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For the most part, I do not like iMessage Tapbacks. While it's marginally fun to send a little heart if you don't have anything else to say, the feature brings mostly unnecessary push notifications and confusion. (Did you even know those things were called Tapbacks?)

Which is why it's hard for me to admit they have a really good alternative use: polls.

This trick is particularly useful during social distancing, when group chats are popping off like never before. If your group of friends wants to schedule a Zoom call, for instance, you'd generally have to either work a good time out via text or use a third party website like Doodle to see when everyone's free. Sure, there is a Polls for iMessage app, but I don't want to download that and neither do you.

Or you could text a list of times to your group chat, then have everyone react to the one they prefer. Here is an example I received recently from a friend while we were trying to schedule a Zoom happy hour. (We decided on Thursday.)

If you don't have anything to schedule, you can also use Tapbacks to conduct informal polls. Want to know if you should pay $1,000 on eBay for a used Nintendo Switch? Ask your friends right in the group chat and watch them disappoint you rapidly. (You should not do that, by the way.) Trying to think of a name for the foster cat that, let's face it, you have bonded with so strongly in self-isolation that there's no way you won't adopt it? Throw a few names out there and see who hearts what.

Maybe I am the last person to know about this, but I'm willing to take that risk. Sending useless and impromptu polls to my friends has given me at least 10-15 minutes of excitement, and I wish that for you as well. Enjoy.

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