I wish I had a shiny nickel every time I heard someone in a conference call say, “Oh, sorry I was talking on mute.” Why is it that people keep doing that? And you notice it’s the same people doing it all the time? And some people never do it.

Now, I’m all for a liberal use of the mute button. In fact, you should have that mute button on more than you have it off. If you’re not talking, you should have that mute button on. We don’t want to hear what you have going on over there. Whether you’re driving. Whether you have the window open and somebody is outside the window with a weed wacker and a lawn mower causing all kinds of ruckus. Whether you have some dog barking. There is someone that, I think every other day on a call, there is some dog barking in the background. And ironically, it’s probably an Alaskan Malamute. They should have that phone muted. Now it’s just as well because a lot of people who pretend to say, “oh sorry I was talking on mute,” their point was probably moot anyway.

I remember in high school we had a class called mass media, which was one of my favorites. And the classroom was actually set up like a news studio where we had the desks up in the front, curtain, cameras, and in the back was a control room where the editor and director would be to put on a full-blown newscast. 

Outside the classroom was a red light above the door that said “ON AIR,” and when we were taping live, that light would go on. It just so happens that classroom was right across the hallway from the main office, so it was a high-traffic area. It’s amazing, the teacher told us, how many people didn’t understand what that red light means. So, you’d have people knocking on the door or throwing open the door, all when that light was on and we’re in the middle of an event or a newscast. 

We said, “Why don’t you just lock the door. Then that way nobody can get in.” He said, “Well, for one the school policy wouldn’t allow that.” And two, he actually did try that one time to see what would happen, and somebody just ended up grabbing ahold of the handle of the door and shaking it and causing a ruckus anyway. So, people just did not understand the purpose of that light.

I tell that story because I think we need a new gadget or device that works in conjunction with a laptop or computer screen that glows bright red when you’re live on a call. When you hit the mute button, the light goes off. So, now you know when you’re live, when everybody can hear you, and when you’re on mute. Makes it very simple and easy. So you hit the mute button, the light goes off, you know you’re on mute. You can have a coughing fit. Fart. Which reminds me of a meme going around: “You know it used to be I would cough to cover a fart. Now I fart to cover a cough!” 

So we really need this red light for everybody. This way there will be no more pretending about talking on mute!

Regular readers may have noticed this post doesn’t have the usual polish of my written pieces. The reason is that it is a transcription of an episode of my podcast that I performed live. If you’d like to hear it come alive, listen here.