WhatsApp's new privacy policy is so bad it might be illegal(androidpolice.com)
androidpolice.com
WhatsApp's new privacy policy is so bad it might be illegal
https://www.androidpolice.com/2021/04/13/whatsapps-new-privacy-policy-is-so-bad-it-might-be-illegal/
243 comments
> I feel like I will just give up and use WhatsApp and assume that I only had privacy pre-internet.
Yup, this is it. The point they've been waiting for us to cross. It was inevitable imo to not give up and surrender to it. It feels like we as a society are slowing transcending from the 4th to the 5th stage of grief.
Yup, this is it. The point they've been waiting for us to cross. It was inevitable imo to not give up and surrender to it. It feels like we as a society are slowing transcending from the 4th to the 5th stage of grief.
I don’t think non-nerds really think about privacy online all that much. This privacy catastrophe is only felt in places like HN.
I talk to my friends, parents, and family about it a lot. They don't understand it, but they do care. Problem is that they don't understand how to fight back. They do not want to give up on Facebook. They also are afraid to switch to a service like Signal because "no one is there." So I think they care, but there's a big sense of helplessness. Honestly that's why I like projects like Signal. There's no way I can get people to use PGP through emails, it is too much work. But anyone can use something like Signal.
> They also are afraid to switch to a service like Signal because "no one is there."
I've been thinking about this a bit, and I'm going to stop short of asking people to switch, and just try to get them to install it (and maybe even get them to casually suggest their friends do the same, if the opportunity arises). It's a hopefully small, risk-free step to take, and the more people that have installs, the more likely it is that "no one is there" will start becoming not true, even if not immediately.
I've been thinking about this a bit, and I'm going to stop short of asking people to switch, and just try to get them to install it (and maybe even get them to casually suggest their friends do the same, if the opportunity arises). It's a hopefully small, risk-free step to take, and the more people that have installs, the more likely it is that "no one is there" will start becoming not true, even if not immediately.
I work in tech and I don't know a single person on Signal. It was already hard enough to get my family to start using WhatsApp over the years, and I still get messages from some of them over Skype(!!!!) for some reason. Frankly, I have no strength for yet another switch, I'm staying with WhatsApp for the time being.
Your mileage clearly varies. Like many people here, I also work in tech. Even before the WhatsApp privacy policy fiasco, there were a good few dozens of my contacts on Signal. Afterwards, there was a push like I haven't seen in all the years I've been using it.
Like many people, I'd definitely prefer having just one messenger, but now I simply use Signal with everyone that's on it and only have to open WhatsApp a few times a week. This entire thing has to be seen as a process IMO.
Like many people, I'd definitely prefer having just one messenger, but now I simply use Signal with everyone that's on it and only have to open WhatsApp a few times a week. This entire thing has to be seen as a process IMO.
> I have no strength for yet another switch
Pidgin with a shitton of plugins. If the only problem is the migration, that still works as a single client, albeit with drawbacks and hiccups. (I collected them at https://github.com/petermolnar/awesome-pidgin-plugins and yes, it'll need to be compiled, even Pidgin itself for some of the solutions. There's nothing user friendly about it, sadly.)
On the other hand... the only system I never had to migrate off is IRC. The funny bit of IRC is that it's not private in terms of security at all, but because it's anonymus, it still feels like it.
And so I keep thinking about needs when it comes to privacy: what do I really need in the context of internet communication? Anonymity, privacy, or both?
I don't have a definitive answer.
Pidgin with a shitton of plugins. If the only problem is the migration, that still works as a single client, albeit with drawbacks and hiccups. (I collected them at https://github.com/petermolnar/awesome-pidgin-plugins and yes, it'll need to be compiled, even Pidgin itself for some of the solutions. There's nothing user friendly about it, sadly.)
On the other hand... the only system I never had to migrate off is IRC. The funny bit of IRC is that it's not private in terms of security at all, but because it's anonymus, it still feels like it.
And so I keep thinking about needs when it comes to privacy: what do I really need in the context of internet communication? Anonymity, privacy, or both?
I don't have a definitive answer.
> "no one is there" will start becoming not true, even if not immediately.
Still waiting for that to be the case. After 6 years of using Signal, I have a whopping... two... people in my contacts who also use it.
The most common response is still "Why don't you just use Whatsapp?"
Pretty much the only way we're going to see critical mass with Signal is if someone like Google were to make it their default platform for messaging.
Still waiting for that to be the case. After 6 years of using Signal, I have a whopping... two... people in my contacts who also use it.
The most common response is still "Why don't you just use Whatsapp?"
Pretty much the only way we're going to see critical mass with Signal is if someone like Google were to make it their default platform for messaging.
I got my parents to install Signal a while ago, now in the recent 2-3 months their Signal contact lists have at least doubled when Signal got an unexpected boost by WhatsApp's privacy PR nightmare. I don't expect things to change much, though.
Because in the end normal users think about the functionality and price first, everything else second. Privacy? Just a neat-sounding bonus you can feel good about if your favorite app includes it and don't care about if it doesn't.
Because in the end normal users think about the functionality and price first, everything else second. Privacy? Just a neat-sounding bonus you can feel good about if your favorite app includes it and don't care about if it doesn't.
> Because in the end normal users think about the functionality and price first, everything else second.
I think the most important factor here is network effects.
I think the most important factor here is network effects.
You could show them this Signal commercial. https://twitter.com/signalapp/status/1354915823501025280?s=2...
Their reasons are completely valid honestly. There's nothing that feels like you have no power than using a chat app with none of your friends on it.
Only way to really take power back is make an app better than what's on the market, and have it respect your privacy. A very, very tall order, but I think it's the only way we can really take power away from big tech and give it back to the people.
Only way to really take power back is make an app better than what's on the market, and have it respect your privacy. A very, very tall order, but I think it's the only way we can really take power away from big tech and give it back to the people.
Sorry for the misunderstanding. I'm not trying to say that their concerns are invalid. They very much are valid.
I don't think you can win by just having a better app. Marketing plays a big role. So something like Signal is going to be a major underdog because OSS and freeware don't have the same cashflow to do marketing. What I'm trying to say is that we need to be that marketing. Talking about data and privacy _is_ that marketing.
I don't think you can win by just having a better app. Marketing plays a big role. So something like Signal is going to be a major underdog because OSS and freeware don't have the same cashflow to do marketing. What I'm trying to say is that we need to be that marketing. Talking about data and privacy _is_ that marketing.
Sorry but Signal is just not a "better app". Yes, it has privacy and such, but the app itself is worse. I'm not even talking about missing features like not having chat backups, but the UI itself is slow and unpolished.
- scrolling contact list is slow and stutters - opening Signal displays empty frame far too long - it's not possible to add/invite a person during the call, you need to define groups for group calls - forwarding message from chat to chat is not working - messages in a chat take too much space. If a person sent three consecutive messages, don't display his name on all of them, just on first one.
And the worst thing is those polish fixes don't have to do anything with crypto and privacy. It's purely client side issue, but Moxie & Co. decided their priority is adding MobileCoint inside a chat app instead of polishing existing clients.
- scrolling contact list is slow and stutters - opening Signal displays empty frame far too long - it's not possible to add/invite a person during the call, you need to define groups for group calls - forwarding message from chat to chat is not working - messages in a chat take too much space. If a person sent three consecutive messages, don't display his name on all of them, just on first one.
And the worst thing is those polish fixes don't have to do anything with crypto and privacy. It's purely client side issue, but Moxie & Co. decided their priority is adding MobileCoint inside a chat app instead of polishing existing clients.
I'm not using signal as my main SMS app because until a week ago, it didn't notify me when I got a text. Which is kind of a problem.
A distinction without a difference. It matters little how much they say they care if the few taps to download a new app and some nonsense "but what if my friends list isn't totally full, the horror!" fear is what's stopping them, especially when they clearly know someone who can and is willing to help them (ie. you).
I wonder how quickly they would switch if WhatsApp started requiring a monthly fee to use it. I get the feeling that big sense of helplessness would suddenly vanish.
If they claim to care so much about online data privacy, let them prove it. They've already proven they care a lot about price.
I wonder how quickly they would switch if WhatsApp started requiring a monthly fee to use it. I get the feeling that big sense of helplessness would suddenly vanish.
If they claim to care so much about online data privacy, let them prove it. They've already proven they care a lot about price.
Your view of the average user is unnecessarily uncharitable and antagonistic. People want privacy, but they also want to talk to their friends: that much is given. But…to basically any normal user, an app that offers privacy but doesn't let them talk to their friends is useless. Not everyone has the time or ability to go around proselytizing their acquaintances to switch to a new app to talk to them. To be honest, a lot barely have the time to figure out how to use a new app…
So how did they start using chatting to their friends with their current chat service in the first place? By that logic, few people would ever leave IRC or Skype or whatever they started using first. Users move, they just don't move for privacy. The fact that proselytization is even required to move to Signal is telling.
Everyone has time and ability to make their own choices with like-minded friends. They do it for everything else, that's how they started using WhatsApp and co in the first place. Their claims to caring about privacy are as convincing as a friend who keeps telling you "sorry, I'm too busy", "another time then?", "maybe", repeated ad nauseam. Then you see them at another party with someone else confusingly named "WhatsApp" and you realize they just couldn't make time for you, who is named "Signal".
Again, look at how quickly users switch when a service requires payment (IIRC WhatsApp did try to do this once and a lot of users chose to leave instead of paying). They're just too busy & helpless, right? How much proselytization did that take?
Everyone has time and ability to make their own choices with like-minded friends. They do it for everything else, that's how they started using WhatsApp and co in the first place. Their claims to caring about privacy are as convincing as a friend who keeps telling you "sorry, I'm too busy", "another time then?", "maybe", repeated ad nauseam. Then you see them at another party with someone else confusingly named "WhatsApp" and you realize they just couldn't make time for you, who is named "Signal".
Again, look at how quickly users switch when a service requires payment (IIRC WhatsApp did try to do this once and a lot of users chose to leave instead of paying). They're just too busy & helpless, right? How much proselytization did that take?
