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Beeper acquired by Automattic

blog.beeper.com

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Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#81

Post by pkulak »

basisword wrote: post #25
ClaraForm wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused, because it legally sounds like the opposite right? All these platforms are legally going to be requested to open up sooner or later because of recent EU rulings. Perhaps Beeper just ran out of runway? They thought they'd be making money in December with their iMessage move, and now it's April?

If all of these services fully open up there will be 100% free and/or open source clients available and Beeper won't be able to compete. Before all of these walled gardens we have tools like Pidgin and if they open up those will be viable again.

The bridges are already free and open source and I don't see my friends and family racing to get them running on their laptops. Pidgin is great, but something needs to be running on a server or you don't get notifications. And without notifications, what's the point of a messaging app?

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#82

Post by ghostly_s »

fareesh wrote: post #74

Their mini tech was built on weird hacks - is all their tech the same or is there something legit powering it?

Well if you consider private APIs/impersonating 1st party clients weird hacks then yes, none of these services have official 3rd party client support.

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#85

Post by yoavm »

drkleiner wrote: post #59
yoavm wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all the new regulations coming out of the EU, I think that if Beeper stays around long enough they might actually live to see the day where these networks have official APIs.

Then Beeper would just be replaced by bigger fish (or open source fish)

All the bridges used by Beeper are already open source, and Beeper itself uses Matrix which is open source too.

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#86

Post by lolinder »

Contortion wrote: post #79
COGlory wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean "no longer"? Beeper has always behaved like this.

No longer as in for a new user that currently uses individual apps.

In context your use of "no longer" is very confusing. This thread is talking about what might change in Beeper as a service, if you want to interject with information about how the service currently works there are other phrases that would have made that clearer.

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#87

Post by ixwt »

beeboobaa3 wrote: post #19
bluish29 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not having to use multiple messaging apps. Some people would pay for this convenience. i.e They support several messaging apps so I don't have to tell peopl thag I don't use WhatsApp now.

> so I don't have to tell peopl thag I don't use WhatsApp now Because you actually are using WhatsApp? > Some people would pay for this convenience Some remember when this used to be widespread and free: https://www.pidgin.im/

Yes, and you can get most of the Matrix bridges that Beeper uses and host the service yourself.

Beeper is just a skin over Matrix, and they are hosting and managing the bridges for you. So that when any of protocols they support breaks because the other company changes something (or intentionally breaks things to stop connections from clients they don't want), Beeper fixes it rather than you having to wait for the open source community to do so and you implement that fix. Which who knows how long either scenario will take.

Paying for Beeper is not having to manage the self hosting, which many are not willing to do. Because as with most open source solutions, it's not very simple and is intimidating for many. Not to mention having some box open to the internet, and having to maintain security updates for that box.

I would love for libpurple to come back and make these things relatively simple. But the reality is that companies have walled off their gardens to control the experience, and many other reasons ranging from greed to security to spam mitigation.

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#88

Post by housebear »

mvkel wrote: post #76
wokwokwok wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, maybe the reality is more nuanced but the optics… > Matt, Automattic’s CEO, and I have known each other for years. He was an early user, supporter and investor in Beeper It certainly sounds like… Beeper was in the bin after the beeper mini fiasco, and resulting massive brand damage (brand aweness is only good if it means people actually want to use your product, not active distrust it), so the friend and earl…

This isn't how business works. A "CEO friend" isn't going to give you $125m out of the goodness of their heart so some random shareholders can save face. Worst case, the business fails, everyone happily moves on. How do you think automattic is funding this transaction? There are underwriters. And underwriters need rigorous dd to justify $1,000 let alone $125m. Even if it's an all-stock deal, a transaction like this w…

This is the same board that approved the Tumblr acquisition, presumably. So...a good board...?

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#89

Post by COGlory »

erohead wrote: post #36

Exciting day for Beeper! It all started here on HN 3 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25848278

Congrats on the new position and future of Beeper. I think Automattic will be a great home and I've been impressed with what they've done with other projects as well.

Are you planning to continue using Matrix to underpin Beeper?

Now I just wish there was convenient way to screen my Beeper notifications without having to take my phone out of my pocket every time it buzzes...

Re: Beeper acquired by Automattic

#90

Post by throw_m239339 »

ein0p wrote: post #66

How does Automattic even survive and remain profitable (?) nowadays? What’s the niche?

A big chunk of news media online use wordpress instead of a custom CMS. So it's kind of the square space / wix / ghost for news media. I imagine Wordpress offers managed website instances for these companies.
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