Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 1001 posts

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#11

Post by blitzar »

mrtksn wrote: post #8

Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services, i.e. how many people pay for paid personal e-mail services? I just don't want to believe that our services have to be paid for through proxy by giving huge cut to 3rd parties. The quality goes down both as UX and as core content, our attention span is destroyed, our privacy is violated and our political power is being stolen as conten…

> Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services

Rounded to the nearest meaningful number - 0%

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#12

Post by 1oooqooq »

snapcaster wrote: post #2

Surprised it took them this long

they got so lucky with whatsbook taking over entire countries, they were swimming in money just selling support channels to gov and big companies.

literal chat dialog tree with 4 options that is not connected to anything for around 250k/year.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#13

Post by angry_octet »

jraby3 wrote: post #5
andrepd wrote: post #3

Would be nice if these kinds of articles would at least take a paragraph to plug some alternatives, such as Signal.

WhatsApp has long promoted itself as a safe alternative to apps like Telegram and Google’s Android messaging. Users flocked to the app globally, finding it a cheap and secure alternative to texting, particularly people in unstable political climates and authoritarian countries, since its messages cannot be easily intercepted without access to personal devices.

This reply screams LLM. Not really responding to the parent comment, nauseatingly anodyne in content. Not wrong, but not right. Will HN be overwhelmed with LLM trash?

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#14

Post by mrtksn »

blitzar wrote: post #11
mrtksn wrote: post #8

Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services, i.e. how many people pay for paid personal e-mail services? I just don't want to believe that our services have to be paid for through proxy by giving huge cut to 3rd parties. The quality goes down both as UX and as core content, our attention span is destroyed, our privacy is violated and our political power is being stolen as conten…

> Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services Rounded to the nearest meaningful number - 0%

I don't know, I expect it to be at least %3 as this is the general conversion rate for "free" users AFAIK.

There must be some some number that makes it viable to have free users and paid users. For games, the free users are usually those who provide the "content".

People usually demonize freemium games but IMHO its much more benign than extracting huge sums by artificially making it worse and sell attention.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#15

Post by 1oooqooq »

blitzar wrote: post #11
mrtksn wrote: post #8

Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services, i.e. how many people pay for paid personal e-mail services? I just don't want to believe that our services have to be paid for through proxy by giving huge cut to 3rd parties. The quality goes down both as UX and as core content, our attention span is destroyed, our privacy is violated and our political power is being stolen as conten…

> Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services Rounded to the nearest meaningful number - 0%

it's probably under 0% even including the 2% error margin.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#16

Post by jahnu »

andrepd wrote: post #3

Would be nice if these kinds of articles would at least take a paragraph to plug some alternatives, such as Signal.

Signal have a few things that make it a hard sell.

It's really hard to clean up media. You have to go into every single chat and from there go about deleting stuff. At least they finally added a "select all" option in there recently.

So the size of it just grows and grows and grows until it's using all the space on your phone. Not a good fit for non-technical types.

Secondly, no web view. There is the desktop app yes, which is flaky, slow and wants to update every day or two.

I just can't see average people putting up with those inconveniences and that's just a couple of them.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#17

Post by AlecSchueler »

leokennis wrote: post #7

At least in The Netherlands, WhatsApp could show a 60 second unskippable modal ad video on every launch, and still get away with it due to network effects. If you’re not on WhatsApp, no updates or news from your kids school, your sports team, your family, your car dealership etc. for you.

Signal seems to be booming right now in the Netherlands. I've been using it for years and never managed to grow my contact list beyond single digits, being a few friends in tech and a few who were very privacy conscious. All of those people were also available on WhatsApp and we'd often forget and message one another there.

But since January the trust in Meta has not only plummeted but it's become a mainstream enough talking point that I now receive invites to join Signal groups from--for want of a better term--normal people. Two of the local parenting groups I'm on are on Signal and no one ever mentions it or questions it, it's just "here's the group link" and the expectation that everyone has it installed.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#18

Post by add-sub-mul-div »

andrepd wrote: post #3

Would be nice if these kinds of articles would at least take a paragraph to plug some alternatives, such as Signal.

Discerning people will already seek out other options on their own, the vast majority won't. We know the pattern from the respective Reddit and Twitter enshittification phases.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#19

Post by 1oooqooq »

mrtksn wrote: post #14
blitzar wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Does anybody have stats on how many people are O.K. paying for their core services Rounded to the nearest meaningful number - 0%

I don't know, I expect it to be at least %3 as this is the general conversion rate for "free" users AFAIK. There must be some some number that makes it viable to have free users and paid users. For games, the free users are usually those who provide the "content". People usually demonize freemium games but IMHO its much more benign than extracting huge sums by artificially making it worse and sell attention.

you're being too generous, as if people were on whatsbook because of a value they get.

they are just there for the captive network effect, which will take a hit the second or becomes a freemium or ad ridden service.

Re: WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

#20

Post by AlexandrB »

laurent123456 wrote: post #6
andrepd wrote: post #3

Would be nice if these kinds of articles would at least take a paragraph to plug some alternatives, such as Signal.

As always network effect will be the problem. I know plenty of people on WhatsApp and almost nobody on Signal

It's a problem but not insurmountable. Otherwise we'd all still be using ICQ/AIM/MSN Messenger/Skype/etc.
Post reply on HN