Sunday, and two things at once
Look at a message written to several people, work out who each part of your answer belongs to, and get it to exactly those people and nobody else.
This course has been about the people at the other end: their faces on a call, the family group, the ones you would tell first. Every bit of it comes down to knowing who is at the other end before you press anything.
A message written to four people and a family group chat are the same animal wearing different clothes — what you send goes to everyone on the list, and the only question is ever whether everyone on the list needs it. Here is one of those, with two things asked in it, and nothing on the screen to tell you which button either answer wants.
Key points
- See at a glance who a message actually went to, before answering it.
- Answer everybody when everybody is waiting, and one person when it is one person’s business.
- Send a photograph or a recipe to several people at once without it reaching anybody who did not ask.
What to remember
- Reply answers the person who wrote. Reply to all answers everybody whose name was on it, which on a family message of four is exactly right and on a message with forty names on it is exactly wrong. The list is written at the top of every message ever sent and takes two seconds to read, and reading it first is the whole of the skill — nobody who reads it gets this wrong. A group chat on a phone is the same thing again: everything written in it goes to everybody in it, so the only question is whether everybody in it needs it. And when the answer is no, a separate message to one person is never rude. It is the polite version.
- Honestly — how was that?
Try this
Open the last group message anybody sent you and read the list of names at the top of it. That list is precisely who would read your answer if you pressed Reply to all — and knowing it before you press is the whole skill.
Practice: Sunday, and two things at once. Your first lesson is free, with no account or card; the rest are part of a Lantern plan. Interactive lessons require JavaScript.