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Signal is having technical difficulties

status.signal.org

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Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#401

Post by Daniel_sk »

tailspin2019 wrote: post #329
krrrh wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could easily add an optional badge to avatars showing that you donated $1 that year via an optional in-app purchase. The subtle social pressure in a lot of group chats would be pretty effective, and it would help raise awareness that it is run by a non-profit foundation.

This is a great idea. One of my friends who just jumped ship to Signal this week said in his first Signal message to me that he wished he’d “bought some shares” in Signal when I first told him about it... The first challenge is getting people to join the platform. The second challenge is educating them on how it’s actually funded... (ie NOT by pimping out your personal data for shareholder benefit).

Stock with ticker SIGL surged 6000% on Jan 11 - investors thought it's the Signal Messenger. Same like the wrong Zoom company.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#402

Post by bilal4hmed »

olah_1 wrote: post #386
bilal4hmed wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$100 million given current growth wont last as long. Telegram 4 years had a run rate of $1 million per month for servers and dev costs. At that time they had about 200 million users. Signal is using AWS & GCP ( for cloud fronting ), they could be approaching that spend level.

> $100 million given current growth wont last as long. That is 100% their problem, though. I trust that they will develop a sustainable business model when it becomes necessary. Otherwise, look at their tax info shared above. Sporadic donations won't even make a small dent. I mean, shoot, they won't even give us a hint at how much to donate to cover our own costs. That would be a start.

WhatsApp used to charge $1/ yr at 200 million users, which kept them well funded. A $1 donated by just the Android users at 50 million + would be $50 million per year.

TBF they havent had to think about this too much before the last 5 days, so give them some time to come up with a plan.

In the mean throw them whatever you are comfortable with.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#404

Post by corford »

Daniel_sk wrote: post #401
tailspin2019 wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great idea. One of my friends who just jumped ship to Signal this week said in his first Signal message to me that he wished he’d “bought some shares” in Signal when I first told him about it... The first challenge is getting people to join the platform. The second challenge is educating them on how it’s actually funded... (ie NOT by pimping out your personal data for shareholder benefit).

Stock with ticker SIGL surged 6000% on Jan 11 - investors thought it's the Signal Messenger. Same like the wrong Zoom company.

"Its market value surged from about $US55 million to over $US6 billion [...]" Pretty bonkers: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-16/signal-telegram-faceb...

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#405

Post by Steltek »

foobandit wrote: post #398

I suspect this is related to all of the people getting kicked off of other social media platforms. Signal may be becoming the platform of choice for the far-right to share disinformation and organize.

I believe it's more to do with users abandoning WhatsApp due to the concerning privacy policy that Apple forced them to disclose to their users. Many high profile influencers are recommending people switch to Signal.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#406

Post by mickotron »

agilob wrote: post #306
alan5 wrote: post #71

I just donated to Signal after seeing the error banner in the app. I realised I was more than happy to pay WhatsApp's yearly charge back in the pre-Facebook days (think it was 70p or so?). Figured I could give Signal a few quid every now and then, maybe keep a server up for a few seconds :) Donation link should anyone be interested: https://signal.org/donate/

> I just donated to Signal after seeing the error banner in the app. I've tried to donate, but none of my 3 cards worked, I got "card rejected error" without any info why and none of banking apps notified me about new transactions.

Same issue here, and I don't use PayPal after they asked me to provide info to Equifax to continue using it.

They aren't on liberapay as far as I can see.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#407

Post by colechristensen »

caturopath wrote: post #222
JUjFJE2I9Y wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"...As of June 2020, Signal had more than 32.4 million total downloads, and the app had approximately 20 million monthly active users as of December 2020...." [0] "...The initial $50M in funding was a loan, not a donation, from Brian Acton to the new nonprofit Signal Technology Foundation. By the end of 2018, the loan had increased to $105,000,400, which is due to be repaid on February 28, 2068. The loan is unsecured…

Why is this structured as a loan? It sounds like it's structured in such a way that he isn't interested in getting paid back. Is it so he can exercise control in a weird scenario like a buyout? Is it some weird tax thing?

Something like an unusual sort of ownership. If signal was sold, the buyer would be on the hook for all of the debt.

Startup funding that looks more like debt than stockholding isn’t all that weird, and has various implications for exit scenarios.

If you wanted to create something similar to a nonprofit, this is a way you could do it while protecting it from vultures.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#408

Post by bgentry »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #388
bgentry wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've actually said publicly that they're working on making it possible to use Signal without a phone number, via usernames. Here's a recent hint at that: https://twitter.com/signalapp/status/1347248608660185089

Yes, and I acknowledged that in my own post. But it took years to get to the point where they are even talking about upcoming support for this, let alone actually providing it. In the interim, this aspect of great importance to people living in authoritarian regimes was ignored.

I agree that it's unfortunate that the initial attachment to phone numbers has thus far made Signal harder to use for dissidents in many countries. But I can also understand that there are legitimate constraints that led them to go this route initially (abuse & spam prevention come to mind).

I can also acknowledge that it's a universally good thing that they are moving in a positive direction here, and I do not hold it against them for being unable to solve all problems for all people at the same time.

NSLs are a problem generally, but I have a lot less concern in Signal's case because they have no data, and they'd have to be forced to make significant software modifications to enable targeted interception of messages. This is something I expect they would be motivated to fight, more so than any for-profit company might.

Let's acknowledge and appreciate progress where it is being made.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#409

Post by angry_octet »

sgt wrote: post #93
xeromal wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know some places still charge for SMS

I think they charge for SMS pretty much anywhere outside the US.

No its the other way around. Americans were still paying to receive phone calls when most other places were on unlimited SMS.

Re: Signal is having technical difficulties

#410

Post by DataSceince123 »

foobandit wrote: post #398

I suspect this is related to all of the people getting kicked off of other social media platforms. Signal may be becoming the platform of choice for the far-right to share disinformation and organize.

yes, this is why we need to get signal banned
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