To think voice clips should be banned?

[scegliere]

I'm not talking about voicemail. I have nothing against a short message to say that you tried to call, give details on when would be good to call back, etc etc.

I'm talking about the voice clips you can record on Whatsapp, messenger and so on. Maybe it's just my circle, but some of my friends will leave about 10x1 minute voice clips. In order to listen to them, I need to have a quiet, private space, time to listen to them all, and some way to note down everything they've said because by the time I've got to the last one I can't remember what was said in the earlier ones. With a text, you can just read back to make sure you've replied to everything they've said. If you need to reply a little later, you have to relisten to the whole thing again. Voice clips only benefit the sender, not the receiver.

They were a good idea to try out, but now we've seen how insanely annoying they are, it's time for them to be treated as a failed experiment.

Patronising much? No actually it wasn’t.

Added to which, dictating a message where you’re having to dictate out every word including the punctuation is far weirder than sending a voice clip.

I find them oddly intrusive. Only one of my friends uses them, and I have trained her out of it by not listening to them until a few hours after they were sent. She’s one of those people who monitors when others are active online and whether or not they’ve read/listened to her messages the minute they go on WhatsApp, so she’d have seen that I was active but didn’t listen, and I had a cast iron excuse “oh I couldn’t listen to it until I was alone”. She just texts now and it’s much better.

Yep it annoys me when it breaks the flow of chat. I have it from one friend and she is not English (European student doing a course with me) so probably it's a case that it's easier to speak than type at times.

Does mean I don't bother responding as quick.

I actually think this kind of attitude is damaging (the one you’re talking about, not yours, obviously,)

people are losing the art of communication. Actually speaking to people is no longer considered acceptable. Don’t want to talk on the phone, don’t want to hear someone talking, is it any wonder that so many children are growing up needing intervention from speech and language therapists. It’s only going to get worse.

Added to which, the screen does not convey emotion, so not only do people lose the art of communication, but they gain the ability to take offence where none is meant, etc. All nuance is lost when all communication only happens through text.

No one I know has ever done it in a group larger than three and it's very occasional. I do it if I have a funny story where typing it won't quite deliver it in the right way. I also like to hear my friends' voices when I don't see them too often so happy to receive them.

As with everything there's a time and a place. If I can't listen there and then I'll save it til later. It's always just silliness anyway. Never urgent arrangements or anything that requires a response.

I like them 🤷🏻‍♀️

This how my 21 yr old dd and her friends communicate too. Can’t see the issue myself. She says it’s easier to explain things than try and write it out. It’s more of a ‘guess what happened….’ type of chat than a quick info text.

My Dds leave them for me - I love them. Just hearing a little snippet of their day makes me happy. Can’t see the big angst about it.

I hate them and don’t bother listening to them. In fact, when friends first started using them I completely ignored them as I assumed they had accidentally recorded something to WhatsApp - a bit like a pocket call.

ah yes, my kids, that's different! Love their voices. They can do what they want.

Everyone else - meh - just write whatever it is you want to say. Don't waste my time. I'm too busy for those self-absorbed ramblings.

My nephew is disabled and struggles to hold his phone to text so he sends me voice messages daily and i just listen to them as and when i can in Private. For some people it is very helpful but i wouldn't like to be spammed with them off friend.

I don't like them as they're inconvenient to listen and respond to while I'm out and about and working.

I walk dogs for a living and can't listen to messages in my phone while I'm working as a) it's too distracting and b) it's guaranteed a dog will start whinging or barking if I try and do it in the car 🤣

I always ask clients to text, email or FB message if they need to contact me during the working day. Most understand but one insists on voice notes and it's such a PITA. I can't ignore them in case she's cancelling her walk or needs to rearrange so I have to make time to listen and respond and it's never that important 🙈

I didn't that these were a thing, but I wouldn't like them. I don't have voicemails set up on my mobile phone. It's fine if someone says "hi yellow it's blue, can you call me back, number is xyz" (and say number TWICE so I have time to get it down) but not when they leave me half an hour of waffle.

Can you delete them without listening to them?

Most understand but one insists on voice notes and it's such a PITA. I can't ignore them in case she's cancelling her walk or needs to rearrange

I think I'd find out if she has problems typing a message, and if not, say you can't listen to messages for the reasons you've given here, and you won't be listening to them anymore. I'd imagine you could replace her as a client quite easily with all the lockdown dogs needing walks!

I am firmly in Team Open the Door, but voice clips are another thing entirely. As PP have said they often require effort on the part of the recepient - my sister is the only person I know who regularly sends them, on group chat, a few at a time, and while I can scan and reply to text messages while working, I am not going to disturb others in the room by listening to voice clips. Also I can read much quicker than I can listen, so it takes much more time. I hardly ever listen to them.

She doesn't have issues typing as she often messages me full, proper paragraphs with no issues with spelling etc ☺️

I'd never ditch her as a client for it though - it's clearly how she prefers to communicate for whatever reason and that's fine, it's just a bit annoying for me but it's not a reason to replace her.

God yes, so tedious. They're convenient for the sender (when driving etc) but inconvenient for the receiver. The one instance in which I will accept them is from non-native speakers , when I know that trying to send a written text would be difficult for them.

I just asked my teen boy about this as I am firmly on the side of those who find them incredibly annoying, but thought it might be a generation thing - he said “that’s weird, I don’t know anyone who does that, who would you not just call someone?”

Why would you not just call someone. Not who!

It's quite common among me and my friends - actual messages for questions/functional stuff, voice notes for catching up/telling a story. I like them :)

Because a call requires you both to be free at the same time, and a text is less personal because you can't hear their voice plus it's sometimes hard to relay tone via message.

Voice note is the best of both worlds - listen in your own time, still hear their voice.

Well, I feel ancient - is this really a thing?! I’ll stick with texting.

I HATE them!! I think the people who send me them think they're being clever and embracing new technology. Like others have said you have to listen to them in private. Then I have nothing to refer back to at a glance, so inevitably forget what I'm meant to be replying to or remembering.

Isn't that what voice mail or answer phone as I still call it is for though?
To be fair I do have Luddite tendencies and when texting first came out in the 90s I said the exact same thing "what's the point of that, just phone and leave a message if they aren't around"! I also "couldn't see the point" of Facebook when my friend made me join it 15 years ago - so I'm not the best judge of communication tech I freely admit .

Voice note is the best of both worlds - listen in your own time, still hear their voice.

Why not leave a voicemail?

I have only recently heard of these. Isn't there a way to set up your phone so it can't get them?

i have only just very reluctantly joined a WhatsApp group but I set it so I have to check it, not so it pings at me.