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BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

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Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#51

Post by kelnos »

TZubiri wrote: post #40
thisislife2 wrote: post #5

Exciting news! Can't wait for iMessage to open up too. Any idea if this (or other future messengers) will work outside of Europe too or does WhatsApp use some kind of geofencing, like Apple, to prevent non-EU citizens from enjoying the same rights too?

But iMessage is already open? You can send an SMS to any number and it shows in iMessage, completely interoperable through that standard protocol. Whatsapp on the other hand does not show SMS messages (Which is a design choice that makes sense from a security perspective I guess, not saying it's wrong.)

You're confusing two different things, though I don't blame you for it, as it is confusing. "iMessage" is the OTT E2E-encrypted chat protocol. "Messages" note the lack of the leading "i" and trailing "s") is an iOS app that lets you send and receive messages using both the iMessage and SMS/MMS/RCS protocols.

iMessage is not open, and Apple fights efforts by other companies (e.g. Beeper) to interoperate with it.

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#52

Post by uriegas »

serial_dev wrote: post #21
zer0zzz wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last I heard iMessage was not deemed an eu “gatekeeper” so no

I don’t know anyone in Europe who uses iMessage, everyone is on WhatsApp though.

I believe iMessage is only used in the USA. In Latin America almost everyone uses WhatsApp.

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#53

Post by benj111 »

odo1242 wrote: post #18
thisislife2 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this a per-contact setting or a "universal" one?

Account-wide. Though you can only turn it on in Europe.

When you say Europe you mean the EU? I'm not seeing an option in the UK. (Yay Brexit)

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#54

Post by jstummbillig »

echelon wrote: post #34
dfajgljsldkjag wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's better than nothing. If you have a different app and want to talk to your friend who uses whatsapp it's much easier to convince him to toggle a setting than to download a different app.

[flagged]

> This is fucking malicious compliance. Meta knows what they're doing.

And so do the courts. Give them some time to cook. How goes the popular American saying: We can do this the easy way or we can do this the hard way.

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#55

Post by chatmasta »

rambambram wrote: post #36

As a European, I would like to know in _which_ European country you're based. I think I know all of them, people from abroad might not. Saying "Made in Europe" is too general for my European liking. ;)

I'd also like to know what "based in the EEA" means:

> For interoperability to work, both you and your WhatsApp contacts need to be based in the EEA.

Does my contact phone number need to have an EEA country code? Does my current IP address need to be geolocated in the EEA? Do I need to download the two apps from a regional App Store in the EEA? Do I need to show an EEA payment method to both apps? What happens to my chats if I move or switch app stores?

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#56

Post by pipo234 »

arter45 wrote: post #32
B1FIDO wrote: post #6

I must protest that this kind of announcement belies the stupidity of proprietary chat protocols. Remember when IRC was king, and basically, anyone could write an IRC client? Anyone could write a MUD client, or even a Telnet client. Those are open protocols. When Pidgin came out, it was like a breath of fresh air for me. In the early 90s I had multiple IM accounts (starting with ICQ!) and unifying them, especially un…

Social networks and chat apps are mostly dominated by the network effect. Since the purpose of these apps is literally putting you in contact with other people, you tend to use the same app/social network most of your friends and family are using. This is not necessarily true for platforms you use to find new people, but even then, you're going to use the websites/apps people with your interests are using.

I don't think his rant is against social networks or instant messaging perse, but about vendor lock in.

The way I read it is along the lines of Mike Masnick's protocols not platforms.

https://knightcolumbia.org/content/protocols-not-platforms-a...

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#57

Post by altern8 »

snowmobile wrote: post #24
altern8 wrote: post #7

This is pretty amazing, but I wish they picked a better name for it. I have a feeling that a good amount of people will dismiss it just because of the name.

What's wrong with the name? Some cultural reference I'm not getting?

It just sounds—let's say—too playful.

Specially if you go to the homepage and they're trying to market it as a work too.. If I went to my boss and tried to make the case that we should move all of our encrypted communication from Whatsapp to something called BirdyChat they would laugh at me and dismiss the idea.

That might just be me, not sure.

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#58

Post by input_sh »

poisonborz wrote: post #31

Even the first announcement about this included BirdyChat and Haiket. Two completely unknown and yet unreleased closed source chat apps with a waitlist. Can't help but think they are maintained by people close to Meta dev teams and were hand-picked for a malicious compliance, where they can just point to them as examples, and they make onboarding as complicated and expensive as possible for others.

Correct! This is just Meta doing malicious compliance by being "compatible" with companies with no actual product, three-months old waitlist, no actual users within the EU, and nobody to push back on WhatsApp's definition of interoperability. Then when some real product tries to actually become interoperable down-the-line, Meta's gonna be like "well these two did it just fine according to this backwards implementation, why can't you?"

They're both b2b products that are gonna try to find their first users by pitching the idea that you can use their products to spam WhatsApp users.

Haiket doesn't even try to hide its connection to Meta. All you have to do is to go to their website, click on press, and see in the only press release they've ever posted that its CEO holds patents in use by Meta. Here, let me save you a click: https://haiket.com/press/release-nov11.html

> Alex holds over 10 patents in voice and communication technologies, assigned to and used by Google and Facebook.

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#59

Post by drcongo »

snowmobile wrote: post #24
altern8 wrote: post #7

This is pretty amazing, but I wish they picked a better name for it. I have a feeling that a good amount of people will dismiss it just because of the name.

What's wrong with the name? Some cultural reference I'm not getting?

I couldn't work out what the hell the app is from the website, as the home page tells you it's a "New Home for Work Chat" and mentions "Still using personal chat apps for work conversations?" - so I'm guessing it's supposed to have some business focus, but the app name makes it sound like something you'd install for your kids. I can't imagine ever saying to someone "we need to discuss contract details, let's talk on BirdyChat".

Re: BirdyChat becomes first European chat app that is interoperable with WhatsApp

#60

Post by zenmac »

Nextgrid wrote: post #25
PEe9bB7D wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Matrix is getting traction though...

Matrix is a lost cause. The protocol is too complex/ambitious and the company behind it doesn't have the resources to actually produce a good server nor client implementation. I was hopeful for it at first but at some point you have to be realistic.

While I agree with you, and there should more diverse members than just the people from Element.

What I do like about them is the zero server trust stand they are taking on their clients which makes migration a pain in the butt, but that is what one would expect from a true e2ee chat app.

And now they have two stable servers in rust. The French and German government including military are using the protocol to make their own apps. Maybe it should be something the EU should put some more resource into it?

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