WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees • Hacker News Board

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#41

Post by janpieterz » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:29 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #34

janpieterz wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've read up a while ago on the questionable cryptography (not an expert in that at all myself) but couldn't find a lot of actual substance. Certainly with claims [0] [1] being that Telegram offers nice sums for breaking it, which gives me as a consumer the idea that someone who actually knows this stuff would love to hit that down, if it was something in my area of expertise offering that I'd love to try and hit it.…

What have you read about the questionable cryptography in Telegram that you found unpersuasive? That's a better starting point, because the formulation you use here is often used on message boards to bait people into doing research work that is then dismissed. Your comment includes an assertion that there aren't substantial complaints about Telegram's security (there very much are, BTW). I think the onus is on you to…

You're absolutely right if my goal was to get people to post these papers, which reading back can easily be how it is interpreted.

My point was more that, as a 'consumer' of this product without any background knowledge, their contests seem extremely convincing to the point of being slightly ridiculous. A 300,000 dollar bounty, while participants get quite some more access than they would normally get while attacking this system, gives me that feeling of it being actually quite secure, besides some possible attacks. If they're possible, if there are complaints, why can't they be made real and substantiated?

My first post is indeed not delivering the message I intended, hope this one shows it better.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#42

Post by ptx » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:32 PM UTC

When I very recently started using WhatsApp, the client displayed a link to a blog post[0] they wrote about why charging subscription fees was important and a good thing:

"At every company that sells ads, a significant portion of their engineering team spends their day tuning data mining, writing better code to collect all your personal data, upgrading the servers that hold all the data and making sure it's all being logged and collated and sliced and packaged and shipped out... And at the end of the day the result of it all is a slightly different advertising banner in your browser or on your mobile screen.

"Remember, when advertising is involved you the user are the product.

...

"When people ask us why we charge for WhatsApp, we say 'Have you considered the alternative?'"

Given that this new blog post carefully talks about not introducing "third-party ads", presumably first-party ads are still on the table? Which would make this new model the alternative that they warned us about earlier.

[0] https://blog.whatsapp.com/245/Why-we-dont-sell-ads

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#43

Post by mynewtb » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:33 PM UTC

pkd wrote: post #28

ronnier wrote: post #8

I don't like that WhatsApp is tied to my phone number.

FWIW, this was my biggest gripe with it too. I did not start using WhatsApp till 2014 while all of my friends had already switched a couple of years back. I was happy with Facebook messenger, but i was forced to switch to be in the loop. Although since Facebook messenger also needs your number to verify the phone, if I remember correctly, it hardly matters. I have recently made the switch to Signal[1], and made my pa…

Sadly signal uses your number too.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#44

Post by cvwright » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:34 PM UTC

firloop wrote: post #30

Worth reading of course is the post (pre FB acquisition) on why they don't sell ads: https://blog.whatsapp.com/245/Why-we-dont-sell-ads

And for those who didn't read the link, the punchline at the end of that post is:

"When people ask us why we charge for WhatsApp, we say 'Have you considered the alternative?'"

The (implied) alternative here is advertising; the author just spent the previous 8 paragraphs discussing all the unpleasantness and creepiness that that entails.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#45

Post by currysausage » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:34 PM UTC

2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #31

XorNot wrote: post #25

I don't think I ever paid fees for Whatsapp, and I'm not sure how or why. But this also seems too late. Facebook own them, my family started using Facebook, and with Messenger as a separate app I more or less lost any incentive to use it.

I think only new sign ups after the fee introduction paid the fee.

When I signed up for WhatsApp in 2012, the iOS app cost 0.79 € (I believe it was a promotion, usually 1.79 €) and gave me a free lifetime license. I think the Android app already asked for a yearly fee after one year at that time, at least in theory.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#46

Post by Pharaoh2 » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:35 PM UTC

51Cards wrote: post #37

defenestration wrote: post #15

Paid business services for customer interaction, sound like a plausible business model for WhatsApp. However, I get the feeling this is only part of the story. I assume that data mined by WhatsApp are probably more valuable to Facebook.

I would agree. I think their user base has hit some tipping point which ensures other revenue streams. That's the only reason I can think they would throw the fees... out the window. (nice user name)

So I know internal figures from facebook regarding whatsapp. A large majority of our users are never actually charged a subscription fee.

The app is facing stiff competition in some markets against apps that don't have any subscription model. Even though whatsapp won't actually charge those users the presence of a subscription feature seems to be causing a growth hinderance.

Not sure how it will compete in these markets now given the entrenched nature of social platforms and how hard it is to convince people to switch but that remains to be seen.

Also, until recently whatsapp/facebook couldn't actually read any message sent by users to other users/groups because of the end to end encryption in place. Not sure why they would change that just to get a data mined revenue source, metadata is quite sufficient for that. Even with NSLs on fb in place, the impossibility of of us to read the messages in whatsapp is sufficient reason to deny a NSL request.

Zuck doesn't really interfere with whatsapp, but like with some other things this seems like a bid to increase DAUs and retention instead of any new source of revenue.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#47

Post by defenestration » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:36 PM UTC

51Cards wrote: post #37

defenestration wrote: post #15

Paid business services for customer interaction, sound like a plausible business model for WhatsApp. However, I get the feeling this is only part of the story. I assume that data mined by WhatsApp are probably more valuable to Facebook.

I would agree. I think their user base has hit some tipping point which ensures other revenue streams. That's the only reason I can think they would throw the fees... out the window. (nice user name)

I couldn't resist to smile. Back on topic, it would be great if WhatsApp clarifies which data they share with Facebook and how that data is being used.

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#48

Post by snorrah » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:37 PM UTC

hendzen wrote: post #40

secfirstmd wrote: post #12

Signal is also free and based on a business model that doesn't require eventually being able to interfere with your privacy and mine your data. https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/signal-private-messenger/id8... https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.thoughtcri...

What business model is Signal based on?

Donations, it seems http://support.whispersystems.org/hc/en-us/articles/21294015...

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#49

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:38 PM UTC

ptx wrote: post #42

When I very recently started using WhatsApp, the client displayed a link to a blog post[0] they wrote about why charging subscription fees was important and a good thing: "At every company that sells ads, a significant portion of their engineering team spends their day tuning data mining, writing better code to collect all your personal data, upgrading the servers that hold all the data and making sure it's all being…

[deleted]

Re: WhatsApp will no longer charge subscription fees

#50

Post by free2rhyme214 » Mon, Jan 18, 2016, 9:39 PM UTC

jhasse wrote: post #21

ultramancool wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a toss up: - WhatsApp uses reputable cryptography from reputable sources, but combines it with a UI so much designed for ease of use that it throws out the possibility of real security - Telegram uses extremely questionable cryptography to begin with from people who probably shouldn't be designing cryptosystems If you want real security, go use Signal or better, OTR where socialist millionaire's is still an opti…

Also WhatsApp is closed-source, but Telegram's client is open-source.

Not everything with Telegram is open source like Signal. I still use Telegram because it's designed better and updated much more frequently.