Whatsapp built its userbase over several years. It did so at a time where it had a clear value prop, replacing sms which cost a lot with something nearly free. It grew in popularity in eastern european countries, spread later in europe and then later in the US when Facebook acquired them.
This was a process, not a 1-day switch from skype to whatsapp. The network effects are real, and if you don't understand how difficult it is to get people to join a chat app, you won't win.
This was a process, not a 1-day switch from skype to whatsapp. The network effects are real, and if you don't understand how difficult it is to get people to join a chat app, you won't win.
The network effects were real for SMS too, yet users still moved to WhatsApp because it was free (much to the chagrin of incumbent carriers), that's what users wanted.
Of course it's difficult to get people to join a chat app, and it should be. At a minimum you should need to provide something that users want and didn't have before. WhatsApp offered something new, it was an effective price tag of zero with phone number contacts. Skype offered something new and desirable (until it didn't). Snapchat offered something new and desirable. All of them had predecessors with network effects and still succeeded by giving users something they really wanted. They didn't throw their hands up and blame users.
Of course it's difficult to get people to join a chat app, and it should be. At a minimum you should need to provide something that users want and didn't have before. WhatsApp offered something new, it was an effective price tag of zero with phone number contacts. Skype offered something new and desirable (until it didn't). Snapchat offered something new and desirable. All of them had predecessors with network effects and still succeeded by giving users something they really wanted. They didn't throw their hands up and blame users.
Signal offers nothing new to users right now. "Privacy" is too abstract. E2EE? The few users who know what that is tend to know that Whatsapp already has it. In fact, those shitty crypto payments might be the only thing Signal does offer to users. But you also lose out on chat syncing for example.
Surprisingly though, Signal is gaining a bit of traction, so I think "Privacy" is still something people do want. But it has to be better defined.
And to be completely honest I don't believe in Signal. The current messenger wars kind of feel like a parallel universe's email wars "yahoo vs gmail vs hotmail vs live" or something. Coming up with a new messenger is easy. Most of them have the same featuresets. The underlying protocols should be compatible instead of this sorry state of affairs.
Matrix will probably win out in the end but it's going to be long-drawn and unnecessarily annoying for users in the mean time. It shouldn't matter if you're using instagram's UI, or messenger's, or signal's, …. You should get access to the contacts you want, and be able to cross-talk.
Surprisingly though, Signal is gaining a bit of traction, so I think "Privacy" is still something people do want. But it has to be better defined.
And to be completely honest I don't believe in Signal. The current messenger wars kind of feel like a parallel universe's email wars "yahoo vs gmail vs hotmail vs live" or something. Coming up with a new messenger is easy. Most of them have the same featuresets. The underlying protocols should be compatible instead of this sorry state of affairs.
Matrix will probably win out in the end but it's going to be long-drawn and unnecessarily annoying for users in the mean time. It shouldn't matter if you're using instagram's UI, or messenger's, or signal's, …. You should get access to the contacts you want, and be able to cross-talk.
It's interesting how people turn into such app misers when it comes to messengers. It's upsetting to have multiple different ones, even though they don't eat up disk space.
Some are very loyal to the Zuckerberg offerings. They ride or die with the Zuckster.
Some are very loyal to the Zuckerberg offerings. They ride or die with the Zuckster.
It's because each app is stealing your data on your phone - personal life, financial things going across your phone.
Most of them have been busted, multiple times.
It comes down to risk exposure, gotta make a deal with one devil, but you don't want a dozen bad actors ganging up on your data.
Most of them have been busted, multiple times.
It comes down to risk exposure, gotta make a deal with one devil, but you don't want a dozen bad actors ganging up on your data.
Some HN readers like me also don’t think about privacy much at all.
I like the sites and apps that accept my data as currency so that I can use/browse them without getting out my wallet. Plus I like seeing ads for products that I might want to buy. Win win.
I like the sites and apps that accept my data as currency so that I can use/browse them without getting out my wallet. Plus I like seeing ads for products that I might want to buy. Win win.
...but it is a catastrophe, nonetheless.
Which is why privacy protection has to come from the top (i.e. regulators), because most people don't know and/or don't care.
"we" care, up to the point of "it's too much effort", and "we" have tried to do a grassroots movement to get people to use more privacy-focused apps.
But these apps, in the end, are still owned by companies who are not charities; they want to earn money, and digitally, it feels like you can only make money by selling subscriptions, ads, or printing a cryptocurrency - and subscriptions don't work because of (sponsored / investor funded) free alternatives.
Anyway, if you put legislation in place like in Europe, the companies will have no choice. In theory anyway; in practice they find and abuse loopholes soon enough, or just do things covertly, hope they won't be found out, and just pay the fine if something does come up. Which they can easily afford by then, not so much from the money they earn from their monetization method, but stock market value.
"we" care, up to the point of "it's too much effort", and "we" have tried to do a grassroots movement to get people to use more privacy-focused apps.
But these apps, in the end, are still owned by companies who are not charities; they want to earn money, and digitally, it feels like you can only make money by selling subscriptions, ads, or printing a cryptocurrency - and subscriptions don't work because of (sponsored / investor funded) free alternatives.
Anyway, if you put legislation in place like in Europe, the companies will have no choice. In theory anyway; in practice they find and abuse loopholes soon enough, or just do things covertly, hope they won't be found out, and just pay the fine if something does come up. Which they can easily afford by then, not so much from the money they earn from their monetization method, but stock market value.
>Which is why privacy protection has to come from the top (i.e. regulators), because most people don't know and/or don't care.
I think there should only be legislation about stuff people care about.
I think there should only be legislation about stuff people care about.
Looking at the mass surveillance revelations by Snowden and other whistleblowers I'd say many people do care.
What makes you say people don't?
What makes you say people don't?
What in the world? They don’t have to use it. This has to be one of the worst arguments I’ve ever seen. Did your friends throw their iPhones in the trash when ApplePay came about?
The argument is "this app, which promises privacy and security in ways I do not have the skills to verify, is made by people who also think cryptocurrencies are a good idea". That is a pretty compelling argument to people who think cryptocurrencies are all about scams and/or useless pollution (a sizeable portion of society). It suggests that the people behind Signal may not be as trustworthy as they're made out to be.
Whether or not a bunch of competent security gurus on HN assure us that yes, Signal is still great and no, Moxie didn't go nuts, doesn't really influence the validity of that argument outside tech circles. Don't forget that we've all spent years training our aunts and nephews to not trust the companies that make the apps they use. It's a major marketing mistake and they should've known better.
Also, ApplePay has nowhere near the same stigma associated with it as cryptocurrencies do, I think your comparison is silly.
FWIW, if Signal was new today and someone would pitch me "a super secure messaging app with built-in crypto payments" I'd not easily get enthusiastic. I've been trained to treat any pitch that includes the word "crypto" or "token" with high suspicion, because of the crap magnets those technologies have been historically. Too many people's "get rich quick" schemes sounded exactly like that a few years ago.
Whether or not a bunch of competent security gurus on HN assure us that yes, Signal is still great and no, Moxie didn't go nuts, doesn't really influence the validity of that argument outside tech circles. Don't forget that we've all spent years training our aunts and nephews to not trust the companies that make the apps they use. It's a major marketing mistake and they should've known better.
Also, ApplePay has nowhere near the same stigma associated with it as cryptocurrencies do, I think your comparison is silly.
FWIW, if Signal was new today and someone would pitch me "a super secure messaging app with built-in crypto payments" I'd not easily get enthusiastic. I've been trained to treat any pitch that includes the word "crypto" or "token" with high suspicion, because of the crap magnets those technologies have been historically. Too many people's "get rich quick" schemes sounded exactly like that a few years ago.
>or useless pollution
Given the energy needed just for one transaction the currently popular ones are actually about useless pollution. It's not like bittorrent when it's not a technological problem but rather copyright owners agenda. In case of bitcoin, it is actually unsustainable technologically as a currency (as opposed to an asset). I get that cryptocurrencies can be efficient but not the ones that are popular right now.
> It suggests that the people behind Signal may not be as trustworthy as they're made out to be.
trust only works in retrospect (it can't be extended into the future to a party simply because they make a promise)
all such relationships have an expiry date (since as the trusted party evolves or needs to reinvent itself to satisfy shareholders). what can prevent this are bullet-proof contracts (that's not how people make decisions though - they never read the fine-print, review it when it changes and instead work on gut-feeling and emotions).
putting your trust into a brand/product is always going to eventually hurt you. A product having reached the size of Signal will most certainly throw part of it's user-base to the curb if it thinks it's held back by their opinions/goals.
The disconnect is people thinking Signal owes them something (when everybody actually used it for free until now).
trust only works in retrospect (it can't be extended into the future to a party simply because they make a promise)
all such relationships have an expiry date (since as the trusted party evolves or needs to reinvent itself to satisfy shareholders). what can prevent this are bullet-proof contracts (that's not how people make decisions though - they never read the fine-print, review it when it changes and instead work on gut-feeling and emotions).
putting your trust into a brand/product is always going to eventually hurt you. A product having reached the size of Signal will most certainly throw part of it's user-base to the curb if it thinks it's held back by their opinions/goals.
The disconnect is people thinking Signal owes them something (when everybody actually used it for free until now).
> trust only works in retrospect
Nonsense. Trust provides a basis for present and future dealings.
Nonsense. Trust provides a basis for present and future dealings.
please get in touch by email, I have a business proposal for you.
I highly recommend Robert Cialdini before making opinionated comments on trust: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence:_Science_and_Practic...
I highly recommend Robert Cialdini before making opinionated comments on trust: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence:_Science_and_Practic...
No, because, and this is very crucial:
I don't trust you.
I don't trust you.
sounds like you did not understand that this was rhetorical?
I understood that perfectly, and I pointed out to you that your rhetorical argument is invalid.
Not everybody. The people who donated to the project owes Moxie not using their money to get rich off a pump and dump scheme.
