Whatsappened?

Illustration/Uday Mohite

See, I'm a WhatsApp kinda guy. For starters, it's free, and more importantly, it works in weak WiFi zones. But now, boom, voila, suddenly I'm being told by the app, that I have to abide by some rules, there are privacy issues, some of my data may be security breached! So my question is, "What data?". I want to ask that dude, Mark Zuckerbeg, "What more do you want to know about me? The truly private stuff you'll never get, all my privacy data is in my head - my fears, my Fixed Deposit details, my Freudian fantasies, my fury towards our governance, my Fez and Marrakech travel details - none of it will ever be on Facebook. What's already there is all you'll get."

What's further complicating my life is I'm being tempted by an alternative communication tool called Telegram - to us non-millennials, telegrams were that light pink thingy you sent from hill stations in the 80s - and then it hit me. WhatsApp Inc will have access to all the 50 assorted WhatsApp groups I'm on.

In the new social media world, two's company, three's a WhatsApp group.

Maybe I've conveyed too much of my life on these group chats, maybe WhatsApp/Facebook wants the information that I've blabbed/inadvertently let out on these chats, right? I better scroll up and check.

Have I said anything controversial or confidential - may be I should exit, at least 47 of these groups. But, to leave a WhatsApp group is a deep insult. Other members feel upset like they've wronged you or you've wronged them. Recently, I left a group called Goan Delicacies. To be honest, the straw on the camel's back was someone suggesting how to make a pork vindaloo with olive oil. I mean, how absurd is that? But moments after I exited, there were questions running amok: "Did we say something that annoyed you, Rahul?", "Have you joined the other competitive group called The Real Goan Delicacies?",
"Have you turned vegan?", "Are you really Goan?".

Would I dare leave my school WhatsApp group called "ICSE 1978"?

Everyone has a school WhatsApp group, right? Take our chat this morning - two of my classmates, both seriously high powered men: Prabhat Pant, now living in the US advises the Department of Defence, and Uttam Sood, teaches political science at Harvard University. You'd think the conversation would be intelligent, much healthy back and forth debate. So, I ask, "Guys, what's the expert view on Trump's impeachment?"

And the following conversation flows.

Prabhat: "Hey ya Daku…forget all this deep talk, let's get nostalgic and gossip. Uttam, you remember Trupti Gupta, in Class VIII?"

Uttam: "Trupti Gupta… haan yaar! She was that real smasher, sat next to Smita Gurshahani."

"Yeah, the one you could never get to dance with you."

"You won't believe who she married."

"Yeah, that pimply-faced guy from C Division."

"No. She divorced him, she's married again…"

"Can you believe that pimply guy runs Stan Chart, Asia Pacific?"

"Noooo shut up, get out of here."

So on and so forth.

Fifteen grown up men, heading major corporations around the world, back to being delinquent school kids.

Yeah, I think I'm gonna exit WhatsApp.

So should one head of a TV channel, who at the moment, could go from a security breach situation to maximum security prison.

Rahul daCunha is an adman, theatre director/playwright, photographer and traveller. Reach him at rahul.dacunha@mid-day.com