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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to still use email?

150 replies

LoveliestFriendEver · 19/01/2019 10:52

I just don't get it. How is WhatsApp or messenger more convenient that email/text? Am I being a luddite?

I've never got on board with Facebook or the newer ways of managing electronic communication.

I email photos to family and use text messages. If I need an instant response I call.

OP posts:
Lovestonap · 19/01/2019 11:38

I use Facebook messenger for all my chat needs and email for everything work related. The only people who text me are my bank!

Iwantedthatname19 · 19/01/2019 11:40

Could people think they're sending me a whatsapp message even though I don't have whatsapp?

I did read somewhere that people can know whether you're 'on' on whatsapp - that would be one reason why i don't use it. Or can you disable that generally? Another reason is just to limit electronic comms generally - but then, I am old fashioned and still sometimes pick up the phone! (admittedly the person at the other end usually sounds very surprised!)

Trampire · 19/01/2019 11:41

I use email for work only.

I use WhatsApp mainly. I have several group chats. A few are huge (school fund raising events) so I have them on hide or my my phone would ping off constantly.
I have never done this with email. Even my 74 year old mum does WhatsApp. Many of us live hundreds of miles apart. We can have a real time conversation while watching a live tv programme for instance, makes comments and jokes about it, send funny gifs. It's almost like being sat together. It's instant.
We also share news story links and funny stories we've found across the internet.

I trying to train my dh to use WhatsApp but he still prefers text. We have are family chat with the kids but they're not too keen on it yet. I still get text messages from them individually, mainly asking me to pick them up or get them something.

Honestly, WhatsApp makes my life more pleasant. I speak to distant (geographically) family and friends every day and it just makes things, fun, easy and up to date even with very trivial things. I also have had very serious in-depth conversations with friends over WhatsApp when something critical is going on in their lives. Sometimes it's easy to write stuff down. Recently my sister had a marriage crisis and it was hard for her to ring me all the time as she was surrounded by her dcs and dh, howler she still needed to talk.

We could do it (more clunkingly) via email but.....meh.

MissingGeorgeMichael · 19/01/2019 11:42

WhatsApp is great for me as I can have free real time 'conversations' with friends when travelling or out and about. Tell people I am running late due to the Tube or I see something they might like in a sale, checking on a family member journeying a long way home etc.

I love email but that is for business and longer communications with friends i.e. 25 years ago I would have written a letter.

Texts also cost me money, WhatsApp is free.

gamerchick · 19/01/2019 11:42

Also sending pictures via email is annoying as you have to attach it. And you can’t attach all in one go. With wattsapp you can send how many you want

Sounds like the perfect reason not to have it. We all know that irritating person who likes to bombard you with photos.

All the things people are saying are pluses aren't to everyone. Staying in constant contact would be suffocating.

Just no

brizzledrizzle · 19/01/2019 11:45

I only use it for work and elderly relatives, pretty much everything else is on Instagram or Whatsapp - Facebook is rarely used by any of my friends now.

DoctorNicoleWatterson · 19/01/2019 11:45

The main reason people use WhatsApp is cost.

Unless all your contacts have iphones it's quite costly to send photos etc. via text, free with WhatsApp. I find emails get lost in amongst all the crap I receive (even though I've unsubscribed from as much as possible). I find WhatsApp very user friendly. I do still use email and text too, but for group conversations WhatsApp is my favourite.

sollyfromsurrey · 19/01/2019 11:45

Email is good for business or formal communication or when you have a lot to say. WhatsApp and Messenger are quick, informal, condensed and to the point. Much more like a real conversation.

Oysterbabe · 19/01/2019 11:45

I find WhatsApp a million times easier to use than email, especially for group chats. I don't know anyone who uses email to talk to friends and family.

burritofan · 19/01/2019 11:46

I hate WhatsApp. 100% of people I group chat with regularly have an iPhone, so why can't we just use iMessage's group chat function? And most people I know have a contract with a ridiculous number of free texts.