Is ApplePay associated with endless scams like ICO, extremely problematic security requiring extreme experience to avoid theft, massive transfer fees, lack of usability, endless scams and massive spam advertising such scam everywhere?
And several other serious problems.
And several other serious problems.
Have you stopped using cash? Think of all the drugs and organized crime that rely on it.
You are being incredibly close-minded and only listing the cons of cryptocurrencies.
You are being incredibly close-minded and only listing the cons of cryptocurrencies.
Nobody is being close-minded. I think you're mixing up "X is often associated with Y" and "X sucks because of Y". I don't think anybody in this thread is making the latter point particularly strongly.
The fact is that many people have negative associations with crypto. Even if they're wrong, it's still going to be bad marketing for Signal.
The fact is that many people have negative associations with crypto. Even if they're wrong, it's still going to be bad marketing for Signal.
Cash is widely used for nonscammy purposes and I had plenty of good contacts with it.
My sole contact with cryptocurrencies is endless spam in mailbox, endless scam attempts in communities that I moderate and information about ICO and other scams. And <s>investments</s> gambling. And very rare cases of cryptocurrencies being useful for something.
And repeated info about being utter failure for payments. For comparison cash/credit card payment is done within 20 seconds for cc and within minute for cash. Both at cost of below 0.01 $ for payment.
My sole contact with cryptocurrencies is endless spam in mailbox, endless scam attempts in communities that I moderate and information about ICO and other scams. And <s>investments</s> gambling. And very rare cases of cryptocurrencies being useful for something.
And repeated info about being utter failure for payments. For comparison cash/credit card payment is done within 20 seconds for cc and within minute for cash. Both at cost of below 0.01 $ for payment.
Not taking sides here, just to nitpick that payment settlement takes a lot longer than that with credit card. It's like calling a bitcoin transfer with 0 confirmations "done", and which case it's actually faster than credit cards.
My customers in Latin America still use whatsapp so i have no choice but to use it even if they go full bitcoin mining malware.
Yeah, the feature will be opt-in as far as I've heard. Most of the people I've convinced to switch to Signal will either be unaware of it or not care.
To me it looks like people here are vastly overreacting.
To me it looks like people here are vastly overreacting.
> they don’t want anything to do with bitcoins
Honestly, this is a bad argument. You can use Signal and never send a gif or stickers. You don't have to do anything with ~~stickers~~crypto when using Signal. It is an opt-in feature that is probably going to not be used my 90% of people. This is just a bad argument surrounding the whole ordeal.
Now the arguments about: regulations, Moxie's involvement (stated he has no coins but there's other potential issues), and how the final system will actually look like (e.g. should it be a second app), those are valid arguments that we should be discussing. But the above one just isn't great and I'm tired of seeing it.
Honestly, this is a bad argument. You can use Signal and never send a gif or stickers. You don't have to do anything with ~~stickers~~crypto when using Signal. It is an opt-in feature that is probably going to not be used my 90% of people. This is just a bad argument surrounding the whole ordeal.
Now the arguments about: regulations, Moxie's involvement (stated he has no coins but there's other potential issues), and how the final system will actually look like (e.g. should it be a second app), those are valid arguments that we should be discussing. But the above one just isn't great and I'm tired of seeing it.
If you're trying to convince your friends and family to use some obscure tech nerd messaging app instead of what they're used to (and all of their friends probably use), it doesn't really matter whether their arguments are "good" or "bad" from a factual standpoint, because most people (or, at least, the OP as we can see here) don't really want to get into a debate defending the bad PR signal has created for itself. Getting folks to change the software they're used to for something new is a fundamentally hard thing to do even when you're providing a _clear upgrade_ (just look at how touchy people get at needing to change text editors/ides, or how vocally people complain about literally every web UI redesign), and every extra hurdle added to that process is going to make it exponentially harder.
It maybe a bad argument but it's a practical view. Governments around the world (see: India, China) have strict laws around crypto. By law of association, any service that remotely mentions this is severely scrutinized. I can hardly blame my friends if they want no part of this.
They are whitelisting the feature. So this is pretty easy to deal with. Government bans? Take off the whitelist. No more issues. Major services like Google Play will have to deal with this too. Most apps don't work the same way in every single country, they adopt to those countries' policies or get banned.
> They are whitelisting the feature. So this is pretty easy to deal with. Government bans? Take off the whitelist. No more issues. Major services like Google Play will have to deal with this too. Most apps don't work the same way in every single country, they adopt to those countries' policies or get banned.
Contrived strawman rebuttal: Government sees app "ThingX" now deals with crypto. ThingX indicates that different variants of the app can interact with crypto depending on the region. Government doesn't care because they're not tech savvy, bans ThingX because crypto.
Contrived strawman rebuttal: Government sees app "ThingX" now deals with crypto. ThingX indicates that different variants of the app can interact with crypto depending on the region. Government doesn't care because they're not tech savvy, bans ThingX because crypto.
Crypto is so strange. You claim ownership over a string of 1s and 0s. Exclusive rights.
That's not how it works. It's more like there's this shared network of participants that has strong incentives to consistently agree that you own a numeric measurement of "value" and that you have the agreed-upon ability to elect to transfer portions of this value to other participants in the network (because you _know_ a specific private key and can irrefutably demonstrate that you know it even without disclosing it).
Most of my finances are just strings of 1s and 0s. My company pays me. They don't send pieces of paper to my bank. It happens via 1s and 0s. From there, 80-90% of my expenses get paid automatically (rent, most taxes, electricity, internet, gas, water, trash collection) all via 1s and 0s. And cash is slowly disappearing into 1s and 0s as well via phone payment systems.
You don't, though. That's more like IP law, where people really do claim rights over the usage of strings. Crypto is more like allocating a string on some servers with a decentralized process
I don't think cryptocoins are about "claiming" ones and zeroes, but instead having the ability to "use" those ones and zeroes, unlike anybody else.
Although ultimately the effect is similar to "claiming" them by virtue of being the only one (as long as you don't share the private key of course) that can operate on those one and zeroes (i.e transfering them to some other address).
Unlike, say, copyright, where even if you claim ownership, someone else can also operate on it (e.g. piracy), illegally of course, but still can.
Although ultimately the effect is similar to "claiming" them by virtue of being the only one (as long as you don't share the private key of course) that can operate on those one and zeroes (i.e transfering them to some other address).
Unlike, say, copyright, where even if you claim ownership, someone else can also operate on it (e.g. piracy), illegally of course, but still can.
Not too different from the 1s and 0s in your bank account. I bet you use cash for less than 1% of your transactions. Everything else is 1s and 0s.
Applies to intellectual property in general.
Banking is so strange. The bank grants you ownership over some pieces of paper that may not even really exist.
Well, their opinion could be that Bitcoin is extremely wasteful and damaging to our environment for very little value, and so they do not want to support any organization that supports Bitcoin. A boycott, if you will.
I’m not arguing that position but I’m just saying that if that is the case, then their boycott is more reasonable than say a “stickers” boycott.
I’m not arguing that position but I’m just saying that if that is the case, then their boycott is more reasonable than say a “stickers” boycott.
Aren't premined coins much less harmful to the environment? I'm not saying this is an argument for using it, but this is definitely true.
Working so the government can piss away my savings is extremely wasteful to my body and time.
Mobilecoin is a proof of stake system and there is no Bitcoin involved. Proof of Stake systems are not damaging to the environment like Proof of Work systems (like Bitcoin’s) are or can potentially be.
Yeah there is a big education gap that just gets wider with stigma.
Yeah there is a big education gap that just gets wider with stigma.
They should educate themselves on why bitcoin is useful and why it's not wasteful, rather than ignore it based on false assumptions.
This series of short articles is very good for those who want to learn the fundamentals: https://tomerstrolight.medium.com/why-bitcoin-the-series-660...
This series of short articles is very good for those who want to learn the fundamentals: https://tomerstrolight.medium.com/why-bitcoin-the-series-660...
The argument in your link boils down to: it will bring the economy down to a deflationary halt, so it's friendly to the environment. Great.
There are 19 articles and the argument doesn't boil to anything. Just one minor argument is that deflationary money system reduces overconsumption. That's not a 'deflationary halt'.
> Honestly, this is a bad argument.
It is a protective heuristic for the non-tech people.
Basically, the more something mentions crypto coins, the higher the likelihood that it is a scam of some type.
It is not always true, but it is true enough for the average person and , in general, functions pretty well as a heuristic.
Thus, they hear about this new, previously unknown, chat service, and see an association with crypto coins, their scam detector immediately goes off, and they don’t want anything to do with it.
It is a protective heuristic for the non-tech people.
Basically, the more something mentions crypto coins, the higher the likelihood that it is a scam of some type.
It is not always true, but it is true enough for the average person and , in general, functions pretty well as a heuristic.
Thus, they hear about this new, previously unknown, chat service, and see an association with crypto coins, their scam detector immediately goes off, and they don’t want anything to do with it.
> Honestly, this is a bad argument.
No, it is a very good argument. Those who are using computers since pre-mobile era (which is everyone but zoomers) remember very well how simple programs slowly became more bloated and then basically became adware. This is what it is associated to.
No, it is a very good argument. Those who are using computers since pre-mobile era (which is everyone but zoomers) remember very well how simple programs slowly became more bloated and then basically became adware. This is what it is associated to.
If you implement any type of cryptocurrency possibility, KYC is around the corner in the United States.
Yes, it may take a while, but the glacier does in fact move.
Yes, it may take a while, but the glacier does in fact move.
I think it’s a valid argument. Once this is deployed everywhere, people will see the statements “Signal supports MOB” and “Signal has 20 million users” and make a conclusion, “20 million people can use MOB”. The only way to avoid being part of this statistic is to avoid the app.
In general, boycotting the product is the time-tested way to send messages to big corp. if you don’t like your clothes being made by child labor, don’t buy the brand. If you don’t like WhatsApp privacy policy, don’t install it. If you don’t like P&G spying on people in China, don’t buy their products. And if you don’t like cryptocurrencies, don’t use stuff from companies which support them.
