Tired of the endless WhatsApp audios?

There are many unimportant things that ‘divide’ the world. Today we are talking about WhatsApp voice notes, an invention or a nuisance, depending on who thinks. Some people resort to them as if they were carrying a ‘Walkie talkie’ in their pocket and respond out loud until they say ‘ok’. Others, however, snort every time they find audio on a phone. Among the ‘pros’ of these notes is one that does not allow written messages: showing emotions, which is not always easy with emoticons. “If you listen to how the other says it and if he laughs, cries or is angry, you can’t guess the emotion of his words, you already have it,” says Inés Valderrábano, Health Psychologist at the
Claritas Psychological Institute. But, who doesn’t have a friend who, with the audio trend, ends up sending an almost three-minute note that looks more like a podcast than a message?

WhatsApp is constantly updated to please its users and has been on the warpath for some time to improve its application. In their fight for security, they wanted to block accounts that use other platforms to connect instead of the official one, then added options to prevent you from being included in the hateful chat groups, unless you had previously given your consent. And they also set out to combat ‘spam’ and ‘fake news’ with a ban on limiting the forwarding of messages. Now they have wanted to establish a kind of protocol regarding the famous audios (nearly 7,000 million voice messages are sent every day through the platform).

Through a guide, the company offers tips for use by Jo Bryant, an expert in British good manners.

no more than two minutes

For the specialist, the first rule is to adjust the duration of the shipment. And, as much as it has to be told, she recommends that it last “between one or two minutes.” She maintains that, once this time is exceeded, the message can already be a nuisance to the recipient. “If it’s too long to type but too short for a call, you’ve hit the sweet spot for voicemail,” Bryant says.

And what happens if, despite the recommendation, we receive a message of several minutes? “Unbearably long audios, you can play them at 1.5x or 2x speed to listen faster.” The tricks of all, go. Although if we speed it up too much it can be counterproductive, since even if we save time, we miss part of the information, the pauses, the nuances, the intonation or the intention that the sender wants to communicate to us, warns the expert.

“In this culture, everything is fast, immediate, there is no patience or waiting times, and this only reflects the obsession we have with making the most of time, something called chronopathy,” reflects the psychologist, who adds that in this way we lose “quality of relationship with the other, for which reason it may be necessary to stop and listen more”. If he is a loved one, friend or family member, and he tells us something but we don’t spend time with him, “I feel like we’re moving away from them.”

audio is for you

A warning in pursuit of good coexistence: let us be aware of the place in which we find ourselves when listening to this type of message. At the end of the day, the note has been sent to you, not to the people around you who are being forced to listen to it. “Keep the volume down or use headphones in crowded places. This is valid both for listening to the audios that are sent to us and for listening to our own messages, which there are many who do so immediately after sending them. A common and widespread practice. Does this tell us something? “Sometimes it can have connotations of insecurity, we repeat to confirm that we have done it well, that we have sounded convincing or that the message has a presence”, Valderrábano deepens.

Get to the point!

Who has not been forced to leave a place and look for a safe corner to listen to that string of questions that your friend asks you in the voice note? Get to the point and reduce the question marks! From the messaging network, they recommend taking into account the questions we ask in the audio so that our recipient does not forget half of it when they go to answer. Or, even worse, having to play the same message multiple times.

Reply with another audio

In another of Bryant’s recommendations, it is likely that not everyone will agree, especially those who hate this form of communication. “A two-way voice conversation is much better than a one-sided monologue. So if you get a voicemail, try to return it.” But without haste: that each one listens to him when he sees fit and responds in the same way. “An audio should not be intrusive to the other person.”