Voice notes

[No1toldmeaboutit]

My friend has recently just started sending me voice messages on WhatsApp, I think she does it with another friend so has started it with me. The thing is I find it quite annoying, they are about 2 minutes long sometimes and I get bored listening or I’m in an environment where I can’t listen (like work.

AIBU to be annoyed at this? I don’t know why she can’t just text me or call me instead. Is it a stupid thing to bring up and say I’d rather you just text me as I can’t always listen to them?

Just tell her you struggle to listen to voice notes due to background noise, being busy, speaker quality or any other reason you can think of and ask could she type any messages instead from now on

I hate them. Can’t quickly skim read and have to listen to make sure it isn’t something important. Agree it’s particularly annoying when at work. Especially if it’s your boss.

Just respond saying ‘can’t listen atm, can you sum it up’ over and over.

I see they are the " in thing" now I've only had 1 from family abroad and it was some news that she wanted to share but not able to speak to people, which I understood. General chit chat though would piss me right off, I'd tell your friend you can't make out what she's saying every single time. So she either phones or messages .

Speed them up to 2x. They don't take long to listen to, then

I’m not a fan either. Just say you can’t always reply quickly to a voice note as you’re often not in the right environment to listen (eg work, public transport) so it will take you longer to get back to her. I do think it’s laziness for some people, not having to be bothered to type.

If she is friend why not just tell her directly? This doesn’t need to be complicated

I hate them so much, I just find them so much more demanding than messages. Like if you’re with other friends or family you can just read a message and reply without it annoying everyone else. Instead of everyone having to wait whilst you listen. I do only have one friend who sends them and some of her voice notes ramble on for minutes and it’s nothing she couldn’t sum up in a text. I just think if we’re gonna send voice notes to each other then we might as well call?

Why don't people just phone? I might be old but I don't understand the concept of .them.

My sister does this. She says it's quicker. Quicker for her, it's not for me! I'll often reply and say I can't listen to that right now, I'll have to get back to you later. Then she'll often sum up what she's said in a normal message.

I mean she's just wasted so much time hasn't she ? Just send the message.

YANBU I can’t stand them. If you want to speak call me, if not type a message.

I just ignore them. I started doing that when they first started appearing in WhatsApps because at the time I didn’t know they were a thing and thought they were accidental!

The world didn’t end, so I carried on ignoring them.

I hate them too. Just tell her you prefer phone calls or messages. Nothing wrong with that.

One of my friends does this too, fine if I’m home and in a position to listen, but otherwise it’s a pain. And if it’s a really long message I forget all the points she’s mentioned that I need to respond to!

If you're not bothered about privacy, you can forward them to this number and get a transcription and a brief summary back. It works pretty well!

+16464965161

The youth are big on this. A young friend started with voice notes and has moved on to videos which is so demanding of my time and attention. I don’t need to see them lying in bed or on the loo talking at me when they could just as easy type it out and I can remain oblivious as to where they were at the time

One of our children does this, at huge volume with overdone intonation, you need to play it twice to understand properly 😬 we hate it YANBU

Agree. Why don’t they use speech to text if it’s hard to type? I do that if I’m eg walking along and want to send a message. Easy for me, easy for the recipient.

Personal preference. I like them. I will listen when I'm cleaning or driving, or relaxing. Just ignore her vn if it gets on your nerves and she will eventually stop.

Anything over a sentence long is sooo boring and time consuming having to listen to a one way conversation.

Because they don’t want an actual conversation and they’re too lazy to type!

Yeah. ‘It’s quicker’….. er, not for me it’s not, I have to wait until I can properly listen, stop my music/podcast, not be at work etc. then listen through your ramble before I can reply 😄

I just refuse to listen to them . It’s incredibly rude !
The sender thinks I should waste two minutes of my time listening to them while they won’t take the thirty seconds to send a text !!!
If I get one I reply and say ‘ sorry , I don’t listen to voice messages , I don’t have the time . Text me if you want ‘ !
Then I delete !

Absolutely this. Weirdly voice note lovers seem to be vehemently against voice to text 😵‍💫 but the seemingly I’m the inverse of that so maybe there’s just 2 passionate camps.