Late to the party, then. Most people I know went on silent a decade or more ago.
Oh and while we are at it, notifications are for important things I need to know, not for fucking ads. Any app that uses notifications for ads gets deleted.
Been on silent for over a decade too, but in an outlier and friends phones are so damn annoying.
Good for you. Unfortunately that’s not the case with most people, or else it wouldn’t be an article
Yeah, it IS good for me. Sorry you’re only just now figuring this out. Meanwhile techies sorted it out 15 years ago.
Theres a “do not disturb at night” option on all modern phones nowadays for people who dont want to become unreachable
And you can configure certain apps or contacts to be excluded, at least on Android. I assume iOS can do the same.
True, one of the first thing I did on my phone, set to DnD from 22h to 7h,except for phone calls and SMS from known contacts.
I changed mine to all calls after a friend called 2am from a cell and I didn’t get it. Still only certain texts though
Should have it set to repeated calls from any number ring through.
iOS also has a nice feature where if you get called by the same number twice in a short period of time it will let the second call through.
The pessimist in me knows it’s just a matter of time until robo callers figure that one out and start double calling, but it is nice peace of mind for now.
A lot of them already do call twice in a row, thanks apple.
Samsung galaxy has the same feature (at least on the S25, I don’t recall if I had it on the S10)
Please don’t tell anyone I know about this feature.
Here’s how my next family gathering would go if I were in the movie Liar Liar:
“Son! We never hear from you anymore! It’s so hard to get ahold of you these days!”
“Yeaaaaah…”
“Everytime I call, there’s never any answer, and your mailbox is full.”
“Yeah. I’ve intentionally kept my voicemailbox full for the past 3 years. Then I turn the ringer to silent, as it has been for 10 years”
“Why?”
“Well, I love all of you, but it is EXAUSTING to talk to most of you for more than 30 minutes, and not very often. If you notice, at Christmas, and other holidays, I tend to flutter. I don’t want to spend any more than 15 minutes with any one of you, so when you start building up your bs, I flutter to the next person, and the cycle renews. Look, I know my niece is only 13, but she better start dating by 15, and have a kid by 18. Look, BEST case scenario, I don’t get to play retro video games with a kid seeing them for the first time for AT LEAST 8-9 years. And that’s assuming my niece grows up waaaaaaay faster than I expect her to. She may not have a kid until she’s 30! I’m not going to be the cool uncle in his late 40s, spending time with the kid, so he feels included…I would be the weird uncle in his late 60s, trying to show his great nephew novelty video games from 80 years prior. And at that point I lose my buffer! Ok, I’m sorry. I would absolutely prefer to play video games with a kid I talk to once a year, and show him games of the past, than have to go have “grown up conversations”. Which roughly translated means hearing my boomer mom get progressively more openly racist, which historically was NEVER the case, and my boomer dad become increasively more peaceful, and accepting of others, and less racist…which is even MORE surprising! Because before Obama, he would not hesitate to throw the n-word around casually. So basically I don’t understand life right now. Then you got my sister, who I feel I should feel guilty for thinking she’s a bad person…but I don’t. She belittles anyone, even those close to her. She loves to argue and make those around her feel bad. Then there’s my other sister who used to be this social animal party drinker when she was in her 20s, and now in her 50s she loves judging people, and gossiping about the neighbors or whoever. Again, historically unlike her. Then there’s my brother in law, who I feel like is the reason my sister turned from free spirit to mean judgy type. And then there’s his parents, who aren’t bad people at all. His parents are salt of the earth people. They’re just really really…boring in every way. Finally there’s my niece. She’s 13, so she’s in that self awkward phase where she doesn’t talk to anyone and somehow gets away with it. Maaaaaan, just a few years ago she was my buffer! I played untitled goose game with her, pokemon with her, some driving game…now she stays in her room and avoids everybody! Lucky…”
And then everybody would look at me and stare. Everybodys feelings are hurt. So instead I just say
“Heh, yeah. I get a lot of telemarketers these days”
I swear to god, their dog better live like 30 years. She LOVES me everytime I come over. And she gets super excited and energetic. So I’m just like “I’ll Maisey for a walk!” And my sister is like “It’s 10 degrees, and blizzarding out there!” And I’m like “So does she have little doggy boots, and maybe like a sweater with overlaying wind breaker…orrrrr…what are we doing? Is this like a pulling her on a sled situation?” And she’d say “No there’s no doggy boots or sweaters, or sleds!” And I say “Well, I mean that’s kind of cruel though, don’t you think? To take her out in this without protection from the elements?” And she says “I WASN’T GOING TO TAKE HER OUT AT ALL!!!” and I just say “Woooowwwwwwww! Hear that Maisey? I’m the only one who loves you enough to take you for a walk. C’mon, we get the old wagon, and at the very least a blacket!”
