231–240 of 256 posts
Another day HN are extremely happy to see Telegram getting ads to support their services. Because they are competing with Facebook / Whatsapp.
May be after all it isn't Ads are evil or bad, it is ads from Facebook or Google are bad?
Any Telegram users here? I've only ever heard it used when talking about batshit American cults. Not exactly a target audience i want to reach.
It's popular among college students where I live. I guess it initially spread among the the sizeable engineering student body, many of whom found it preferable over a Facebook-owned IM application, but less of a hassle than Signal.
Yes, Telegram has the superior UI compared to both. But for me, if I had to name an alternative to WhatsApp, Signal is the first coming to mind. The biggest (only?) reason being the lack of e2e encryption per default for 1:1 chats and complete lack thereof for group messaging in Telegram.
And even if e2ee in groups wasn't important for me, the lack of e2ee support in the desktop client breaks the usability argument completely for me. It's such a pity, because I'd love to recommend Telegram if they'd just use some variant of the Sinal Protocol for everything, just like Matrix, XMPP and WhatsApp are doing it.
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My guess is, because instant messaging only works with multiple people. The usfullness of an IM service is directly coupled to the amount of your peers using it. If there is no one to talk two, why bother? Sure, you and I may be happy to pay this, and may even fork out the fee for our loved ones, but how many other people would do that?
Ads if you don't want to pay, no ads if you want to pay. If there is any problem with that, I fail to see it. The only thing I can really think of is that it is not economically worthwhile - the expectation is that so few people will be willing to pay or leave because of ads, that the added complexity is not worth it. You could then try to throw in some random stuff - larger file size limits, more GIFs, different ski…
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Could you define "real open protocol" vs "public API"? If the former entails an adopted RFC, isn't it common practice to prove need via a product before proposing a standard? Asking because I'm at work on a safer, decentralized protocol for email, TMTP.
Real open protocols are ones not coming from a single vendor / not controlled by a single entity. XMPP and email are open protocols, Matrix, Mattermost and RocketChat are not.
Are you saying that the Matrix authors won't submit an RFC?
> Unlike other apps, Telegram doesn't track whether users tap on a sponsored message and doesn't profile them based on their activity. I wonder how this will go down with advertisers used to the usual pay-per-click and being able to demographically target their audience before spending their ad dollars.
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Yes telegram is so much better than WA from a customer's point of view. The best thing I like about it is that it's an instant setup on every phone and doesn't require the Google backup integration which can take an hour to restore. Also the fact I can run it on multiple devices simultaneously is also kind of a big deal. Their API is also pretty amazing tbh. I wish all my friends were on tg instead of wa and i would…
> I wish all my friends were on tg Just send them all a message that you prefer to be contacted on Telegram now. That works surprisingly well, so many people are on the fence waiting for somebody else to make the first move.
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Real open protocols are ones not coming from a single vendor / not controlled by a single entity. XMPP and email are open protocols, Matrix, Mattermost and RocketChat are not.
Didn't XMPP originate with a single vendor? And JMAP? Didn't SMTP also originate in the field? Are you saying that the Matrix authors won't submit an RFC?
In terms of contributions to the Matrix spec; from a quick eyeball at https://spec.matrix.org/unstable/proposals/, there are 95 different authors, of which 31 work for Element (the company formed by the original team who created Matrix). Or to slice it another way, there are 498 spec change proposals there, of which 358 were written by folks at Element (so 70%). Meanwhile the protocol itself is defined by the independent and neutral Matrix.org Foundation non-profit (https://matrix.org/foundation).
In other words, accusations that Matrix is entirely defined or controlled by Element are untrue - by the time we created Element there was already significant contribution from the wider community, and these days there are loads of other individuals and companies like Beeper, Famedly and even Ericsson contributing to the spec.
Edit: oh, and Rocket.chat is adopting Matrix too, which refutes the GP comment even more...
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AFAIK you do have to use a phone number to sign up with Telegram, but you never need to expose it to other users. I assume that's the kind of anonymity that OP means.
That doesn't hide your identity from a government that wants to arrest you for unapproved speech. If you're an LGBTQ user in many countries, you might want more anonymity than a "please don't show this to other users" button.
But I wouldn't trust TG on that area either. If a government really wants to, they can certainly exploit encryption flaws in the TG protocol and get you. Not as easy as tracing SIM cards, but definitely possible and within govs reach
But in the advertiser-directed comms, it's clear you can have an external link in a button below the ad text.
Am I not seeing something obvious or is it a contradiction?