Offtopic: Since when does HN have polls?
Since 2008 (possibly earlier): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=129951
Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
431–440 of 972 posts
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#432Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mainly because of the fact that it is de facto controlled by Google (via Jibe).
I'm a Googler opinions are my own. While Google is the main implementer of RCS servers and clients, a few larger carriers have done their own implementation of it, with no need for Google. Client side, I believe Samsung had their own implementation for it? And Apple could make iMessage RCS compatible, they just have chosen not to at this point. Edit: to add, RCS does support 1:1 encryption now, though I don't believe…
Totally missed opportunity for RCS IMHO. If RCS was available worldwide (I believe it is mostly still US only) along with encryption, it would have been the obvious choice for most people by now since it would allow users to use their favorite (RCS supported) app
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#433Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.
As someone who's never used such a service, help me understand what's so critical about it. Can't people just send SMS? Aren't people on fb anyway, which can be accessed with a container on Firefox? EDIT: got some answers re SMS. Fine, though that doesn't explain why there is so much overlap/redundancy with social media applications. At a glance, it appears I could do the very same things (groups, multimedia) messagi…
People use whatsapp groups a lot. Also sharing images doesn't work well with SMS.
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#434Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.
That’s not a good comparison. There are many alternatives to WhatsApp and it’s not a „critical“ infrastructure. In contrast, you sometimes can’t choose your ISP and internet is much more critical.
Where I live, everything is based around WhatsApp. If you want to receive a package from Amazon/FedEx/DHL/UPS, etc. The shipment will only be delivered to the location you share with the courier on WhatsApp, if you're not on WhatsApp you can't even receive packages. There are so many other things like this that are happening only on WhatsApp, and if you're not on it you won't even be able to use basic services.
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#435Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, I don't know where parent is located, but here in Brazil they are pretty much right. Everybody has WhatsApp... it's assumed that if you have a phone you have WhatsApp. A lot of financial transactions are conducted by doing a bank transfer and then sending the receipt via WhatsApp. The schools send essential messages to parents via WhatsApp. During lockdowns, stores were taking delivery orders via WhatsApp. What…
> What's more, several cell phone operators' plans include unlimited WhatsApp, but only a few GB of other data... meaning when your data limits are reached you can still use WhatsApp for the rest of the month, but not i.e. Signal or Telegram. That makes is rather hard to convince people to switch. isn't this illegal? Portugal had such a problem, but i don't think anything happened since this: https://news.ycombinator…
Wikipedia says net neutrality is enforced in Brazil, so it should be illegal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_by_country#Braz...
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#436Missing option: none. Whatsapp's value to me was negligible (that isn't to say I wasn't using it quite a lot; it's value was just low). So I'm removing it and not replacing it.
Out of curiosity, what do you use to communicate with friends / distant family members when you have to?
Most of my WhatsApp use has been to stay in touch with friends / families. Planning trips is almost impossible without WhatsApp for me and my groups.
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#437Where is the "Don't switch" option? Because as much as I hate that Facebook bought them, they're part of what I would call "critical social infrastructure." Asking to leave WhatsApp is like cancelling your contract with your ISP and going offline just because you don't like the company.
As someone who's never used such a service, help me understand what's so critical about it. Can't people just send SMS? Aren't people on fb anyway, which can be accessed with a container on Firefox? EDIT: got some answers re SMS. Fine, though that doesn't explain why there is so much overlap/redundancy with social media applications. At a glance, it appears I could do the very same things (groups, multimedia) messagi…
Unfortunately, people in Brazil don't want to use SMS anymore. They replaced it by WhatsApp because well, they can show their happy life in Stories, see if someone is online, if they saw the message or are answering it... Really bad
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#438What is meant by "switching" here? Forcing others to install/use the client for communication with you?
I have all of them installed, different people use different ones, I don't care really.
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#439I like Session[1]. It's snappy, simple, and built on an onion network like Tor. Their private group chats can handle something like 20 people but I believe that this will expand in the near future. Plus they expressed interest in using Arweave[2] as a decentralized storage option, which seems cool to me.
I am also interested in Berty[3] and Iris[4], but those aren't really "ready" yet, despite being cool tech.
[3]: https://berty.tech/
Re: Poll: Switching from WhatsApp
#440Is there any unbiased analysis of the implications of the WhatsApp change of policy? The most popular HN story on the subject [1] tells us little about that. As far as I can tell, the TL;DR of the change is that your WhatsApp identifier will be linked to your FB data, so that personalized advertisements can be displayed in WhatsApp. The only detail I find highly objectionable in the change, is FB collecting through W…
It isn't even clear to me what is really changing or whether it matters... WhatsApp has had a feature they have been working on with Facebook for a while to allow Facebook business pages to maintain a presence on WhatsApp with a hosted client (something you might appreciate being useful for a lot of companies), and as far as I know this is just that.
> The move, the spokeswoman said, is part of a previously disclosed move to allow businesses to store and manage WhatsApp chats using Facebook's infrastructure. Users won't have to use WhatsApp to interact with the businesses and have the option of blocking the businesses. She said there will be no change in how WhatsApp shares provide[d] data with Facebook for non-business chats and account data.