In general, boycotting the product is the time-tested way to send messages to big corp. if you don’t like your clothes being made by child labor, don’t buy the brand. If you don’t like WhatsApp privacy policy, don’t install it. If you don’t like P&G spying on people in China, don’t buy their products. And if you don’t like cryptocurrencies, don’t use stuff from companies which support them.
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Any time there's a project that's almost open-source, almost open standards, that's how it ends up going. If you'd gone for Matrix you wouldn't have that problem, because even if their developers decide to embed some bitcoin nonsense into the official client, the protocol and ecosystem is much bigger than that.
You might say that well I’m no worse off than before which is true but still feels weird that I was unable to use my existing riot im account when I wanted to sign into Mozilla’s riot server. I ended up creating a different login for Mozilla’s riot.
I think of myself as a technophile but element/matrix/riot made me eat the humble pie.
I think of myself as a technophile but element/matrix/riot made me eat the humble pie.
Is it possible you were trying to login without the full path? You're email isn't minot, it's [email protected]. Similarly, on Matrix, your username isn't minot, but [email protected]. Trying to sign in with your provider can be non-obvious, and would also cause the issue it sounds like you were having :)
Small correction. The syntax for MXIDs is @minot:matrix.org, not [email protected] in order to prevent people from mixing it with emails.
My mistake! I must have been stuck thinking on the email analogy
There is currently no way to port user profiles between homeservers of matrix. They have it planned, but I don't know the current progress on that.
Which is why I'm not converting my friends to anything at the moment. Matrix is slowly gaining adoption, but I can't recommend neither a client nor a homeserver. It is at a place where every university should run a homeserver, though.
That’s true. But there’s another problem with something like Matrix. It’s not to be adopted by the masses by design. The clients/apps are miles away from a nerd/tech savvy person would like to use and another few miles away from the UX non-nerds would want to see. So that’s dba anyway - dead before arrival.
I'm not associated with FluffyChat, just want to point out that it appears to be a Matrix client that meets the "UX non-nerds would want to see" requirement: https://matrix.org/docs/projects/client/fluffychat
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What's wrong with the design of Element? I don't think it's anymore complicated than e-mail and even my grandpa has one of those
Design isn't the biggest issue of Element imo. The speed it. It's super slow. I used another matrix app (can't remember the name now) and that also had the same issue. And the speed wasn't the app issue I think as everything else worked fine but loading messages and sending them took forever. Has this improved recently?
It sounds most likely the issue wasn't with the client, but with the server. The most popular server matrix.org is dealing with a lot of clients, but its performance has been improved, well, "recently", by improvements to the most popular homeserver Synapse.
The next step plan is to move to Dendrite, which is a new homeserver taking the lessons learned from writing Synapse, as well as being implemented in Go instead of Python. But it doesn't yet do everything. You can try a dendrite-hosted server by using dendrite.matrix.org as your homeserver. (AFAIK it has its own accounts.)
The next step plan is to move to Dendrite, which is a new homeserver taking the lessons learned from writing Synapse, as well as being implemented in Go instead of Python. But it doesn't yet do everything. You can try a dendrite-hosted server by using dendrite.matrix.org as your homeserver. (AFAIK it has its own accounts.)
And the audio calls. It was bad, it’s still bad while crypto is being added. I knew when I started aggressively trying to move friend’s family to Signal that this benevolent dictator thing will backfire someday. I didn’t expect it to happen so soon.
Now I still don’t want to use WhatsApp but I don’t know which other messaging app will replace it. I think none.
Now I still don’t want to use WhatsApp but I don’t know which other messaging app will replace it. I think none.
This comment has been shown every time a thread related to WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal is posted..
Exactly the same?
Or similar? Because as far as HN bubble/bias/hivemind goes "We like privacy, we like to complain, we dislike cryptocurrency scams" would be a fitting (though partial) description.
So people irritated by that change by Signal being heavily represented on HN is not surprising.
Or similar? Because as far as HN bubble/bias/hivemind goes "We like privacy, we like to complain, we dislike cryptocurrency scams" would be a fitting (though partial) description.
So people irritated by that change by Signal being heavily represented on HN is not surprising.
I don't get it. OPs comment seems completely unrelated to the article
Or use something open and decentralized like Matrix that no one single party can control the future of.
What about Wickr. (Assuming you and your friends are not seeking privacy from US government.) I think they have paying customers so unlikely to push ads or sell crypto.
What a weird assumption.
What?! How does anyone using Signal get any news about the "bitcoins"? None of my friends I converted even heard about it.
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You don’t need to use bitcoins to use signal for messaging.
Good thing then that there won't be any bitcoins in Signal.
I felt the same when fax machines started being released with internet connectivity.
Needless to say all the fax machine companies went out of business because no one wanted internet features associated with their faxes.
Needless to say all the fax machine companies went out of business because no one wanted internet features associated with their faxes.
There are three pre-requisites to escaping the messenger silo treadmill:
The IETF standard is MLS and it will live alongside TLS, https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/. The team behind Wire founded Skype and contributed to the first patent-free high-def audio codec (OPUS), which in turn enabled WebRTC, the protocol behind most modern video conferencing services. Matrix.org provides #2 and #3 and has stated that they will migrate to the IETF MLS standard protocol.
Since both Wire and Matrix offer both OSS clients & servers, and there is active multi-vendor development on an open standard protocol for E2EE group messaging, web & mobile developers have multiple options for open-source contribution. Matrix already supports federated servers that can be self-hosted, and they recently supported the FOSDEM online conference with ~30,000 attendees, https://matrix.org/blog/2021/02/15/how-we-hosted-fosdem-2021...
> The most unique thing about Matrix is that conversations get replicated across all servers whose users are present in the conversation, so there's never a single point of control or failure for a conversation (much as git repositories get replicated between all contributors). And so hosting FOSDEM in Matrix meant that everyone already on Matrix (including users bridged to Matrix from IRC, XMPP, Slack, Discord etc) could attend directly - in addition to users signing up for the first time on the FOSDEM server.
1. multi-vendor, open standard protocol for E2EE group messaging
2. reference open-source clients for web, desktop & mobile
3. reference open-source server
The IETF standard is MLS and it will live alongside TLS, https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/. The team behind Wire founded Skype and contributed to the first patent-free high-def audio codec (OPUS), which in turn enabled WebRTC, the protocol behind most modern video conferencing services. Matrix.org provides #2 and #3 and has stated that they will migrate to the IETF MLS standard protocol.
Since both Wire and Matrix offer both OSS clients & servers, and there is active multi-vendor development on an open standard protocol for E2EE group messaging, web & mobile developers have multiple options for open-source contribution. Matrix already supports federated servers that can be self-hosted, and they recently supported the FOSDEM online conference with ~30,000 attendees, https://matrix.org/blog/2021/02/15/how-we-hosted-fosdem-2021...
> The most unique thing about Matrix is that conversations get replicated across all servers whose users are present in the conversation, so there's never a single point of control or failure for a conversation (much as git repositories get replicated between all contributors). And so hosting FOSDEM in Matrix meant that everyone already on Matrix (including users bridged to Matrix from IRC, XMPP, Slack, Discord etc) could attend directly - in addition to users signing up for the first time on the FOSDEM server.
4. Economic incentives for the current entrenched players to participate, or for everyone to abandon the entrenched players for new open ones.
That's by far the hardest part, and I'm skeptical it will happen anytime soon. I suspect things will shift eventually as the market changes (e.g. the shift from desktop to mobile), but I doubt it will be toward openness absent government regulation the forces it.
That's by far the hardest part, and I'm skeptical it will happen anytime soon. I suspect things will shift eventually as the market changes (e.g. the shift from desktop to mobile), but I doubt it will be toward openness absent government regulation the forces it.
In Jan, there was a big outcry, i thought all would move to signal.
I have about 25% of the conversations in signal, but especially for groups, whatsapp is so sticky, that they seem to have broadly failed in signal, and are back to whatsapp.
I continue to have individual conversations on signal with most friends, but the idea of being able to leave whatsapp seems to be much tougher than I thought.
I continue to have individual conversations on signal with most friends, but the idea of being able to leave whatsapp seems to be much tougher than I thought.
The way I see it, you can choose to be part of the problem or not. And with a product that gets stronger the more people use it, then using it is part of the problem. You can’t complain about how So-And-So company’s products are bad, but then say “but I can’t bear to stop using em!”
I cut all of FB and their ecosystem out of my life years ago. Can’t say this one person out of billions has had an effect on the company but at least I can honestly say I’m not even a tiny part of the problem.
I don't proselytize to normal people anymore because most just aren't receptive to the message. It's like an addiction. Even when they agree with me, everyone has their little excuses as to why they can't possibly quit. And at the end of the day your one-one-billionth share of the problem amounts to peanuts, anyway.
I cut all of FB and their ecosystem out of my life years ago. Can’t say this one person out of billions has had an effect on the company but at least I can honestly say I’m not even a tiny part of the problem.
I don't proselytize to normal people anymore because most just aren't receptive to the message. It's like an addiction. Even when they agree with me, everyone has their little excuses as to why they can't possibly quit. And at the end of the day your one-one-billionth share of the problem amounts to peanuts, anyway.
> “but I can’t bear to stop using em!”
well, it requires sacrifice on your part to stop messaging your friends. Most people would not give up their friends for "the greater good" of stopping privacy intrusion (which won't have an effect until the majority of people give up whatsapp first).
I can see why most people won't fight the good fight.
well, it requires sacrifice on your part to stop messaging your friends. Most people would not give up their friends for "the greater good" of stopping privacy intrusion (which won't have an effect until the majority of people give up whatsapp first).
I can see why most people won't fight the good fight.
Your really good friends won't stop messaging you just because you've left Facebook.
If anything, leaving Facebook was a wake-up call as to who my very good friends were.
If anything, leaving Facebook was a wake-up call as to who my very good friends were.
“Really good friends” aren’t the only friends worth staying in touch with.
My life is rich in social engagements and I don't need Facebook to do it. And now that I'm off Facebook, the friendships I do have have grown immeasurably in closeness. My overall stress has plummeted.
