We have to show up to meetings

This day was one of those days that looks like the beginning of the end for remote work.

The day started off with our retro. And while there were 10 people in the "room", no one added anything to the virtual retro board. Now frankly, I could give a shit about which rituals we employ to book-end our sprints, whether we call ourselves agile, play point poker, whatever. I don't care. But if we aren't going to show up to these meetings with a pulse, let's change the formats or change the meeting or kill the meeting. But the last thing I want to do is waste time staring at a bunch of blank avatars with no sound and no mouse movement.

I even said: "what's going on, I see a bunch of people but no movement. Are we here?" The response was that nothing was going on. This couldn't be further from the truth, we are very much in the middle of the action. My interpretation is: "I am going to say this thing and see if it flies because I don't want to be a part of." And again, I don't have an issue with that. But let's talk about it.

So that was retro.

Then came planning. Twelve avatars. No sound. I went through the planning, I asked questions. Nothing. I even said: "can you just give me a signal, a thumbs up, or a middle finger, whatever, just let me know I am not speaking into the void."

Finally someone turned on their camera, surprised I said: "Oh my God, a human."

To the usual redditor the response my be like: "you sound like an asshole!" But the reality is that I am not alone. We need to show up to work otherwise: game over.