I was careful enough not to say that most people are sitting in front or close to their personal laptops. I said a lot of people most of the time. (And also didn't say personal, but I guess that doesn't matter.)

The point of the laptop is not checking the messages, but typing them. If you're at home, which is where a lot of us are these days, it's pretty easy to open the laptop and save time on typing.

BTW, not sure why I got downvoted. Maybe it wasn't you, we'll see.

But that's exactly the point: if it's not most people, then network effects are already greatly limited. And if those laptops aren't their personal laptops, then the odds of them having a personal messaging client open are even lower. Consider that most people do have their personal phone on them at all times.

My point was exactly that pressuring people to have the client on their phone makes them check the messages more often, because that makes the service more attractive to other users. That, I think, is the reason most popular service are phone-first, even when typing messages is easier on desktop.

(And no, I didn't downvote.)