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Wire – Modern Communications Network

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Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#301

Post by cataflam »

morganvachon wrote: post #159
coldtea wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "What we need is another messaging app" said nobody, ever. The usual negative HN top post. I have to disagree. We've moved from irc, to ICQ, to Microsoft Messenger, to ..., to Skype, to (what's hot now), so somehow all those people really DID want another messaging app and even adopted one. > It looks pretty, but this is yet another app in the long list of "Skype killers" or "Voice/video/text" messaging. Most of th…

> We've moved from irc, to ICQ, to Microsoft Messenger, to ..., to Skype, to (what's hot now) You forgot Hangouts, which works on Android, iOS, and the desktop. It supports text, voice, and video, just like Wire. Its only negative from my personal viewpoint is no Windows Phone support, but that OS is the punchline of many jokes these days. There's also Slack for businesses, non-profits, and private groups (my local I…

Hangouts is getting worse as far as I'm concerned.

Google Talk had only chat, but I could trust it to work as intended and deliver my messages. With Hangouts:

- synchronization between devices is not as good. I will often not see everything I typed on my mobile when I open it on my desktop.

- Messages do not arrive in order !!! Sorry for the triple exclamation marks, but this is implemented in the most stupid way I have ever seen in an IM application. Say we are using Hangouts on my mobile. You send the messages

    A
    B
    C
Occasionally, I will receive C first, then A, then B. Fine. I receive C and read it.

    C
Then I receive A and B. And this happens :

    A
    B
    C
Messages A and B, having been sent before, will appear above the last message I have read and I will probably miss them.

Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#304

Post by GrinningFool »

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #226
sandeepspatil wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they can quote the most advanced encryption algorithm, but you still can't be sure if they have really used it unless they share their code. Bottomline: You either trust them or you don't. One reason for them not sharing the details could be that they want the potential hackers to keep guessing rather than making their life easier (No encrytion is foolproof)

"Bottomline: You either trust them or you don't." That's not true at all. Trust isn't blind faith. Their choice of algorithm, and other factors they can disclose tells a lot about their understanding. "One reason for them not sharing the details could be that they want the potential hackers to keep guessing rather than making their life easier (No encrytion is foolproof)" This is security by obscurity, an example of…

Security by obscurity is a perfectly valid security mechanism - to be used in conjunction with other security mechanisms.

There is no security silver bullet - a properly secured system is security by many strategies. One of those strategies may indeed be obscurity.

Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#305

Post by grimman »

cataflam wrote: post #297
grimman wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> so somehow all those people really DID want another messaging app and even adopted one. Very disingenuous. In terms of ICQ, they were just early to market, had a competent client and... a deeply flawed method of identification. Messenger? Rolled out with Windows, just like certain other software that caused a bit of a stink in courtrooms at one point. Leverage. AOL did the same thing, pretty much. As for Skype... i…

In my memory, ICQ had a terrible client. But the protocol could be used with better, less bloated clients (like trillian). And it had features at the time, like offline messages, that came surprisingly late or were missing in other, later clients. By the same standards, I would of course say Skype has a terrible client now.

ICQ went down the same path most clients seem to go, ie. it got very bloated. At first it was very bare-bones, with some really pleasant file transfer capabilities.

Skype really is history repeating itself. The client is becoming less usable by the day, and for some reason I was selected for a beta test that introduced the "new" flat style, at a huge cost to layout efficiency. It's truly terrible.

Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#306

Post by FreezerburnV »

Ridley wrote: post #266
FreezerburnV wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, even if they DID specifically list out all the security measures that they used, someone would still complain because it isn't completely open source. The previous company I worked for not only had legitimate encryption for anything private we received from the user (e.g.: email passwords) so that nobody at the company could ever read them, but also had some (if I remember correctly) good documentation…

There are already FOSS replacements for Skype, such as Tox. The fact is that if every line of code can't be inspected then the software can't be considered secure, and we're forced to put blind faith in a faceless corporation, which is understandably not acceptable for many people. I don't really care if you think this is "practical" or not. That's simply the reality of the situation. Proprietary == insecure. If a co…

I would argue that, theoretically, proprietary can be secure. A code base can be made secure by highly experienced engineers who are paid to make the code secure. You might never be able to see the code, but it could still be secure. The problem is that you can never actual verify how secure the proprietary solution is. So whether or not it is secure, you don't trust it. (there are even some interesting arguments to be made about the security of any solution that deals with some kind of user input. my previous boss stipulated that the only way to have a truly secure email client is to have some third-party, verified library that takes all the input, and spits out encrypted data to whatever program deals with email servers, without the program dealing with email servers ever seeing that input in plain text form because who knows what it might do with it)

On the other hand as well, open source most certainly does not mean secure. I don't even have to argue to make this point, I merely have to point out Heartbleed or Shellshock.

Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#308

Post by danyork »

gcb0 wrote: post #172
gurkendoktor wrote: post #156

Am I such an outlier if I use Skype for business, not for leisure? I have clients on three continents and every single one used Skype to communicate about the project. Skype was generally running on every machine as a "watercooler chat"/IRC replacement. Just open groups, give them names and pin them to the sidebar. Done. So I really expected this to be more secure, more portable and LESS designer-driven. Who is even…

i like to joke there are two types of tech companies, mutually exclusive. - profit driven - investor money driven skype is a profit company. wire is clearly investor money driven. So while your example is valid, i don't think they want to displace the corporate consumer that creates the bulky of skype profit. It probably wants to go after the users that uses snapchat/wasup/etc for free, with little revenue besides wh…

And curiously, Microsoft is replacing "Lync" with "Skype for Business".... although I'm not sure if that is a simple renaming of the existing client.

Re: Wire – Modern Communications Network

#310

Post by rip747 »

how is this a Skype killer? Not for nothing, but for $2.99 a month I can anywhere with Skype. There is no information on the site about pricing, coverage or restrictions.

Maybe I'm not the majority of Skype users, but I use Skype as a replacement for a second phone in my office. I'm not using it as a messager, picture/video uploader or whatever else this thing does, again, I'm using it as a low cost phone line.

From what I see on the website, I can see this competing with SnapChat, Instagram or whatever other messaging client, but not Skype.

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