And then leave the house for like…45 minutes to an hour.
Look, I love my family. I just don’t have the social stamina to interact with them.
Edit: Oh, and if you’ve never seen Liar Liar, the concept is this guy (jim carry) has a spell put on him where he can’t physically lie. So instead he just blurts out the cold hard truth. Go watch it. It’s good.
Thanks for sharing, it really did feel like a sketch out of the movie.
I guess I would also focus on the dog and the niece when they are more approachable and not as combative and so many people in your family are changing quite profoundly
I hope you have a lovely day without phone calls!
I disable notifications for most of my apps anyway, but the neural connections are still there and hard to undo. Breaking them is a long process in my experience… or maybe I reinforce them too much still.
Bro ya need to use your neuralizer
I’ve had mine on vibrate for years. Texting doesn’t trigger it, only calls. It’s been great. I look at my phone only when I’m ready to look at it.
Hmm maybe I should try this
Not sure how I can accomplish this. All my texts and calls are through signal and I still want notifications
I use signal too, exclusively apart from sms or the rare iMessage my grandparents send. It’s been fine. I can’t recall if it was app setting or it just works™, but I get no sounds, and still get notifications so I can check them when I have the time and energy to deal with all that.
Ofc I can set it like that for the whole app but does it allow phone calls to get through?
Yeah same here, and I haven’t missed it a bit. As a downside, I constantly misplace the thing and have to search for it when I hear the specific rhythmic vibration somewhere. If anyone had something extremely urgent, they’ll be able to call my partner or neighbor or something. And I do check the notifications daily, too, so Im never completely out of the loop.
I’ve noticed, also, that I’m much better at actually answering the phone or answering messages. Former since I so seldomly get any noticeable feedback from the phone, so it feels fine to grab it and answer if it rings and I happen to notice it. The messages, because I read them when I have time, so then I also have time to answer. I used to get messages and read them and I’d be in middle of something, so I’d just think to myself “I’ll reply later”, and I very rarely remembered and actually did.
It feels counterintuitive, but I’m not complaining. Life is much more peaceful. I get all the busy notifications and contacts and news and all that on my own terms, when I’m ready, and it feels great not to be disturbed while I’m working or cooking or whatever.
Am I the only one that just ignores calls and texts that I don’t want to respond to immediately or ever? I never have my ring volume up and I’ve muted almost all of my group chats, so only individual messages get through. My Pixel also does call screening which blocks a lot of trash from getting to me, and I keep space in my VM for when I have important calls get through that I either can’t or don’t want to answer.
You have a GOOGLE phone?!?! Does it notify ICE when you’re near an immigrant? JK
Google hardware is actually solid. Just don’t run Google software.
Yes, me too. My phone is always silent and with Do Not Disturb on. Only few family contacts can get through, and only with a phone call.
I don’t even know what’s the sound of the notifications of my phone. It’s blissful.
Own your notifications or they will surely own you.
Seems a lot of comments are arguing about this as if it’s an all-or-nothing. I use a dumbphone (for many reasons), but even it allows me to configure DND settings to allow certain phone numbers to audibly ring or vibrate. Surely smartphones can do the same? I find being with someone whose phone is constantly making noises to be very irritating–and more so if they interrupt our conversation to check it every time.
My not-so-dumb flip phone also has 3 indicator lights on the closed cover – red if battery is low, a green envelope if I have a message or other notification, and a blue phone if I’ve had a call (even those can be disabled). So I don’t have to touch it or do anything other than glance in its direction to know I have a message. “Smart” phones can do such simple things as this, can’t they?
I have my phone set to DND at all times, and I can confirm that you can allow certain notifications to come through. Only important notifications and calls from contacts come in. My peace of mind improved quite a bit with this change.
That’s good. Some of the comments were making me wonder!
I think some people may not realize how detrimental it can be to their quality of life or stress level, to have something constantly interrupting their attention or that it’s something that can be controlled without having to completely cut themselves off.
