Voice messaging – conversational gain or pain?

The warmth of a call with the ease of a text - or just a time-wasting nuisance? Either way, they are the new chat

Trawl through social media or simply have the misfortune to be friends with an early adopter of tech trends and you'll see that the next big form of communication is upon us. It isn't a brand new app or some strange semaphore. In some ways, it's a throwback to the 1980s era of answering machines. "Voice messaging" - sending recorded voice messages to recipients using apps such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and Telegram - is having a moment. Unlike with voicemail, there's no opportunity for the recipient to pick up and chat, and you can mix voice messages in with regular chat messages. For those who haven't yet had the pleasure of encountering them, here's what you need to know.