you need to hear from those who understand the importance of overlapping conversation — collaborative conversation:

Suppose someone is speaking and another person, eager to express agreement, chimes in at the end of their sentence. Over Zoom, this tends to derail the discussion or narrative.... Then there’s the turn-waiting....

[S]ociolinguist Deborah Tannen... describes cooperative overlap as “talking along to show enthusiasm, as a way of encouraging the other person to keep speaking rather than cutting them off.” Her initial research focused on the difference between Jewish New Yorkers with an Eastern European background (who were inclined toward talking over) and Californians of a Christian background (who tended to feel interrupted).

Well, there you have it. California is winning.

Meanwhile, for people who don’t particularly like the idea of fighting to be heard, the Zoom era — which creates more orderly queues for commenting during conversation — has been a boon.

The article doesn't mention Justice Thomas at this point, but should. He didn't speak at oral argument for a decade, and now, he's a full and equal participant. 

ADDED: Despite the usual eagerness to talk about race, this WaPo article avoids the subject. Because the idea is that overlapping, collaborative conversation is good, there's an avoidance of the possibility that it's part of white supremacy.  Thus we have Christian Californians on the anti-interruption side and Jewish New Yorkers as their opposite. Where are the black people?

With oral argument by telephone and the Justices subjected to a protocol of asking their questions in order of seniority, the long-silent Justice Thomas asked 2 questions.

Thomas has been on the Court longer than any of the Justices, but the Chief Justice is regarded as first in seniority. That makes Thomas second in seniority, and therefore the second to have the opportunity to speak under this new approach.

I'm reading the report at Fox News, which notes that Thomas had, before this morning, only spoken twice at oral argument since 2006.

Thomas's questions today were about whether Booking.com could trademark "Booking.com": "Could Booking acquire an 800 number that's a vanity number, 1-800-booking for example, that is similar to 1-800-plumbing, which is a registered mark?... I'd like you to compare this to Goodyear.... In Goodyear, you had a generic term, but you also had an added term, such as company or inc, which any company could use. With Booking here there could only be one domain address dot com, so this would seem to be more analogous to the 1-800 numbers which are also individualized."

The new approach is much more polite and orderly. Obviously, the usual approach of Justices breaking in and attempting to dominate would be horrible on a telephone conference call. Maybe this experiment in order will affect how the Justices go forward with their courtroom theatrics if and when the social distancing ends.