I miss blinkenlights on smartphones. They went out of style circa 2015, and now all you get is the screen turning on momentarily, or some variant of a dim always-on view that wastes battery.
They don’t blink except for the red one when it’s charging and stops when it’s full. The notification ones are solid. Yes, they are really nice to have!
I appreciate that Android changed from an opt-out to an opt-in model when it comes to notification permissions, but it’s still not enough. I can’t believe the mobile OS world became so much worse than actual computing. What a corporate hell scape.
I can’t emphasize how important it is for you to control your phone, especially notifications. Every notification is literally a mind hijacking attempt. Regardless of the type of notification, it’s something that disrupts our thinking and our flow.
Some of them are necessary—but most aren’t.
All the native apps will of course try to get as much permission from you as possible, including notifications. Don’t allow this permission freely.
Get really strict about which apps need to send you notifications, and when. Take it from a dude who used to give free reign to all apps for notifications.
Once I started thinking in a more digitally minimalistic way, it made a huge difference. Running GrapheneOS actually helped with this a lot. But you don’t need GOS to do this and feel the difference.
I got some notifications turned on, but most of em are silent. So they still get delivered, but they’re not time-sensitive. They’ll be there when I check my phone next. I don’t need em interrupting whatever I was doing or thinking.
TL;DR: Be strict about which notifications you allow, and when. It’ll do wonders for your thinking, productivity, and mental health.
I’m probably a nightmare to get hold of at a moment’s notice – and should never, ever be someone’s In Case of Emergency, much to my partner’s chagrin.
Any phone will allow you to still receive notifications for select contacts or numbers that call repeatedly in a given time frame with DND on so she’s chosen to not be directly contactable by her partner or be his emergency contact. I would be offended by that if I was in his shoes, especially considering they have two young children.
I had to scroll too far for this. If your child is a school and there’s an emergency, or your husband gets into an accident, or a million other very important things. You’ll just get back to them whenever? This seems borderline neglectful.
I keep Do Not Disturb on most of the time and my wife can contact me at any time. Her and a few others are flagged as exceptions.
Most allow you to also nominate VIP contacts that always get through, he should dump her
Headlines like this are annoying AF. You wouldn’t want your doctor keeping their phone on DND 24/7.
Edit: I didn’t expect people to need examples, but here you go, something that happened to me few months ago:
23:21 - my IP phone rings, I’m literally about to go to sleep but I set this specific type of call to come through. I recognize the number and I know it’s an emergency so I pick it up. A patient’s family calling about them being in their local ER and the ER physician is about to pull the plug on my patient. I spend the next hour yelling at the ER physician to do his fucking job, frantically arranging a transfer. Next day afternoon, I’m having a full conversation with my patient in our hospital. If I didn’t fight for this person, and let this go through the regular channels, they would have died.
My comment isn’t primarily about work culture or work/life balance. There are some calls that you take because it’s the right thing. Advice from people who claim they can turn off all notifications just tells me two things, 1) they don’t know how notification scheduling works 2) they aren’t the kind of people that others ever rely on in an emergencies.
Your doctor has a work phone that is available only during hours.
if they are doing outpatient work, they don’t. even worse, the paging systems migrated to cell phones.
sauce: am doctor
You really should use a separate phone though. Even if it’s just a virtual phone. Everyone deserves to have free time.
I use an IP phone for calls that you can switch off. The paging system is a whole 'nother story.
I have been using scheduled do not disturb for over a decade, it makes SUCH a difference. I always have it on 10 PM - 7 AM, and I have started enabling it for an hour if work picks up or if I’m at the gym so I can focus.
My work phone is on DND more than not, I’m available 7:30 AM - 5 PM on weekdays and it is in DND otherwise, super nice.
I just turned off notifications for everything, except Signal and banking apps. Most convenient solution IMO.
I love scheduled and automation based DND, except that about twice per year, SOMETHING SOMEWHERE updates and causes my alarm to be silenced by DND, despite having my clock app exempted from every possible silencing mechanism I can find.
For the life of me, I can’t understand why that would ever be a useful behavior, let along default one.
Lucky for me, I have a pretty robust internal clock, but Holy Fuck is that annoying.
I ignore any calls that are not from my contacts. If it’s important they’ll leave a message. I have DND on at night. Calls and messages from my wife have separate sounds and exception from DND.
