{"id":4425,"date":"2011-03-14T06:00:39","date_gmt":"2011-03-14T10:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=4425"},"modified":"2011-03-14T06:00:39","modified_gmt":"2011-03-14T10:00:39","slug":"cell-phones-at-the-bookstore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=4425","title":{"rendered":"Cell Phones at the Bookstore"},"content":{"rendered":"

Like the opposite of that old Seinfeld <\/em>episode that centered on people who are “low talkers,” today I want to talk about loud talkers. Lots of folks have conversations at the bookstore, and I encourage that. I never want the store to have a library reverence about it, where people feel speaking above a hushed whisper is frowned upon, but there need to be some standards.
\nPeople generally are great about modulating their voices for their surroundings. But all too often, the cell phone throws that skill away. Bad connections often have folks resorting to shouting. Admittedly, our store seems to be a weird black hole for all cell phones, so a connection is a rare and tenuous thing. But listening to someone shout through a call, where every other word is either “what?” or “can you hear me?” can make it hard for other customers to shop in peace. And I’ll be honest — the last thing I want to hear are two divorced parents arguing about whose turn it is to be take their son to hockey. I feel bad for the parents, and I feel really bad for the child. And during that argument, I really hate being asked to gift wrap.
\nWhile I can understand a quick call home about which book was asked for or what to do if the desired book is out, it’s another thing to come in on the phone. When you walk in the store talking on the cell phone like you would at home, at well above the “inside voice,” that’s not right. And folks need to know that if you’re standing at the counter, not only can I hear you loud and clear, nine times out of ten I can hear the other person on the phone pretty clearly too. Once a mom called her sick teenager at home to ask what books she wanted. After going through only two titles which we were out of, the teen said, “Does that store actually <\/em>carry any books?” You know, at the end of a long day, I wanted to say “no” just to end the agony,\u00a0 but instead, I asked the mom if I could talk to her daughter.
\nNext thing we know, the girl is explaining to me what she likes, and I found two great options that she was actually excited about. Imagine that, an excited teenager.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like the opposite of that old Seinfeld episode that centered on people who are “low talkers,” today I want to talk about loud talkers. People generally are great about modulating their voices for their surroundings. But all too often, the cell phone throws that skill away.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4425\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}