As a full-time remote person (at IBM, ironically), I personally hate using the phone - however, video/voice call via Slack or similar is totally fine. As far as I'm concerned, a decent headset is the #2 requirement after a good internet connection when it comes to working remotely effectively.

What's the difference?

(It would typically be initiated the same way, e.g. via a Slack question if they are ok talk on the phone. If there's no reply and it's blocking other stuff; yeah I am going to place an actual 20th century phone call.)

Picking up a phone is interrupting as hell for me.

Clicking the green button on Discord or a softphone is not.

Seriously? What is the difference? Telephone handset vs headphones?

It's just ridiculously foreign and breaks my train of thought. No idea why, just a mental thing.

I have never used a physical 'telephone handset' (and don't have a desk phone)

Please don't startle the millennials. They are unique snowflakes.

;)

People text instead of calling and especially instead of leaving voicemail. Just asking one question seems rude via phone so the conversation is buffered with "hi, what's going on, how's the weather, how about them lakers, while I have you, what do you think about this, etc."

Phone calls are less information dense to many developers to something like slack, especially if you need to send a link, a document, etc.

Slack is also async in that I don't have to immediately answer. I can get to a nice commit point in 5 or so minutes and not have to stop in the middle of a deep thought.

If it's a scheduled call once a week though, that shouldn't matter at all. Maybe they just don't like you :D j/k. A lot of devs think they communicate as well via voice

I am talking about architecture design discussions that actually, really do run at 2-3x speed when done via voice as opposed to text chat. And yes, having to schedule them to slow things down in an excessive way.