Business Insider / Michael Seto
When Business Insider wrangled a panel of seven teens on stage at our IGNITION conference in New York City on Tuesday, interviewer Stephanie Retblatt asked them how often they called their friends on the phone.
The answer was nearly unanimous: never.
"I FaceTime my friends, but I would never just call them," one girl answered. "Yeah, I will never call them."
FaceTime is an iPhone-only service that lets users video-chat each other.
"I can easily just text," another said. "I don't see the point of a phone call!"
Between texting, FaceTime, Instagram, and Snapchat, several of the teens said they feel as if they're constantly in contact with their closest friends.
"Two people could not talk in person but have the biggest social life on their phones," one girl said, adding that she and her best friend recently had a never-ending stream of conversation for seven days, without ever seeing each other in person or even hearing each other's voices.
Even birthday wishes have been relegated to Facebook and Instagram, instead of phone calls, the teens said.
"Does anyone see the merit of a phone call?" Retblatt asked in mock horror.
"You're making us sound so evil," one boy quipped.
He added that one of the beautiful things about texting was that you could do it sneakily at school.
"You can't discretely make a phone call in class," he said.