I strongly believe that platforms like Facebook and Twitter are extremely harmful to social cohesion and mental health.
I strongly believe that platforms like Facebook and Twitter are extremely harmful to social cohesion and mental health.
> My life is rich in social engagements
i don't care what or how your life is - this discussion is about the general case. Not everyone has a rich social life, and these messaging apps/services do help people engage with others which would otherwise have not.
And to change can be disruptive - casually dismissing these concerns is not the way to solve the problem connected with these platforms.
i don't care what or how your life is - this discussion is about the general case. Not everyone has a rich social life, and these messaging apps/services do help people engage with others which would otherwise have not.
And to change can be disruptive - casually dismissing these concerns is not the way to solve the problem connected with these platforms.
> i don't care what or how your life is
Please try and be a little kinder.
I'm not dismissing these concerns. The social harms of these platforms far outweigh whatever gains are wrung from them. They are a net negative to society and to public discourse, full stop. The longer we defend the legitimate reasons people have to stay netizens of these platforms, the darker their shadow weighs over our consciousness.
My country has a former prime minister on Facebook's oversight board because everyone here uses Facebook. That's not in anyone's interest but Facebook's because now it's convinced us that it can be brought to heel, as if it was Facebook, the company, that was the problem.
That's a treacherous misdiagnosis: the issue is the platform itself. It must be dismantled if society is going to heal from the psychic traumas unknowingly and knowingly caused by our participation.
Please try and be a little kinder.
I'm not dismissing these concerns. The social harms of these platforms far outweigh whatever gains are wrung from them. They are a net negative to society and to public discourse, full stop. The longer we defend the legitimate reasons people have to stay netizens of these platforms, the darker their shadow weighs over our consciousness.
My country has a former prime minister on Facebook's oversight board because everyone here uses Facebook. That's not in anyone's interest but Facebook's because now it's convinced us that it can be brought to heel, as if it was Facebook, the company, that was the problem.
That's a treacherous misdiagnosis: the issue is the platform itself. It must be dismantled if society is going to heal from the psychic traumas unknowingly and knowingly caused by our participation.
I think your over-generalization in the first paragraph doesn’t work for most situations. This can apply to a small messaging app in which there are many alternatives, but you can surely participate in something while still pointing out its flaws. https://thenib.com/mister-gotcha/
If we're doing anecdata: All my contacts are on Signal now. I uninstalled WhatsApp back in Jan.
They're back on WhatsApp because you and others still have an account there.
The migration to Signal has two parts: start using Signal, and delete your Facebook accounts.
The migration to Signal has two parts: start using Signal, and delete your Facebook accounts.
It works the other way around too though! Create Signal equivalents for your WhatsApp groups, add the subset of the WhatApp members that also have Signal, and then if you have something fun to share, do so in the Signal group. That way you're meeting people where they are, while simultaneously using an app you can get behind as well, leaving it to others (and their FOMO) to meet you where you are.
And Signal saw that movement, and decided instead of focusing all their development effort in making sure the user experience for all these new users was top notch and developing in the open, instead to push a cryptocoin that no one has heard of before but one which their principals likely have a stash of.
Given Signal's behavior, I am not going to waste any friendship capital trying to convince my friends to switch to Signal.
Given Signal's behavior, I am not going to waste any friendship capital trying to convince my friends to switch to Signal.
WhatsApp have been focusing on payments lately[0] so it only makes sense for Signal to put efforts into that, too.
[0]: https://blog.whatsapp.com/send-payments-in-india-with-whatsa...
[0]: https://blog.whatsapp.com/send-payments-in-india-with-whatsa...
If it’s actual payments, yes. If it’s some weird fully owned cryptocoin, no.
Not sure for you, but what makes WhatsApp the stickiest for me out of the chat apps is the statuses (stories). I start many of my conversations on WA by seeing someone's status (story). On Signal, Telegram, or even iMessage, there isn't that nudge to restart the conversation.
I think if those platforms made some story-like feature, I'd have an easier time leaving WhatsApp.
I think if those platforms made some story-like feature, I'd have an easier time leaving WhatsApp.
That's funny, I don't know anyone who uses that feature.
Fascinating! Maybe it depends on the region...I have many friends in East Africa and they seem to use it all the time. This has inspired me to look more closely at which friends actually post and which ones view the statuses. Thanks!
> Not sure for you, but what makes WhatsApp the stickiest for me out of the chat apps is the statuses (stories).
For me it's the other way around.
I've stopped using all platforms which offers that "feature", because I find it distracting and annoying.
For me it's the other way around.
I've stopped using all platforms which offers that "feature", because I find it distracting and annoying.
Haha that makes sense, too. Thanks for sharing your perspective!
I have never ever seen anyone around me do a WhatsApp story
As I mentioned in a different comment, maybe it depends on the region, with many of my friends who post being from East Africa. Would you mind sharing in which part of the world are most of your WhatsApp contacts living?
France
>> the idea of being able to leave whatsapp seems to be much tougher than I thought.
Network lock-in is real. I think a lot of people who disconnect from fb also disregard the difficulty. Even if you don't like the barman, your local is wherever your buddies hang out.
Network lock-in is real. I think a lot of people who disconnect from fb also disregard the difficulty. Even if you don't like the barman, your local is wherever your buddies hang out.
It is difficult but not impossible. Everyone switched from Myspace to Facebook. Thing was the Facebook offered something different. But it did start small. The way you defeat network lock-in is by fighting against it hard. It definitely is not easy. I lost friends when I deleted my Facebook. But truth is, they weren't people I frequently talked to anyways so it is probably better to call them acquaintances. The thing is that I've contacted plenty of those people years after nothing and they are all happy to grab a beer. But we pretend that this isn't the case. We say "Yeah, I'd do that, but they wouldn't." Or something similar.
Though I'll admit, getting people to switch to Signal was a lot of work. People like Elon and Joe Rogan helped onboard a lot of the people that were holding out. One group chat has a member that is only there because everyone else bought in and he complains, but uses it (big WA user).
I don't think people calling for disconnecting are unaware of the difficulties. Ripping off a bandaid hurts, but the thought of ripping it off often is more painful than the actual experience.
Though I'll admit, getting people to switch to Signal was a lot of work. People like Elon and Joe Rogan helped onboard a lot of the people that were holding out. One group chat has a member that is only there because everyone else bought in and he complains, but uses it (big WA user).
I don't think people calling for disconnecting are unaware of the difficulties. Ripping off a bandaid hurts, but the thought of ripping it off often is more painful than the actual experience.
Throwing in my anecdotal experience.
I noticed something very similar. About 25% of one-on-one conversations are now in Signal. Another 25% are in iMessage, which is a very easy sell for iOS users.
I've had a terrible time with group chats. One large chat is occurring in iMessage (very poor experience). Another large chat is occurring in Discord, which has been fantastic, but it changes the dynamic and caused a few friends to ghost (the onboarding to Discord is harder for newcomers vs. iMessage, WhatsApp or Signal IMO).
I noticed something very similar. About 25% of one-on-one conversations are now in Signal. Another 25% are in iMessage, which is a very easy sell for iOS users.
I've had a terrible time with group chats. One large chat is occurring in iMessage (very poor experience). Another large chat is occurring in Discord, which has been fantastic, but it changes the dynamic and caused a few friends to ghost (the onboarding to Discord is harder for newcomers vs. iMessage, WhatsApp or Signal IMO).
Discord is not end to end encrypted, and thus should be actively avoided.
It is reasonable to assume that every single chat and every single DM is logged in plaintext by Discord for all time.
It is reasonable to assume that every single chat and every single DM is logged in plaintext by Discord for all time.
> I've had a terrible time with group chats.
When was this? There was a migration from groupv1 to groupv2 which could explain it. I've always found it stable personally (including during migration). At any rate, it should be better now that there are less changes.
When was this? There was a migration from groupv1 to groupv2 which could explain it. I've always found it stable personally (including during migration). At any rate, it should be better now that there are less changes.
I have absolutely no issues with Signal group chat? Where did this rainbow puke?
Most of my groups went to Signal. But until they support live location (something I use frequently, albeit less during Corona), I won't uninstall Whatsapp. For all their privacy faults, it's still the app with probably one of the best UX (so easy it's the only app my grandma can use) all features I'd want for a chat app without annoying extras.
The Signal UX for groups is truly terrible. It looks like a rainbow puked in there. And heaven help you if you use their crappy desktop client. It doesn't sync with your mobile client unless you open the app on your phone, and then syncs everything slowly, which messes up your group chats if you happen to send another message in between.
When is the last time you used it? Because I have none of these issues. None. Especially since "It doesn't sync with your mobile client unless you open the app on your phone" is architecturally completely wrong. The desktop client doesn't communicate through your phone. That's how WhatsApp web works, but Signal Desktop doesn't.
Same here, both Signal groups and Signal desktop work flawlessly for me.
For me it went from 30% FB, 60% Whatsapp, 10% Signal in January to 0% FB, 10% Whatsapp, 90% Signal today. I might get rid of the 10% after May. So it's possible. That said I'm only talking about maybe 15-20 contacts, so small sample size.
Similar experience here, except most people who moved to Signal were tech-savvy, while all my family and closest friends have stuck with WhatsApp.
Given Signal's recent changes in direction, I'm considering just giving up on it and sticking with WhatsApp.
Given Signal's recent changes in direction, I'm considering just giving up on it and sticking with WhatsApp.
I set up a Matrix server for my family, and then bridged in everyone else I know who uses iMessage. Now at least I'm chatting in a single app.
That means your family can't communicate if your server is down?
Yup. Just like how we couldn't communicate for 2 days when Signal's servers went down a few weeks before I made the switch.
The difference with me is that my server has a dozen users and I could rebuild the whole thing from backups on a brand new provider in a couple hours if I needed to. I doubt I'll need to, though. It's not exactly working hard. :D
The difference with me is that my server has a dozen users and I could rebuild the whole thing from backups on a brand new provider in a couple hours if I needed to. I doubt I'll need to, though. It's not exactly working hard. :D
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Quicksy.im / Conversations.im developer here. I promise I’ll never implement crypto currency into my messenger apps.¹
Even if I break my promise you could just use a fork of my app since XMPP servers don’t prevent third party clients from connecting.
