In terms of business, for %90 of everything, I'll take an email over a phone call any day.
Phone calls demand your immediate attention and are honestly kind of intrusive. Some
folks are also a little phone happy. My VOIP dealy-doo has a web page where you can
view all of your phone calls and times and whatnot. One client I counted 30+ phone calls and
a little over an hour on the phone, for one job. Granted it was a large job, but literally
everything they asked had been outlined (and re-outlined, post phone call) in email. Ugh.
Not to mention PDF mockups and estimates and invoices are a hell of a lot better than a bunch
of talk. Picture thousand words yadda yaddaa...
You're right about everything else though.