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this post was submitted on 07 Dec 2023
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Privacy
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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.
Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
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An open source and private chat app that everybody wants to use
Signal works. The adoption is fairly slow, but I've had friends slowly begin to use it.
Signal gets some things right, but others wrong, such as phone numbers and centralized architecture. As such, it doesn't fit the "everybody wants to use" part.
WhatsApp uses phone numbers and a centralized architecture. Remind me how many people use it?
Seeing how the dumb community feels trapped now that Meta stopped supporting KaiOS, I can tell there are a lot of people that wish they could leave the service. A lot of spaces make you feel like you have to use it, not want to use it. I used a few months while I was in the UK, but after that I’ve been lucky enough to delete my account as the service was useless elsewhere where other places I lived, no one used it.
…That said, I now have issues with LINE as a defacto chat option locally that gets in the way. My account was crushed after they canceled LINE Lite which was 10× smaller with no bloat or trackers & I refused to “upgrade” (where like WhatsApp & Signal, one is forced to have a mobile device as a primary device). Largely I can inconvenience everyone by making them choose a different means of communication (with email be largely the only common denominator) but if I were dating again, I would inevitably be forced to use the unsafe app putting myself in the position a lot of WhatsApp users feel they are without effective choice.
"some people use" ≠ “everybody wants to use”
(And are you sincerely suggesting WhatsApp, which is run by one of the largest and most aggressive privacy invaders the world has ever known, as a privacy friendly application? I would suggest re-thinking that position if you want to be taken seriously.)
The guy I replied to is saying that not everyone wants to use Signal because it's centralized and based on phone numbers. But billions of people use WhatsApp despite being exactly that. Signal nails the privacy stuff but obviously people don't give a shit because they're using WhatsApp anyway.
Plus the arbitrary requirement of a mobile device as a primary, so it would be either inconvenient Signal-cli or something like Waydroid.
I've been using Signal since like 2016 and have not seen any appreciable adoption rate whatsoever within my social network.
I used to actively try to get people to use it but I got enough ambivalent or negative responses that I just stopped asking.
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Exactly. And I gave up trying even when it was "easier". Not to mention, since it can't do SMS anymore, I actually helped my mom. stop using it, because then she'd need 2 different messaging apps. She and I now use Google Messages to text and whatever Google is calling the integrated video chat app now.
Yeah, a new messaging app is definitely a hard sell for me if it's data/wifi only. I have Discord for unimportant internet conversations that can wait for me to burn data and texting for important things like work because I get unlimited texts. Having a separate app for a couple of people would be annoying.
I seriously don't understand the resistance. It doesn't lack any features, people have 40 thousand apps on their phone anyway - just install one more if you want to talk to me?
My biggest problem with Signal is how much battery it uses when you don't have Google services on your phone.
It easily uses 30-40% of my battery compared to the rest.
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Signal is great. I miss when it worked with SMS. There are 2 E2EE SMS apps that I'm aware of, bit one is not well supported and the other needs quite a bit of UI work before it's usable by the general public. Also, neither can be used as the default SMS app on Apple phones,but that's not the app's fault.
My problem is that it does not work on multiple devices at the same time, so I have personally given up on it. Maybe it has changed, did not check for a long time.
It works everywhere except Android tablets, and you can just use Molly for that.
I mean, I guess if I’m high enough it’ll seem like I have the messages on my tablet.
Oh, not that Molly…..
If that really works like it reads, it's what I was looking for, thank you!
They are currently in bit trouble as their funds are gone
I don't think they're in trouble, they're just talking about long term funding because it's relevant. Can't expand and get more funding without mentioning that you need it
Of the articles I saw about funding
Source?
This was the article that raised a small stir. Some question the motivation and accuracy of some of the statements. The grabber quote is:
I think he’s talking about this, but it’s very clearly just a normal fundraising pitch that doesn’t even hint at a current issue with funding.
One of their own posts. No motivation to research a link for you
https://signal.org/blog/signal-is-expensive/
Making an extraordinary claim, and then saying you're too lazy to provide a source weakens your claim
Research it yourself. This is a random lemmy comment and not a scientific paper.
https://signal.org/blog/signal-is-expensive/
We would like to raise more funds != our funds are gone.
Yes true there are some claims like CIA funding with little evidence
We got reasonably close with signal, but I know what you mean. I've had friends think I was some sort of escaped convict just because I'd rather use Matrix to chat instead of FB.
https://signal.org/ ?
I love it and have gotten everyone to want to use it?
Lucky you
Signal feels the closest, it's basically equivalent to other messaging apps. Somewhat cleaner and easier to use IMO
The only downside is chat backups for people coming from Messenger, in particular those on iOS devices. Streamlining that process might get me to go "contact me on signal, I don't check messenger often", but right now I get why there's a last bit of friction with my friends
WhatsApp has a similar limitation but they walk you through the backups process. Even then, they limit backups to google drive iirc. Signal could do something similar, but much better by explaining the process and opening up backup locations
Session is coming along nicely, and has true anonymous accounts. But that "everyone wants to use" requirenent is a killer.
The problem here is that a really private application would be p2p over i2p/TOR, but with people behind CG-NAT that is becoming quite troublesome
Some of the hurtles I've encountered using privacy focused chat apps with friends and family is the lack of smooth group chats and adding people remotely.
Some apps have a QR code feature but also allow you to enter a code. It can be a challenge to setup with older family members.
boomers will always complain and cry.
in their minds, they should be able to buy a device and when they open it up, it should already come pre-installed with their granddaughter's name and contact ready to go through a mind reading technology that knows that knows who bought the device and knows who exactly they want to talk to and when.
Star Trek on steroids or something idk.