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

WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

411–420 of 1001 posts

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#411

Post by deathanatos »

CincinnatiMan wrote: post #197
frereubu wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't do group chats in the same way using SMS messages. People who receive an SMS have no idea who else the message was sent to, so they can't even "reply all".

The person you're replying to probably meant MMS which can be used for group texting as you're describing.

The fragmented and quirky MMS implementations in the wild render MMS functionally useless, especially compared to what feature set an app can have. I've seen MMS implementations that send replies to only the sender of the original (so some replies, from better implementations, end up in the MMS group, and some end up only sent back to the sender, resulting in confusion); I've seen MMS implementations that allow you to "like" a message, and this is implemented by just sending "I liked this." as a message back to the other clients — which can't interpret it as anything other than just a normal message — resulting in confusion.

Did you know that MMS can transmit slideshows[1]? I didn't, until my father somehow sent me one. The UI that Android has for that is — naturally — a complete afterthought. (No way to pause the slideshow, no way to navigate the slides, nothing. Just one run through the animation at Warp 8.)

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multimedia_Messaging_Service

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#412

Post by Triv888 »

frereubu wrote: post #22

I'd love to give up WhatsApp, but network effects are key here. I tried moving my extended family off WhatsApp onto Signal a couple of years ago and it failed miserably because the app wasn't nearly as easy to use, and they had all their friends on Whatsapp. Has anyone here had any success moving a large group of people onto something like Signal or Telegram? If so, do you have any tips?

One thing that is strange with signal is that you are required to have a phone number to signup?

That's one reason with I prefer Matrix/Element...

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#413

Post by croes »

upofadown wrote: post #327
croes wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean the signal protocol.

The protocol isn't really the root issue with interoperability. It's identity. As a start you should be able to easily use your verified identities across the different systems. Signal would probably be a poor base for an interoperability standard. Which flavour would you use? Signal Messenger, Matrix, OMEMO and allegedly WhatsApp all use the Signal protocol but can not interoperate at all. Signal Protocol is also mo…

Simple as possible? Than use email. The security of the signal protocol is necessary if you look who all wants to read the data. The EU wants to practically abolish encryption so that intelligence services and authorities can read all messages.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#414

Post by Zelphyr »

the_arun wrote: post #386
Zelphyr wrote: post #285

It has been said that companies that build rely too heavily on the public, free API’s of another service are doomed when that service decides to monetize those API’s. See, for example, API users of Google Maps. I think we are now at the point where this applies to individuals. If a person or group of people rely too heavily on a single free service then they’re going to feel pain when that service finally decides to…

I agree there is no free lunch. But for that I don't want to sell everything & stand naked. Instead Whatsapp should introduce features on top of their platform - like Payments and make money out of that. Or add a throttle on number of messages people send per day or something. No free lunch is not an excuse for stealing data.

I believe you may have misunderstood my post. I’m not excusing Facebook’s actions around their users’ privacy (or any of their crooked actions for that matter)

I’m trying to encourage people to remember that this is what these companies do when we use their services for free. They seem to think they are entitled to our private data and they are beginning to respond harshly when we try to keep what is rightly ours to ourselves.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#415

Post by letitbeirie »

grishka wrote: post #382
tinyhouse wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not entirely true. They did charge something tiny to use the app (I think it was ~$2/year) but in many countries (outside the US where they were much more popular) they didn't block users who didn't pay. If you didn't want to see annoying reminders you would just pay and get rid of it. Many people I know never paid.

For me it simply displayed "the next year of service is on us" once a year, every year. Paying for WhatsApp was something of an urban legend.

The modern day WinRAR

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#416

Post by doc_gunthrop »

mr_toad wrote: post #350
seesawtron wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social life is impossible without the mainstream technology. Sure you can find alternatives but if no one uses it other than you, you end up being sidelined. The technology gets enforced and leaves one with no choice but to accept it or be a red flag. Shouldn't it be possible to delete your whatsapp chat and contacts data regularly from the cloud? Eg. one could delete the whatsapp account, clear data on cloud and mak…

> Social life is impossible without the mainstream technology. If people won’t go to the trouble of using an alternate way of getting in touch with you then they’re not really your friends.

It's more like:

If people won’t go to the trouble of using your preferred method of getting in touch with you then you don't have enough social clout.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#417

Post by Maken »

aftbit wrote: post #381
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other people who run on donations: Public Radio, The Red Cross, all government services, all religions. It's fine to be skeptical of how they use their donations, but don't be skeptical just because that's their funding model.

Taxes to pay for government services are more like protection money than donations IMHO. If I were to stop paying, some angry people with guns would eventually come to my door to take me away.

It's more like a subscription fee. They kick you out of society if you stop paying.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#419

Post by baxtr »

frereubu wrote: post #22

I'd love to give up WhatsApp, but network effects are key here. I tried moving my extended family off WhatsApp onto Signal a couple of years ago and it failed miserably because the app wasn't nearly as easy to use, and they had all their friends on Whatsapp. Has anyone here had any success moving a large group of people onto something like Signal or Telegram? If so, do you have any tips?

This is changing rapidly. Many people I know are moving Signal. Also, don’t delete WhatsApp right away. Do a “silent” move: whenever people send you a WhatsApp answer on iMessage if they’re Apple users and actively push the Android friends over to signal. Works well in my case.

Re: WhatsApp gives users an ultimatum: Share data with Facebook or stop using app

#420

Post by Hammershaft »

frereubu wrote: post #22

I'd love to give up WhatsApp, but network effects are key here. I tried moving my extended family off WhatsApp onto Signal a couple of years ago and it failed miserably because the app wasn't nearly as easy to use, and they had all their friends on Whatsapp. Has anyone here had any success moving a large group of people onto something like Signal or Telegram? If so, do you have any tips?

Telegram is fantastic! Frankly I think it has a better ux then Whatsapp, especially considering the desktop apps.
Post reply on HN