We used to have the back and forth of actual conversation. Now we have phones filled with our friends’ rambling soliloquies
T
he message I most dread receiving on WhatsApp isn’t “Call me” or “I can’t believe what you did last night”. It’s “I’m just going to vn you, it’ll be easier”. I roll my eyes as I fish my grubby headphones out of my bag to listen to yet another voice note.
Voice notes were fun when WhatsApp introduced them in 2013, but what was once a novelty has become too many people’s go-to method of communication. We are now faced with what feels to me like a voice note epidemic. Side effects may include the cheapening of conversation and a startling increase in narcissism.
WhatsApp estimates that 7bn audio messages are sent on its platform every day. And Britons are serious offenders, sending an average of 58 hours’ worth of these digital soliloquies a year. Senders can be spotted on their morning commute, phone held in front of them at a 45-degree angle, as they wax lyrical about a colleague who never replenishes the communal biscuit tin or a situationship who, surprise, doesn’t want to be in a relationship. These wannabe podcast hosts interrupt themselves with: “Oh my god, such a cute dog” or “Oops, was nearly ploughed down by a bicycle”, as if the listener needs environmental colour as they strain to understand the story soup sloshing around in their ears.
