During the pandemic, a combination of fears over Covid, anger over police racism and sheer cabin fever saw company Slack channels boil with discontent. One day in February 2021, Mike Pesca, a contrarian podcaster, made the mistake of getting stuck in, voicing controversial opinions to his colleagues - in between shovelling snow from his parents’ driveway. And then he saw the dreaded words, "several people are typing …".A Tempo &amp; Talker production for BBC Radio 4

Left The Chat: No 4. I Married a ChatBot

Helen Lewis Has Left the Chat. Have you ever been trapped in a group chat nightmare, either grabbing the popcorn or wondering how to leave without causing a scene? Who's the admin in your family group, and do they wield that power responsibly? Do you ever wonder if it's appropriate to use emojis when talking to your boss? The rise of instant messaging has made our social and professional lives faster, more casual — and more chaotic. But amid all the discussion of the effects of public social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, there has been relatively little attention paid to private social networks—the direct message and the group chat — and how they are shaping our relationships and our world. In this series, Helen Lewis looks at the secret world of instant messaging, meeting a woman who married a chatbot, discovering how Russian dissidents are fighting a propaganda war, and hearing the inside story of how Britain ended up governed from a single WhatsApp group. It's a strange new world where workplace rebellions are conducted through duelling emojis and military secrets are traded on chat forums about a children's cartoon. It's also a world where you can never be quite sure who you're talking to—and who's eavesdropping on you.