Another notch along the dizzying climb of human evolution – calling the local multinational pizza parlour can now divert us to someone from another country, happy to recite a menu and take our delivery order. There’s a stoner sci-fi novel in there somewhere.
Call Centre Chaos
“..Call me any anytime…
…Call me, call me for some overtime”
– Blondie, back in the days before mobile phones.
As well as the large number of impoverished people India holds, it’s population of 1 billion people also carries an educated middle class larger than that of the United States, and a booming IT industry. The combination of IT saturation and cheap labour is fast gathering India a reputation as the call centre capital of the world – as phone queries from richer countries are increasingly being re-routed via the cheaper Indian phone operators. While no pizza companies in Australia actually do this yet (that I’m aware of ), several larger companies in Australia already send their phone queries offshore and undoubtedly the budget conscious takeaway biz isn’t far behind.
But what does it all Mean Batman?
Aside from mobile phone virii ( already here, and there’s more coming), the continued wiring of the global village is also very useful for drawing attention to some of the disparities between people born in different parts of it. If something feels strange about having a poorly paid offshore call operator answer one of your leisurely queries – it’s probably to do with the way this transaction highlights how the abundant western lifestyle is made possible by taking advantage of the resources and labour of poorer countries. This is something already implicit in the outsourced production of consumer goods such as computers, televisions or even mobile phones, but the human factor of having the voice on the other of the line can bring this home more effectively.
( See : www.fairtraderesource.org – http://fairtrade.asn.au – or – www.newint.com/catalog/nonofair.htm )
Mid-Column Pop Quiz
Q1. Are you the type of person who* :
a) Acknowledges and engages the person behind the cash register serving you the food?
b) Still hasn’t outsourced memory to a phone and can remember numbers?
c) Often have to replace your wiped bankcard because of your unusual body magnetics?
d) Asks telephone operators or telemarketers interesting and unusual questions?
e) Had friends in high school who rang random numbers, telling people not to answer the phone – as a repairman would be on the line for the next 15 minutes – then ring them back repeatedly until they finally answered, then scream down the line at them?
A1. (*note, for A1 there are no wrong answers )
Q2. What is Skypecasting?
A2. Combine podcasting ( blog style audio publishing online that can subscribed to and automatically downloaded to both your computer and then mp3 player) with recorded phone call interviews made with skype (free voice over internet software) and you have all needed for a complete bedroom radio production suite. Google away, people are already jumping on this.
Mobile Phone Theatre
Nothing to do with iTunes mobile 1.0 ( due in June ), German artist trio Rimini Protokoll have developed an excellent theatre piece “Call Calcuta” (www.call-cutta.in) which explores what would happen if India’s army of call centre operators got personal on the phone. In part 1 of their project they made a theatre piece which involved the arriving audience in a Kolkata ( Calcutta, India ) theatre, being given mobile phones and directed to leave the building. The city becomes the stage, and an interesting interplay between call operators ( who have also been trained with a theatrical script ) and audience members unfolds. Part 2 of their project extends it to Berlin – with a Berlin audience being given directions around their own city, and told unusual histories of various hidden landmarks as well as histories of anti-colonial Indian history – by the call operators in India!
Terrorist Training School
Am now officially a graduate of the above, having been on the city-as-stage / theatre / performance-art-on-a-bus tour of capital Australian cities beind currently undertaken by Perth’s PVI collective. ( www.ttsaustralia.com ). Aye aye, a 22 seater bus and a pretty funny alternative sight seeing ‘terror’ tour – using live performance, on-board media, video and wireless audio, the bus navigates through public sites, with on-board tour guides probing the darker underbelly of public anxiety. Well worth a look – Be alert, but not alarmed ( your next fridge magnet is coming soon ).