Poll: Switching from WhatsApp • Hacker News Board

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#171

Post by Fnoord » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:32 PM UTC

gbrown_ wrote: post #24

Sadly the inertia of WhatsApp is something hard to escape. I would/do choose Signal with a few of my tech savvy friends. But the majority of people I know use WhatsApp, and consequently so do I.

I know various people who are not tech savvy, and use Signal. It doesn't require a lot of skill to use Signal; on the contrary. IMO, if you can use WhatsApp, you can use Signal. Some features like Axolotl and 2FA even overlap. That's why I decided to switch away from WhatsApp to Signal. Whoever doesn't follow can send me SMS or e-mail.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#172

Post by whywhywhywhy » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:33 PM UTC

I don't feel like I have a say in it anyway, what I use is dictated by the people I have to talk to.

I'm not a willing participant in WhatsApp, it's what my boss and coworkers use.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#173

Post by prajjwal » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:33 PM UTC

ddevault wrote: post #82

IRC. IRC has been around for the rise and fall of everything else on your list, and a dozen more that we've already forgotten. I have used IRC for my entire life and I see no reason to switch.

As much as I love IRC, it is fundamentally incompatible with the way people use IM these days. Even if you gloss over the lack of "modern" features, you're still going to have a very hard time with vanilla IRC on mobile where keeping a persistent background socket open is frowned upon (if not outright illegal).

Don't get me wrong - I love IRC, and have used it as my primary social network for years. And after spending a full decade trying to switch people over to open protocols, I've found the hard way that the network effect trumps all.

I just don't see the average Whatsapp user ever switching to IRC.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#174

Post by hkt » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:34 PM UTC

Please add Delta Chat to this list.

It is encrypted, uses email under the hood, and they have a large amount of funding as I understand it. The independence and cross-provider nature of this option means whatever email provider you use, they get very limited data about you and your contacts.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#175

Post by Erazal » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:34 PM UTC

Lazare wrote: post #56

Telegram is a great IM experience . The client is good, feature set is good, the stickers are amusing (if you're into that kind of thing), the feature set is complete and everything is polished. Telegram is, I think, going to be one of the easier sells if you're trying to convince non-technical users to switch from WhatsApp or FB Messenger. The privacy, security, and governance story is not great though. If you care…

/Aside

First time I'm meeting my virtual Doppelganger, best part is, it's on HN !

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#176

Post by lbj » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:34 PM UTC

apexalpha wrote: post #155

Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.

I quit WhatsApp, Facebook et al and went with Signal. Initially it was hard converting people to a privacy oriented service, but today I have an endless list of open chats in Signal.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#177

Post by anupamchugh » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:35 PM UTC

Elon Musk says Signal https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1347165127036977153

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#178

Post by nindalf » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

apexalpha wrote: post #155

Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.

Regardless of your opinion of this comment, it's still worthwhile to have the option of "staying with WhatsApp" in the poll.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#179

Post by studiecomput » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

0x_rs wrote: post #43

Been using Telegram for a long time. I don't trust it any more than I do with WhatsApp (therefore, Facebook), however it is well done and thought out, has a real desktop client with a real desktop UI toolkit and enough of my contacts are on it already, therefore it's the best compromise to me. I greatly dislike Signal's UI when I tried it out and I've read about some weird decisions lately (that "using a PIN? uploadi…

I'm facing the same problems. All the people in my (real life) social circle are using WhatsApp. All of my friends are calling me crazy that I don't have Instagram, so talking about alternative messaging apps is probably not going to work. I think this is true for most people in the western culture. I value my privacy, but the struggle is to big for me.

Maybe an open-source protocol, like how e-mail works, could be a solution for this problem. That you can choose your messaging apps and that they can interfere with each other, like email clients.

Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp

#180

Post by jcelerier » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

apexalpha wrote: post #155

Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.

> Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure."

... is it ? I only got whatsapp last year and most of the people I know from real life aren't on it. In a big french city with a 50 thousand-students university.