This little gem of a video from Seth Godin puts what we do in a wonderfully positive context:

So much of what we’re used to doing involves half-duplex communication. We’re so used to that method of communication that it can be disorienting when, all of a sudden, we’re told that the old limitations no longer apply. I’m reminded of a Cisco rep who came to do a phone demo. He told me that the voice quality of VoIP phones is so clear that when they first rolled them out, most users found it disconcerting when talking to someone. What did Cisco do? They developed a way to inject synthetic line noise to make users feel more at ease.

We’re at the point where a decision needs to be made, either collectively or individually: do we maintain the traditional distance from our users, or do we become curious with them and turn our interactions into co-discovery?