I only have it because one friend, WHO HAS AN IPHONE, refuses to turn on iMessage for some stupid, ornery reason. So to organise anything as a group with her, I have to have WhatsApp. But I have read receipts, status, etc, switched off. I don't get the appeal. It's just texts but with an extra app sucking up memory on my phone.

TheBitchOfTheVicar · 19/01/2019 11:54

Free texts and calls
Instant messaging
Possible over WiFi but where there is no 3G or 4G reception
Group chats
You can see when people are online
Photo sharing

Original poster
LoveliestFriendEver · 19/01/2019 11:55

I'm wondering now if I'm seem as a funny older relative/friend when I email people.

My mum writes actual letters to my DC and I think it's lovely. They do too. There's something lovely about the care taken. Although there usually a fiver tucked in which is probably appealing!

I still think of email as quite a casual means of communication re business! That's clearly a dated thought.

OP posts:
Cookit · 19/01/2019 11:56

I WhatsApp people who don’t have an iPhone, and use for group chats but other than that I don’t overly get it - if I’m texting someone iPhone to iPhone iMessage allows me to do everything WhatsApp does doesn’t it? And most people don’t get charged for texts or calls anyway.

SilverySurfer · 19/01/2019 11:56

I still use e-mail or actually telephone phone people and speak to them. I know it's a shocking idea to lots of people these days. I reckon in a couple of hundred years babies will be plugged into ipads and social media from birth and speech will become extinct.

Cherries101 · 19/01/2019 11:57

Whatsapp is more secure.

Badbadbunny · 19/01/2019 11:58

Email here! I don't even text. Never found email to be a problem for my communication needs. If urgent, I'd just phone. Don't have any messenger/whatsapp applications on my phone.

Badbadbunny · 19/01/2019 12:01

*You can see when people are online"

I really couldn't be doing with that. Life's stressful enough without people expecting an instant response to inane questions/comments because they can see you're online.

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 19/01/2019 12:02

I'm not a big fan of Whatsapp, to be honest. One of my friends swears by it but it pisses me off - I don't like having to type things on my phone, when I can use the keyboard on my laptop FAR faster.

I mostly use Messenger when I want to get in touch with someone in a hurry, because I can use the laptop for that - it does require me to be part of FB but that's ok, I quite like FB (I know! the horror...)

Other than that, email or phonecall. I will use text messaging for one or 2 texts, but if it starts to get more involved than that then I will phone the person instead (again with the typing messages on the phone - argh!)

Gwenhwyfar · 19/01/2019 12:04

"Wattsapp is so much easier. You can make free calls to people just using the internet, group chats, send voice notes, send gifs, send lots of pictures. It’s especially good if you want to call someone in another country for free. "

You can do all this with FB messenger as well.
Whatsapp is not a replacement for texting because it only works when you've got Internet. I hate people using it if they want an instant reply from me. At work I'm on my email all day - email me!
I only see Whatsapp if I look at my phone and I will only see new messages if I'm in a place with wi-fi. I'm not going to start paying for data because people use WA instead of texting.

3out · 19/01/2019 12:04

I find messenger really clunky. WhatsApp is more user friendly.

Gwenhwyfar · 19/01/2019 12:05

"Whatsapp is more secure."

Good job I'm not a spy then and can use text and email without worrying.

HappilyHarridan · 19/01/2019 12:06

I don’t why whatsapp, I email and text.

HappilyHarridan · 19/01/2019 12:07

Use not why!

DonCorleoneTheThird · 19/01/2019 12:10

I don't use them for the same thing at all.

Emails are for work, obviously, school and club stuff, all my admin.
I also use emails to send long messages to people, because I am faster at typing on my computer than on my phone, and I like a bigger screen. I don't really use whatsapp on my computer ,even if I could.

I use Whatsapp on the go, to send a one or 2 lines messages, and to send photos and videos I just took. I also use messenger, but not everybody uses it, so it varies.

I don't really text that much anymore

I don't really call either unless I want a long chat. It's much better and less intrusive to arrange things by whatsapp or text. I send messages when convenient for me, people reply when convenient for them.

SwedishEdith · 19/01/2019 12:11

You can see when people are online

That is not a selling point.

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