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Telegram to award grants to bot developers

telegram.org

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Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#61

Post by sangnoir »

collyw wrote: post #19

Can someone explain to me what bots are for. It looks like using something similar to a REST API over Telegram. Whats the point / use / advantage of that?

> Can someone explain to me what bots are for.

Anything the bot-builder wants really. I think the aim of this grant is to explore the limits of what bots could be used for.

Bots don't have to use AI or ML to be useful: right now I use the @gif bot to search for and reply with reaction gifs inline (without having to launch browser->search->download->attach into chat). You can create a Jenkins/CI bot that chimes in when a build fails, or create a weather bot that tells you it's going to rain

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#62

Post by Shoot_The_Moon »

sangnoir wrote: post #61
collyw wrote: post #19

Can someone explain to me what bots are for. It looks like using something similar to a REST API over Telegram. Whats the point / use / advantage of that?

> Can someone explain to me what bots are for. Anything the bot-builder wants really. I think the aim of this grant is to explore the limits of what bots could be used for. Bots don't have to use AI or ML to be useful: right now I use the @gif bot to search for and reply with reaction gifs inline (without having to launch browser->search->download->attach into chat). You can create a Jenkins/CI bot that chimes in whe…

You can even create games! Shameless plug: http://mrwgame.com/

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#64

Post by harry8 »

amk_ wrote: post #53
harry8 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So use chromium? Or have your messages stored by a third party in clear text - which seems like a far worse option than having a browser you don't otherwise have to use at all, installed.

There are other browsers than Chrome and Chromium, you know.

I think you missed the point. Use another browser by all means, I do. Chrome or Chromium is required to run the Signal desktop client.

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#65

Post by pdappollonio »

CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #8

If they have $1M to invest, why don't they focus on securing their protocol (i.e. switching to authenticated encryption) and turning encryption on by default? See http://cs.au.dk/~jakjak/master-thesis.pdf for more on why Telegram isn't secure and you shouldn't trust it (as it is today) for anything requiring privacy.

I'm not up to date, but didn't Telegram had a bounty for someone who could read a conversation even by knowing the phone numbers involved? If so, why the writer here didn't got the bounty?

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#66

Post by yagop »

What about API library developers [1]? We haven't received anything yet but thanks to us others can build bots. I invented the Telegram bots back in 2014 [2] (there wasn't API) and haven't received any thanks from Telegram.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/TelegramBots/comments/3bsec7/unoffi... [2] https://github.com/yagop/telegram-bot

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#67

Post by nagarjun »

Underneath the original "wow factor", I think bots have a glaring UX problem. Developers just haven't figured out the real use-case for bots. In some ways, I think this current bot-craze is very similar to what happened with smartwatches 2 years ago. Simply cramming a phone app into a watch doesn't make it magically awesome or useful.

I think a lot of developers seem to be taking the same approach with bots. They are trying to create alternative UIs for their already existing mobile apps through bots. Mobile / web apps do a lot of the same stuff as bots in a much more user-friendly way. Take a look at https://storebot.me/ and tell me if there's one bot that can do something better than a mobile app.

I'm not anti-bot but I just think the bot-frenzy is premature,

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#68

Post by Shoot_The_Moon »

nagarjun wrote: post #67

Underneath the original "wow factor", I think bots have a glaring UX problem. Developers just haven't figured out the real use-case for bots. In some ways, I think this current bot-craze is very similar to what happened with smartwatches 2 years ago. Simply cramming a phone app into a watch doesn't make it magically awesome or useful. I think a lot of developers seem to be taking the same approach with bots. They are…

I developed a game solely as a Telegram bot: https://storebot.me/bot/mrw_bot

I think that this is a better platform than mobile as it supports multiple devices, user accounts are already setup, it's easy to test and it has built in notifications.

One thing I did have an issue with, is showcasing what it's features were. One option is to create a lot of videos and screenshots which would take a lot of time. As further improvements were made, I would have to reshoot the videos.

Instead, I created a React component to simulate interactions with a bot. The React component is here: http://sevenleaps.github.io/chat-template/

The website for the bot is: http://www.mrwgame.com/

Re: Telegram to award grants to bot developers

#70

Post by mkohlmyr »

ahalam wrote: post #56
mkohlmyr wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't reply to the post underneath yours but I very much agree with you and for me the reason I don't want the "link your phone to your macbook" solution is because my phone and it's number are very much not going to be permanent. I do however have an email address I intend to use for a very long time. I was actually looking for a chat solution earlier today and neither telegram nor signal fit the bill for these ve…

Why aren't you using Wire ( https://www.wire.com )? It is cross platform, end to end secure w/ open source audited crypto, focuses on app usability, and doesn't need a phone number to sign up.

I had honestly never heard of it before. It looks good, but the website is completely lacking any information about the company which again makes me feel a little bit uneasy. I might try it, though.
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