Stories Are Coming to Signal • Hacker News Board

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#101

Post by barbazoo » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:11 PM UTC

jbreitbart wrote: post #47

newscracker wrote: post #27

The development of Signal, sorry to put it harshly, seems to suffer from a split brained syndrome. On one hand they’ll focus on adding stickers, stories and other trivial features to help appeal to a broader user base, but on the other hand they’ll refuse to implement basic and important features that people need in a chat app, like chat backups (there is no backup option for iOS, only a device to device transfer…so…

I intentionally drop all messages from time to time (typically once I get a new device). Am I the only one who feels like loosing old conversations is just fine? After all, I don’t remember all conversations I had in person as well. I understand that loosing them at an unexpected time can be annoying and a backup is useful, but I personally never had a use for that feature and knowing that it is annoying for someone…

Same here, I don't get that insistence on backups at all but I get that others might feel differently. I wouldn't be surprised that this is more prevalent in us techie types than the average user of chat apps.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#102

Post by wizzwizz4 » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

fragmede wrote: post #84

bostik wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a messaging application whose intended target audience includes dissidents, location sharing even as an option sounds dangerous. Especially given this from your comment: Focus on providing security fixes and minor improvements that improve user experience - when UX includes such irrelevancies such as "avoid getting users vanished and/or killed", the guiding principle should be: no footguns.

A secret tracking device that reveals the location of the rebels secret underground base certainly sounds dangerous, but allowing dissidents to share location of the protest for everyone to gather at seems almost necessary for a modern messaging app! How else do you get to that critical mass of people in the main city square? In the end, it's just a tool that isn't inherently good or evil.

There's a difference between sharing a location (good) and sharing your location (perhaps not so good).

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#103

Post by nixpulvis » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

Mystlix wrote: post #54

nixpulvis wrote: post #42

Whelp, there goes the neighborhood. Honestly, why can't we just make products and services that do one thing and do it well. Leave "stories" to the social media applications.

Could you elaborate over what the "one thing" a messaging application should do actually is? Because I could argue that sending people pictures, videos, documents or general file blobs is waaaay outside of what a "pure" messaging platform should offer

I can tell you that posting a story is clearly outside this domain, but as for the exact set of features, that's a harder question.

I like the idea of MMS tho, so I'd personally like messages to be like short and quick e-mail. Packaged up media is nice to be able to send as opposed to just links, since they are more direct. Though links are good too, esspecially when files are large and might be shared with multiple people.

Building a streamlined interface still remains an unsolved problem it seems, which is why it pains me to see yet another chat app fail to prioritize features effectively.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#104

Post by wizzwizz4 » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:16 PM UTC

_8j50 wrote: post #95

Ffs! Just have cross platform backup/restore and migration, accounts not tied to phones and multi-device accounts already! I have heard others complain about this for years now. I can code but I don't code for a living, these things seem like they would take at most two weeks dev time, is there a complexity I am missing here? Or do they just not care? I have all but abandoned secure mobile messanging at this point. T…

One of Signal's main purposes is to be used by Snowden types (whistleblowers, dissidents, journalists, etc.) – or, at least, it used to be. Messages Are Private is the most important principle for Signal, even if it means messages are lost.

Accounts not tied to phones, I don't really have an explanation for. It was in the works two years ago, but I haven't heard anything since.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#105

Post by jimkleiber » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:17 PM UTC

fragmede wrote: post #96

jimkleiber wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, called Statuses. In iOS, it's the bottom left corner of the menu, click that and you can add a story near the top next to My Story. Probably similar UI for Android. > What other apps are common among you and your peers? Ironically, I'm in the US but used to live in East Africa and have lots of friends out there. So I'm not sure what's too popular out there nowadays besides WhatsApp and TikTok. Some apps probably…

I'd be extremely curious to hear about any the money management apps (even if you're not sure which one is dominant, or the information out of date). I'm guessing the main apps in the US (Venmo and Paypal) don't even operate in East Africa.

Ahh, well, I'm not sure of any new players, as of a few years ago most of the telecoms have their own form of mobile money transfer. It mostly started in Kenya with m-Pesa years ago, where people could send money thru USSD codes. Now these companies have apps to do it, like Airtel, Safaricom/Vodacom, MTN, Togo, etc. Some companies in West Africa appear to be going hard for the market in consolidating across telecoms, like Paystack and Flutterwave, one of whom I think got investment from Stripe and the other from Visa I believe.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#106

Post by deutschepost » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:17 PM UTC

Mystlix wrote: post #38

anthropodie wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow I did not realize that Signal was missing this. I think they are focusing on getting more people on board than building a great app. Too many people blame Matrix but I love it. It's UI is not as polished but hey I can work with it because sooner or later all these centralized apps run after revenue and ruin the most basic stuff that these app should do: messaging.

