India, Dec. 19 -- It started with the BlackBerry. Those pre-smartphone devices put, for the first time, every incoming notification, on a single device. Early fans (you know who you are) would reach for the phone first thing in the morning, and start replying to texts and emails. Read receipts became tiny moral tests. Speed became a form of virtue.

Now, we're snowed under. We clear unread messages mid-commute, we record voice notes between meetings, we're half listening to an IRL story to respond to a DM, we jump when the phone pings. Friends expect instant reactions to Reels. Colleagues interpret a five-minute pause on Slack as a crisis. Family groups treat silence as a personal slight. Bank loan SMSes pop up in the morning, Uber wants ...