¹: I don’t have to either because I have a working business model that’s not a ponzi scheme
Even if I break my promise you could just use a fork of my app since XMPP servers don’t prevent third party clients from connecting.
¹: I don’t have to either because I have a working business model that’s not a ponzi scheme
Is there a way to sign up to it which is as simple for tech-illiterate people as WhatsApp/Signal? I recall the last few times I, a developer, have tried to functionally use any sort of XMPP based thing it has been a confusing and inconsistent experience.
That's exactly what quicksy.im is for, it's a build flavor of conversations that uses the users phone number as jabber id with auto discovery
Can't see an App Store link :(
What's your business model?
Bizarre story given the new privacy policy in the EU changed nothing wrt what data is shared with Facebook.
Last I checked it was a lot of words for no change at all. If the change is so small, they could have allowed EU users to opt out (and maybe miss out on some features), they would have avoided the outcry.
The point of the change is to enable business messaging, which is necessary for WhatsApp to generate any real revenue.
That's what I heard indeed, but that's still too many words if I don't want to receive messages from businesses anyway. They could have prompted users before the first interaction with a business for instance. Then users would have clearly linked the two.
Citation needed.
> WhatsApp has been facing one hell of a backlash ever since it shared that it wanted to update its privacy policy with changes that would allow Facebook to aggregate all of its users' data across all of its services.
I think this is bad. But also a general tendency: Accumulations of data are valuable to companies which exploit them. Larger accumulations of data are even more valuable, in a non-linear way. This is because data sets are multi-dimensional, and the more dimensions you have, the more information you can get out of it, even if the users initially have never thought about that. So, if you have two large accumulations of data, and you join them, you get extra value.
Google is doing this aggregation as well, as mentioned in its terms of service.
You also see that in they way Microsoft is trying to link business and personal accounts via Lynx and so on. You also see that with platforms like LinkedIn (which was bought by Microsoft).
In other words, it works a bit like gravity. Mass attracts other masses and more mass attracts even more mass. And what we will end up is a kind of black hole in which everything is collapsing into the same place.
Without effective regulation, one day, Facebook's data and Google's data will probably be combined.
BTW I am also skeptic whether some of the reported "data leaks" are not in reality covered-up data sales. As long as there are no substantial consequences, like criminal sentences, to people who do that, there are very few barriers to exploiting personal data in this way.
I think this is bad. But also a general tendency: Accumulations of data are valuable to companies which exploit them. Larger accumulations of data are even more valuable, in a non-linear way. This is because data sets are multi-dimensional, and the more dimensions you have, the more information you can get out of it, even if the users initially have never thought about that. So, if you have two large accumulations of data, and you join them, you get extra value.
Google is doing this aggregation as well, as mentioned in its terms of service.
You also see that in they way Microsoft is trying to link business and personal accounts via Lynx and so on. You also see that with platforms like LinkedIn (which was bought by Microsoft).
In other words, it works a bit like gravity. Mass attracts other masses and more mass attracts even more mass. And what we will end up is a kind of black hole in which everything is collapsing into the same place.
Without effective regulation, one day, Facebook's data and Google's data will probably be combined.
BTW I am also skeptic whether some of the reported "data leaks" are not in reality covered-up data sales. As long as there are no substantial consequences, like criminal sentences, to people who do that, there are very few barriers to exploiting personal data in this way.
> Without effective regulation, one day, Facebook's data and Google's data will probably be combined.
Can you elaborate on why you think this might happen? It doesn't seem like an obvious outcome to me.
Can you elaborate on why you think this might happen? It doesn't seem like an obvious outcome to me.
Because you can squeeze out more money from it that way. Having everything collapsed in one giant data collection is just the natural equilibrium state from the physics point of view.
That big privacy policy update everyone was complaining about was--again--only about providing hosted e2e clients in the cloud for Facebook Business customers, and had nothing to do with end user to end user chats: the goal was to solve the experience problem of a company wanting to provide a chatbot and realizing "omg, I have to host all of the chat client parts myself and build some way for random people in my organization to get access to it?!". The updates were all clearly narrowly targeted towards that--including to the security document, which merely moved the statement that data was encrypted (as opposed to removing it, which some people claimed)--and Facebook representatives immediately provided explicit clarification of all of this, but no one cared and everyone caused this massive denigration of WhatsApp... one that is apparently continuing, as this doesn't seem to be anything new they changed?
Here is a comment with some defense of all of this, for those who were only reading the big headlines:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25875802
And for what: so that the only mass-market end-to-end encrypted messaging tool could be discredited? And we could prove to large companies "we don't care if you are end-to-end encrypted: in fact, we will punish you harder if you are end-to-end encrypted than if you are just a normal service!"?!? Where is all the continued outrage over Snapchat, the service we actually should be trying to replace with an e2e encrypted alternative (but for which Signal is an insufficient replacement as a big reason people like Snapchat is that you don't have to give your real phone number to the random people you talk to online)? While some people remind us that Telegram sucks, where are the weekly threads and news articles about how horrible Telegram is? Why are groups like Signal targeting advertising at WhatsApp instead of at Telegram? Hell: why is everyone so upset over WhatsApp, but no one ever mentions Facebook Messenger in any of these articles or rants?
And let us not forget the cherry on top of this whole thing: that right after everyone decided to do this massive mobilization to cause the great exodus from WhatsApp--only some of those people of course ending up on Signal, with some reasonable number likely moving to Snapchat or Telegram or even Facebook Messenger--Signal decided they had a great moment to launch MobileCoin... a cryptocurrency whose claim to fame is being built on broken-by-design DRM technology (Intel SGX / ARM TrustZone) and which--whether you think cryptocurrency is a good idea (which I do) or not--has managed to undermine confidence not only in the only big open source end-to-end encrypted messenger (by both clouding its motives and tying it to cryptocurrencies, which many end users consider to be a scam) but which has now soured everyone's opinion (maybe correctly) of the privacy community (due to the recent push to use it). This is all just so infuriating as someone who wants people to universally have end-to-end encryption :/.
(FWIW, if there is something new here--something that Facebook is now suddenly doing that is actually bad, unlike before--I'm very curious, but am going to note that all of the above is now the reason why I'm even past the point of caring enough than to skim a few paragraphs to verify "this is part of the same FUD from a couple months ago": you can only cry wolf so many times before even the super technical people like me are no long going to care. But this just seems to now be "great, government is now going to step in and also punish WhatsApp for having the gall to have bothered to build an end-to-end encrypted messaging app and then be carefully transparent about the process by which they add a new feature that just shouldn't be considered a big problem". When this same politician decides to sanction Snapchat or Telegram for the way they handle privacy--or goes after Facebook Messenger or Instagram--I'll be excited, but this is going to harm the efforts for end-to-end encryption, not help them!)
Here is a comment with some defense of all of this, for those who were only reading the big headlines:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25875802
And for what: so that the only mass-market end-to-end encrypted messaging tool could be discredited? And we could prove to large companies "we don't care if you are end-to-end encrypted: in fact, we will punish you harder if you are end-to-end encrypted than if you are just a normal service!"?!? Where is all the continued outrage over Snapchat, the service we actually should be trying to replace with an e2e encrypted alternative (but for which Signal is an insufficient replacement as a big reason people like Snapchat is that you don't have to give your real phone number to the random people you talk to online)? While some people remind us that Telegram sucks, where are the weekly threads and news articles about how horrible Telegram is? Why are groups like Signal targeting advertising at WhatsApp instead of at Telegram? Hell: why is everyone so upset over WhatsApp, but no one ever mentions Facebook Messenger in any of these articles or rants?
And let us not forget the cherry on top of this whole thing: that right after everyone decided to do this massive mobilization to cause the great exodus from WhatsApp--only some of those people of course ending up on Signal, with some reasonable number likely moving to Snapchat or Telegram or even Facebook Messenger--Signal decided they had a great moment to launch MobileCoin... a cryptocurrency whose claim to fame is being built on broken-by-design DRM technology (Intel SGX / ARM TrustZone) and which--whether you think cryptocurrency is a good idea (which I do) or not--has managed to undermine confidence not only in the only big open source end-to-end encrypted messenger (by both clouding its motives and tying it to cryptocurrencies, which many end users consider to be a scam) but which has now soured everyone's opinion (maybe correctly) of the privacy community (due to the recent push to use it). This is all just so infuriating as someone who wants people to universally have end-to-end encryption :/.
(FWIW, if there is something new here--something that Facebook is now suddenly doing that is actually bad, unlike before--I'm very curious, but am going to note that all of the above is now the reason why I'm even past the point of caring enough than to skim a few paragraphs to verify "this is part of the same FUD from a couple months ago": you can only cry wolf so many times before even the super technical people like me are no long going to care. But this just seems to now be "great, government is now going to step in and also punish WhatsApp for having the gall to have bothered to build an end-to-end encrypted messaging app and then be carefully transparent about the process by which they add a new feature that just shouldn't be considered a big problem". When this same politician decides to sanction Snapchat or Telegram for the way they handle privacy--or goes after Facebook Messenger or Instagram--I'll be excited, but this is going to harm the efforts for end-to-end encryption, not help them!)
People are mad about whatsapp because it used to be a good platform that they now feel compelled to abandon. I don't think people have any particular allegiance to fb messenger—it exists and is something to be tolerated.
the whole "but the privacy policy changes weren't that bad!!!" to which I say: it was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. People didn't want their metadata harvestsed by FB, and this was a convenient time to jump.
FB apologists will be quick to note that FB had access to WA metadata for years unless if you dug through some menus for an opt-out button (now removed). I have no clue how they think this is a compelling argument.
