Okay, so, today I wanted to mess around with something I saw on the New York Times Mini crossword. It was this clue, “Goes tap-tap-tap in a texting app,” and I was like, “What the heck could that be?” I mean, I’m on my phone all the time, texting away, but I never really thought about it like that.
First, I grabbed my phone and opened up my usual texting app. I started typing a message to my buddy, just a simple “Hey, what’s up?” As I typed, I really paid attention to the feeling of my fingers hitting the screen. Tap-tap-tap, just like the clue said. It was kinda funny because I’d never really noticed how much that tapping is a part of texting.
Then, I tried a few other texting apps. You know, just to see if there was any difference. I switched over to that other messaging app, you know, the one with the blue icon, and typed out the same message. Tap-tap-tap again. It was pretty much the same deal, but maybe the sound was a little different? I don’t know, maybe I was just imagining things.
Next, I decided to get a little more into it. I searched online for stuff about phone tapping. I saw that sometimes when your phone has trouble shutting down, it can be a sign of it being tapped. I immediately tried to shut down my phone to test it out. Fortunately, it shut down normally, so I probably didn’t have to worry.
I also read about how clicking noises during phone calls could mean your phone is being tapped. I called my friend to see if I noticed anything, and I listened carefully. Luckily, I didn’t hear any weird clicking sounds, so I guess my phone was in the clear.
- Tried turning off my phone – backlight didn’t stay on.
- Called a friend – didn’t hear any clicking noises.
So, after all that, I figured out that the “tap-tap-tap” thing is really just about typing on your phone. It’s how you write messages in any texting app. I mean, it seems obvious now, but it was a fun little experiment to actually think about it.
Oh, and I also checked out some stuff about how wiretapping works. It’s all pretty complicated, but it sounds like you can’t just tap someone’s phone by calling them. Phew! That’s a relief. It seems like phone taps are usually done physically, which is a bit creepy, but at least I don’t have to worry about random calls messing with my phone.
Anyway, that was my little adventure for the day. It all started with a crossword clue and ended with me learning a bit more about how my phone works. Not bad for a random afternoon, right?
