notthetup/whatsapp.md

## whatsapp.md

      
    Raw
  

              whatsapp.md
            
          
    WhatsApp (if used well) is one the best things that has happened in communications in recent times.
It is excellent for deepening bonds with friends, relatives, and professional contacts.
But you have to work to ensure that WhatsApp doesn't degenerate into uselessness/toxicity 
By default WhatsApp can be too noisy and a distraction. Here's 4 things I have done to improve the situation significantly:
1. Surgical notifications

2. Ruthless exits from noisy large groups

3. Proactive creation of smaller groups

4. Polite policing 
1. Surgical notifications:


3 customized levels of notifications
Disable all notifications for groups : No sound, no popup, nothing
Gentle, low-volume, low-duration notification for 1–1 chats
Proper notification for a selected few people: kids, spouse, boss, important small groups 
Any group messages I don't notice unless I actually open WhatsApp or go to the WhatsApp Web tab.
Non-important 1–1s give gentle notifications which I ignore if I'm busy but check out if I'm goofing off.
"Proper notifications" are rare and I almost always open. 

This notification regime significantly reduces the distraction factor of WhatsApp for me. 
Now for noise (2. Ruthless exits from noisy large groups)


Ruthlessly quit groups that have high noise and low original content. It seems difficult to quit some groups (either because of FOMO or because people will see you as rude). But I say your concerns are overblown 
I know a few people who quit all large groups (yes, that includes the large family cousins groups but not the smaller close family groups) with this text :


Hello all, I have also realised that I spend a lot of time on my phone and WhatsApp takes up a lot of that time. I am quitting all large groups. I am always looking forward to one-to-one convesations. Thank you!


They have no regrets (and no negative blowback from the other group members AFAIK).

3. Proactive creation of smaller groups

Replace the large groups with smaller, more focused groups. Proactively create such groups if they don't exist.
And disallow generic forwards on those groups. You have to explicitly police violations of this policy a few times after which people fall in line 
4. Polite policing 

On some of the larger groups, I am notorious as the person who scolds others (politely) for posting irrelevant forwards. I believe it has helped the groups have high quality, personal conversations and people actually read most of the messages on those groups. 
Some people used to send me generic forwards via 1–1 messages. An uncle. An uncle-in-law. An older neighbor. I screwed up the courage to politely tell them that I don't want these messages
They took me off their broadcast lists. And I still have good relations with them 
And finally: I don't feel the compulsion to respond to messages immediately. Some people get a little huffy about it: "you seen-zoned me."
Yes. I was busy.
After the first few times, people understand. 
This is what allows me to have the WhatsApp Web tab on all the time even when I'm working without it becoming a distraction. And keeps it a high content low noise channel for me.