what happens in your decentralized system if one of your friends has their account registered on a naughty naughty server that just got blacklisted by the righteous admins of your instance and now you can't talk together anymore? does that person need to make a completely new account just to send some messages to you? does a migration scenario exist? and if it exists, does it warn your contacts and transfer everythin…

Last time I checked Matrix was researching about the topic of multiple homeservers. So you could just use a local homeserver on your device and a remote homesesrver with a fancy name simultaniously. This would also enable users to communicate P2P. But I don't know how advanced this system is yet.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#107

Post by Slothborg » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:19 PM UTC

saurik wrote: post #75

ringworld wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone has different UI feature desires so ill put that aside for this comment; flexibility is my key reason for Signal losing favor. What the Matrix solution gives me: - chat from multiple devices with history upon login (I read they're working on downloadable exports/backups) from any client; - zero knowledge webapp logins (e.g. the work laptop on VPN, app.element.io in a Chrome tab) just use your Security Key li…

And yet Moxie spends a ton of time and effort attempting to convince everyone that working on protocols and federated systems (not just "Web3" and crypto-adjacent stuff, as in his article yesterday, but the entire space: he gave a scathing talk a year or two ago you can find a copy of, though he interestingly hadn't wanted it recorded) are useless and that no one should waste their time building them :(.

> he gave a scathing talk a year or two ago you can find a copy of, though he interestingly hadn't wanted it recorded

Do you mean the talk he gave at C3?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj3YFprqAr8

Never heard anything about him not wanting it recorded, presenting at C3 means your talk will be recorded and distributed.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#108

Post by _8j50 » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:21 PM UTC

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #104

_8j50 wrote: post #95

Ffs! Just have cross platform backup/restore and migration, accounts not tied to phones and multi-device accounts already! I have heard others complain about this for years now. I can code but I don't code for a living, these things seem like they would take at most two weeks dev time, is there a complexity I am missing here? Or do they just not care? I have all but abandoned secure mobile messanging at this point. T…

One of Signal's main purposes is to be used by Snowden types (whistleblowers, dissidents, journalists, etc.) – or, at least, it used to be. Messages Are Private is the most important principle for Signal, even if it means messages are lost. Accounts not tied to phones, I don't really have an explanation for. It was in the works two years ago, but I haven't heard anything since.

There are better alternatives like Briar for snowden types. Signal is always competing against telegram or whatsapp and comparing themselves. Integrity and reliability are critical security properties.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#109

Post by jimkleiber » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:32 PM UTC

fragmede wrote: post #94

jimkleiber wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WhatsApp has had stories for years, just called statuses. Most of my American friends don't use it or know they're there, but my East African friends use them all the time. Frankly, most of my US friends aren't even on WhatsApp or Telegram or Signal. I don't know where they are :-D Maybe iMessage, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Snapchat, Facebook. How do you define the difference between a messaging app and social media…

It's the blurring of lines that some users are objecting to. Instagram is a perfect example where yes, important communication happens via Instagram messages, but the problem is that once the app is open, it's exceedingly easy to accidentally spend minutes/hours listlessly scrolling. In order to avoid listlessly scrolling, users will uninstall the app or set time limits on it, or other techniques to avoid it sucking…

Ah, yeah, fair point. When I was building an app, I tried to make it as not addictive as possible, and yet the thought that would come to my mind was that if what I make is not that addictive, they may just use the other one. So this back and forth about not wanting people to be addicted to it but also wanting to be compelling enough to pull people from the other ones. I've thought about this with podcasting—I don't want people to listen to my podcasts all day, I'd prefer they also talk with people around them. That being said, people will listen to podcasts and would I prefer they listen to me over someone else, given no matter what I do, they may spend X hours per day listening?

I appreciate you saying what you did about the blurring.

Re: Stories Are Coming to Signal

#110

Post by piaste » Sat, Jan 08, 2022, 7:42 PM UTC

jbreitbart wrote: post #47

newscracker wrote: post #27

The development of Signal, sorry to put it harshly, seems to suffer from a split brained syndrome. On one hand they’ll focus on adding stickers, stories and other trivial features to help appeal to a broader user base, but on the other hand they’ll refuse to implement basic and important features that people need in a chat app, like chat backups (there is no backup option for iOS, only a device to device transfer…so…

I intentionally drop all messages from time to time (typically once I get a new device). Am I the only one who feels like loosing old conversations is just fine? After all, I don’t remember all conversations I had in person as well. I understand that loosing them at an unexpected time can be annoying and a backup is useful, but I personally never had a use for that feature and knowing that it is annoying for someone…

I recently decided to watch a movie that my ex-girlfriend had recommended to me, and I was able to quietly search for it in the chat history since we're no longer on speaking terms so I couldn't ask her.

On the other side, when I broke up with her I also used the chat history to point out some times she had tried to lie to me. That was a bitter satisfaction I could probably have done without.