Just because the dam hasn't broken yet doesn't mean that you can't keep chizzling away at it. eventually it'll break. I'd argue that WA would have never been in this mess if they stayed as an arms-length corporation and were left to their own devices. But no: FB has an immediate desire to gather the biggest heap of user data possible. As they should: it's how they make their money. But that doesn't mean people aren't allowed protest.
the whole "but the privacy policy changes weren't that bad!!!" to which I say: it was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. People didn't want their metadata harvestsed by FB, and this was a convenient time to jump.
FB apologists will be quick to note that FB had access to WA metadata for years unless if you dug through some menus for an opt-out button (now removed). I have no clue how they think this is a compelling argument.
Just because the dam hasn't broken yet doesn't mean that you can't keep chizzling away at it. eventually it'll break. I'd argue that WA would have never been in this mess if they stayed as an arms-length corporation and were left to their own devices. But no: FB has an immediate desire to gather the biggest heap of user data possible. As they should: it's how they make their money. But that doesn't mean people aren't allowed protest.
The problem is that the protests are not framed this way. Not "WA was going downhill for years, and now my patience ran out", but "Ouch, this particular change in ToS is a game-changer, all is lost, I'm quitting!!"
This undermines trust to the argument. It looks more like it aims for a knee-jerk reaction, all emotion, zero thought. If you don a large enough tinfoil hat, you can even imagine for a second that somebody is trying to scare away more users from the largest e2ee platform out there, so that they would land on less secure platforms — but of course I'm no RMS to suggest such outlandish things.
This undermines trust to the argument. It looks more like it aims for a knee-jerk reaction, all emotion, zero thought. If you don a large enough tinfoil hat, you can even imagine for a second that somebody is trying to scare away more users from the largest e2ee platform out there, so that they would land on less secure platforms — but of course I'm no RMS to suggest such outlandish things.
People's protest was other fb data harvesting. Even if they didn't understand the specific changes in the tos, they had legitimate grievances.
Which is to say, "you're only allowed to me mad about a change when it's rolled out" is not a theory I buy into.
The reason the exodus happened was not "because" of the privacy change, in the same way the dam didn't break because a squirrel running across knocked the "last piece" loose.
Years of negligence are responsible.
Which is to say, "you're only allowed to me mad about a change when it's rolled out" is not a theory I buy into.
The reason the exodus happened was not "because" of the privacy change, in the same way the dam didn't break because a squirrel running across knocked the "last piece" loose.
Years of negligence are responsible.
I have said this before. The contract you sign with facebook allows them to send all your stuff from whatsapp to facebook. Any of it.
Who cares what they say their intent is?
It was so clearly, so obviously written to deceive, I wonder whether the defenders have ever actually read the new privacy agreements they are supposed to sign.
It says that in the future (e.g. as soon as the EU allows it), Facebook will merge all Whatsapp and Facebook data. And it will share whatever it can do now.
They do NOT say they will not share the data with Facebook. They use the same sentence, carefully worded, saying that they don't share the data right now, but might later.
Why the funk do you think they write it that way?
Some people also believe sentences like this: "We at company X deeply care about your privacy".
Not everyone is so naive.
Who cares what they say their intent is?
It was so clearly, so obviously written to deceive, I wonder whether the defenders have ever actually read the new privacy agreements they are supposed to sign.
It says that in the future (e.g. as soon as the EU allows it), Facebook will merge all Whatsapp and Facebook data. And it will share whatever it can do now.
They do NOT say they will not share the data with Facebook. They use the same sentence, carefully worded, saying that they don't share the data right now, but might later.
Why the funk do you think they write it that way?
Some people also believe sentences like this: "We at company X deeply care about your privacy".
Not everyone is so naive.
Why is Wire never mentioned in these discussions on HN, is there something I'm missing? Seems like the most secure option to me: https://wire.com/en/security/
I've never heard of wire but it looks good, aside from the pricing.
I'm hoping the future is a migration to a protocol such as Matrix, rather than users endlessly hoping from one product to another until they get sold out.
https://matrix.org/
I'm hoping the future is a migration to a protocol such as Matrix, rather than users endlessly hoping from one product to another until they get sold out.
https://matrix.org/
My friends and I did just that. I run us a federated self host. It's great. They aren't tech savvy - and no complaints.
I'm glad to hear the migration worked. I tried doing this but got stuck at the reverse proxy part, so my synapse instance was never accessible. It was likely user error, as it was my first attempt at using a reverse proxy. I'm going to move away from PFSense and try again.
I use Wire with some family members. The web client takes an age to load, and the best way to describe the UX of their mobile (Android) client is "Like wading through molasses".
Swiping or hitting the back key to leave a chat, entering a chat from the group/contact list, and tapping on a notification to reply in-app is absolutely painful.
Some inspired soul will say "Great! That's a golden opportunity for a Matrix bridge!" And it would be, if that wasn't explicitly against Wire's ToS. As such, it's the absolute dog of an app, or nothing. iOS must be better though, as nobody else has suggested switching. And between poor performance on Wire, or all the drawbacks of Whatsapp, I know which one I choose.
Swiping or hitting the back key to leave a chat, entering a chat from the group/contact list, and tapping on a notification to reply in-app is absolutely painful.
Some inspired soul will say "Great! That's a golden opportunity for a Matrix bridge!" And it would be, if that wasn't explicitly against Wire's ToS. As such, it's the absolute dog of an app, or nothing. iOS must be better though, as nobody else has suggested switching. And between poor performance on Wire, or all the drawbacks of Whatsapp, I know which one I choose.
While they use the Signal protocol for encryption, they do leave more metadata on the server. For example your recently contacted contacts and all your groups.
People don't use the most secure option, but the option that other people they want to be in contact with use.
I've never heard of wire, so I doubt any of my friends or family have either
I've never heard of wire, so I doubt any of my friends or family have either
Wire is intended for team chat. You can't use it to talk to your friends, parents, or third party companies. Signal, Telegram, Whatsapp, Matrix, etc. are general purpose chat networks with millions of users each. Different use case. Matrix you could use for corporate chat and lots of companies do. It's one of the few federated options out there currently. Oss too.
Honest question. What do Signal and WhatsApp bring to the table that I'm not getting with the messaging apps built into my phones? Me and all my friends and family just use those, and nobody has ever asked me to communicate with Signal or WhatsApp.
My messaging apps built into your phone do you mean SMS? Or iMessage or RCS?
Because SMS leaves a lot on the table. It is okay if you want to send just text but doesn't support rich features such as reactions, replies various forms of formatting or media. It is also very insecure. iMessage and RCS provide more but have their own limitations particularly across platforms.
Furthermore other messaging apps provide a wide variety of features and aren't tied to (often temporary) identifiers such as phone numbers.
So SMS may be sufficient for many people but I'm surprised that you haven't encountered people using other communications tools that are much more full featured.
Because SMS leaves a lot on the table. It is okay if you want to send just text but doesn't support rich features such as reactions, replies various forms of formatting or media. It is also very insecure. iMessage and RCS provide more but have their own limitations particularly across platforms.
Furthermore other messaging apps provide a wide variety of features and aren't tied to (often temporary) identifiers such as phone numbers.
So SMS may be sufficient for many people but I'm surprised that you haven't encountered people using other communications tools that are much more full featured.
It's the icon at the bottom besides the phone icon :)
I can't imaging asking a friend or relative to install an app so that I can message them. I'm sure the response would be "you can already message me". I send text. I send photos. I guess I could install it on both of my phones and message myself to see what it adds. I'm just having a hard time imaging what it could be.
I can't imaging asking a friend or relative to install an app so that I can message them. I'm sure the response would be "you can already message me". I send text. I send photos. I guess I could install it on both of my phones and message myself to see what it adds. I'm just having a hard time imaging what it could be.
So you don't care about security or reactions... How about group chat? That is a very useful feature that SMS doesn't provide.
The iPhone is my daily device that I use for messaging. iMessage gives me reactions and group. I had assumed that the Android message app did the same.
If you are using iMessage you are using a custom messaging app. The only difference is that it was pre-installed on you phone.
I think whatsapp and signal gained real momentum in countries where sending too many text messages was super expensive than having a cheap internet pack and send unlimited messages using whatsapp or signal
Do you mean Apps on your phone relying on SMS?
I mean the native apps whatever they are. I've an iPhone and an Android phone, and they both message just fine.
Do they encrypt the data end-to-end? Are they private and privacy friendly? If the answer is no, then they don't message 'just fine' but are an obvious liablity.
I'll have to research RCS some more, but it seems that it is.
https://www.pocket-lint.com/phones/news/144258-what-is-rcs-m...
https://www.pocket-lint.com/phones/news/144258-what-is-rcs-m...
My personal experience is that I moved some friends to Telegram and kept family in WhatsApp.The time using the phone decreased, I found having 2 messengers more beneficial as I will switch only when there is some relevant conversation or topic happening.
Telegram is LESS secure than WhatsApp.
https://www.wired.com/story/telegram-encryption-whatsapp-set...
https://www.wired.com/story/telegram-encryption-whatsapp-set...
Only if you trust Facebook to implement E2E encryption well in their proprietary code.
> I'm sorry, but that's not how computer software works. Anyone who knows what a basic block is can straightforwardly verify the claims WhatsApp is making.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11432096
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11432096
Even if you can verify that the encryption is indeed E2D, can you also be sure that your messages are not simultaneously transferred to Facebook before they are encrypted?
I invite you to read the thread I linked, because this whole discussion has been rehashed several times over on HN already.
... and Telegram FOSS [1] fixes all of the mentioned points?
[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS
[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS
E2EE is in Telegram is disabled by default. Also, look at the jurisdictions Telegram operates from. Sketchy would be an understatement.
While I agree that the Arab Emirates are suboptimal at best, you have to be fair and mention that the previous countries Telegram operated in all wanted the encryption keys. Including Germany, France and Switzerland.
Not many options to be neutral in the spying game if the EU is ruled out.
Not many options to be neutral in the spying game if the EU is ruled out.
PRIVACY =! SECURITY
Unless privacy == security (i.e. operational security need privacy). It's laughably to take over Telegram accounts (or just join as an invisible listener) and because nothing is encrypted, you get the full message history.
Telegram has really, really great UI/UX and even DX regarding their API. Other than that it's a shit show.
I would never recommend using Whatsapp, but compared to Telegram, Whatsapp is a poster child.
Telegram has really, really great UI/UX and even DX regarding their API. Other than that it's a shit show.
I would never recommend using Whatsapp, but compared to Telegram, Whatsapp is a poster child.
Can you elaborate the claims regarding account takeover more in detail? I'm generally curious.
Is it because of SS7 confirmation of pins or what are you referring to?
Is it because of SS7 confirmation of pins or what are you referring to?
If the service is free, you are the product. Why expect any level of privacy from a free to use app? Bonkers.
Why is it so hard for someone to make a simple WhatsApp competitor with the same business model as the pre-facebook WhatsApp? It was build by just a few people 10 freakin years ago. I wish people valued their privacy higher than $1 a year but I guess many don't.
> It was build by just a few people 10 freakin years ago.
I think this here is the key point, that it was built 10 years ago when smartphones were just catching up and general public needed one working and stable chatting app. Replicating that is not the issue here but making people switch from their "used-to" app is. Not saying that is right or wrong but I get where most of the people are coming from. These apps are now intertwined with normal lives who are either unaware or don't care about their privacy. Also making that switching harder by incorporating more popular apps together like facebook-instagram, facebook-whatsapp doesn't help either.
I think this here is the key point, that it was built 10 years ago when smartphones were just catching up and general public needed one working and stable chatting app. Replicating that is not the issue here but making people switch from their "used-to" app is. Not saying that is right or wrong but I get where most of the people are coming from. These apps are now intertwined with normal lives who are either unaware or don't care about their privacy. Also making that switching harder by incorporating more popular apps together like facebook-instagram, facebook-whatsapp doesn't help either.
Because pre-facebook WhatsApp wasn't that great. It was frequently down and didn't even use TLS.
However Threema exists. It is paid up front and otherwise fairly boring: https://threema.ch/en
However Threema exists. It is paid up front and otherwise fairly boring: https://threema.ch/en
I actually paid for using whatsapp, but too many people prefer something free even if you are paying with your privacy. The thing is that a communication app has to be used by both parties on the conversation, and that's a huge entry barrier.
WhatsApp had far smaller competition that nowadays.
Bar of what is acceptable was raised.
Windows 3.1 was extremely impressive when released and got popular.
Releasing equivalent of Windows 3.1 in 2021 will not be impressive or popular.
Bar of what is acceptable was raised.
Windows 3.1 was extremely impressive when released and got popular.
Releasing equivalent of Windows 3.1 in 2021 will not be impressive or popular.
WhatsApp never had a real business model. Its peak revenue, disclosed by Facebook at the time of acquisition, was ~$1.5 million/year, and this was when they had 500 million active users. It was always running on VC cash.
> Its peak revenue, disclosed by Facebook at the time of acquisition, was ~$1.5 million/year
Not sure where you got that number, but in 2013 (before aquisition) they reported ~$10 million in revenue. (https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680114...)
They brought in $15 million in the first half of 2014. (https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680114...)
They only had 55 employees at acquisition.
They might not have become a unicorn... but there most definitely was a path to profitability.
Not sure where you got that number, but in 2013 (before aquisition) they reported ~$10 million in revenue. (https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680114...)
They brought in $15 million in the first half of 2014. (https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680114...)
They only had 55 employees at acquisition.
They might not have become a unicorn... but there most definitely was a path to profitability.
This was my source - https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/04091... (which points to that same document but somehow draws a different conclusion).
Also that document shows a net loss of $230 million in that same period, so not exactly on a strong path to profitability.
Also that document shows a net loss of $230 million in that same period, so not exactly on a strong path to profitability.
Thanks! Looks like they link Facebook's 10Q filing. Can't tell how they arrived at the number though.
I agree that their losses were surprisingly high at the time... especially given how lean their engineering team and operations were supposed to be. (https://blog.whatsapp.com/1-million-is-so-2011/?lang=en)
I agree that their losses were surprisingly high at the time... especially given how lean their engineering team and operations were supposed to be. (https://blog.whatsapp.com/1-million-is-so-2011/?lang=en)
does show though that if they could get all 500 million to pay just that $1 a year, they've got $270 million profit.
- 30% goes straight to Apple/Google.
- A large chunk of the world (especially people in developing countries) will be unwilling to pay anything more than $0.
- Even if they want to pay, most of those users won't have a payment method set up. How many of their 2 billion+ users have a credit card or even a bank account?
- A large chunk of the world (especially people in developing countries) will be unwilling to pay anything more than $0.
- Even if they want to pay, most of those users won't have a payment method set up. How many of their 2 billion+ users have a credit card or even a bank account?
They attempted to force people to pay $1/yr. but that backfired hard because they couldn't figure out how to do the rollout, offered nothing in return, and suffered the backlash of their mismanagement.
Even just giving paid users some small extra features or a little icon by their name or something small would have been enough to get people willingly give a dollar rather than their approach of trying to charge people.
Even just giving paid users some small extra features or a little icon by their name or something small would have been enough to get people willingly give a dollar rather than their approach of trying to charge people.
You think whatsapp service isn’t worth $1 per year? I was perfectly happy to pay that.
Just because you're happy to pay it doesn't mean 500 million people are all happy to pay it
Of course it was worth a dollar before it went to facebook, the problem was they didn't plan how they were going to charge people.
They only charged some users, not everyone, because they couldn't figure out how to do it.. and who got charged was relatively random.
Those that did get charged could just complain and the subscription fee would just go away.
Value is one thing, but only charging a fraction of your customer base at what seemingly felt like random was never going to gain public acceptance.
I don't even think they even had a plan for how to deal with poorer nations in Africa where the app is exremely popular.
They only charged some users, not everyone, because they couldn't figure out how to do it.. and who got charged was relatively random.
Those that did get charged could just complain and the subscription fee would just go away.
Value is one thing, but only charging a fraction of your customer base at what seemingly felt like random was never going to gain public acceptance.
I don't even think they even had a plan for how to deal with poorer nations in Africa where the app is exremely popular.
There is also threema.
https://threema.ch/en/
https://threema.ch/en/
Yes, a niche of a niche, but it exists.
What about Keybase, though? This thread reminded me of its existence and I just renewed it on my iPhone...
What about Keybase, though? This thread reminded me of its existence and I just renewed it on my iPhone...
>> a simple WhatsApp competitor with the same business model as the pre-facebook WhatsApp.
Because the business was "sell to fb," effectively. Whoever succeeds in putting together a wide network of people will face similar incentives. I suppose someone could do it Craig Newmark style, but for that a Craig Newmark needs to be CEO of a major app company. Long odds.
Because the business was "sell to fb," effectively. Whoever succeeds in putting together a wide network of people will face similar incentives. I suppose someone could do it Craig Newmark style, but for that a Craig Newmark needs to be CEO of a major app company. Long odds.
All centralized communications and social networking platforms will fall to pressure to sell at this point, if that wasn't their intention (this seems to be the exit strategy of most startups these days). The alternatives exist, but they don't have marketing budgets. They're things like jabber, matrix, Jami, and the many ActivityPub implementations out there.
We have the alternatives already. We can use them now. To me this defeatism is like jumping out of a plane with a parachute and saying "I guess there's nothing to be done now." It starts with you making the decision to use something else. It is harder because of the lock in. But there's only one way to do it.
We have the alternatives already. We can use them now. To me this defeatism is like jumping out of a plane with a parachute and saying "I guess there's nothing to be done now." It starts with you making the decision to use something else. It is harder because of the lock in. But there's only one way to do it.
It's not me using it, it's all my friends and family that's the challenge. Whatsapp isn't just marketing, it was better than everything else by being super easy to use, required no sign up, looked just like text messaging so my parents liked it too. They did everything right (up until they sold it!).
Well, what makes you think that some new company would get any users then? Whatsapp requires sign in by the way. They take your phone number for that reason.
Android Police's cookie notice is so bad, it might be illegal.
As someone who has never held a WhatsApp account / Instagram, I do see the network effect that wants to pull me into the conversation but I have always resisted. Even before, I had telegram, there were like 3 contacts total. Then with the recent mass migration, I quit that as well because "people" joined.
Now im a happy matrix camper. Didnt even bother with signal because meh mobile requirement and their dishonest Foss policy.
Now im a happy matrix camper. Didnt even bother with signal because meh mobile requirement and their dishonest Foss policy.
Reminds me of Firefox and Pocket. It’s been years since that. Somehow I still can’t use Firefox the way it was - my only browser. I try once in a while and somehow or the other it doesn’t feel right anymore.
Signal has done it repeatedly as well (no federation etc) but I’ve always ignored it and let it slide but for f’s sake this thing is not even open source really!
Signal has done it repeatedly as well (no federation etc) but I’ve always ignored it and let it slide but for f’s sake this thing is not even open source really!
I was really hoping these privacy concerns would dissuade people from using WhatsApp. But I have a hidden agenda: I hate their web app. I just want a chat software I can use from anywhere.
Heh, let's be honest, Signal's isn't better (and I mean the desktop app, cause they don't have a web app). It randomly corrupts the sqlite database forcing me to set it up all over again, it takes a significantly long time to even do the setup process, and can't even do sms at all.
It allows you to connect from multiple devices simultaneously and you don’t need to have your mobile charged and connected. That’s second only to actually be able to send messages to me.
Don’t forget about the sync time if you left it closed for a long time. On my new laptop it's not so horrendous but on my old computer I just gave up using it there.
How can it be illegal?
It is their platform, their own rules, right?
If you don't like it, then just don't use it.
There are other platforms which are more than good enough.
/s if not obv, I'm making fun of people defending the App Store, yet when FB is in question are blatantly showing their hypocrisy.
There are other platforms which are more than good enough.
/s if not obv, I'm making fun of people defending the App Store, yet when FB is in question are blatantly showing their hypocrisy.
No, that is not that simple. There are laws around what and how can be shared between companies.
I feel like I will just give up and use WhatsApp and assume that I only had privacy pre-internet.