turns out durov’s bullshit is bullshit. huh.
I’m using Signal because I still hope I’ll be mistakenly invited to USA’s strike plans…
I’ve been in Signal chats with Tulsi Gabbard’s staff.
And no ofc it’s not that impressive. They used the app during the Dem Primary campaign trail so all the campaign volunteers used it to coordinate.
Back then I thought she would be a charismatic Dem that could win against Trump – when none of the Dems (esp. not Biden IMO) seemed to have a chance.
Back then she was inclusive with her political rhetoric. She was the only candidate on either side whose primary message was:
Respect the other side as people, and try to understand their point of view
OMFG I wish I’d hear that from politicians more often. Or ever.
Please forgive me. I was like 9 years younger back then and Tulsi hadn’t gone MAGA.
although it’s interesting research, I think it’s a weak text if you’re even tangentially aware of Telegram’s bullshit narrative as it focuses on the wrong thing. the main point should be “this dude was caught lying on a number of occasions and throws out smoke-screens and FUD when confronted about super-simple stuff. therefore nothing that comes outta his mouth is to be trusted” which should’ve prompted a mass exodus from this bullshit platform a long time ago.
the way more important issue is the collective action problem of dumping this crapware - leave it for what?
I run XMPP and Matrix servers and use various clients, along with Signal. all of those things are fucking dogshit software, there isn’t one that can come close to Telegram’s UX. if you fell into a coma in 2014 and woke up now to Element of Fluffy or whatever, you’d think someone’s pulling your leg. this is what a decade of development looks like?!
A decade of voluntary, part-time, crowdfunded development maybe
Unfortunately, that’s the cost of products made by and for the people - rough but private and mostly noninvasive.
No; in the case of Matrix it’s because the spec is insanely bloated. Nobody wants to work on that, especially for free.
Matrix is dogshit and the backend is no longer fully open source, from what I gather. XMPP stuff is basic, yeah, but Cheogram’s WebXDC apps and Movim as a whole have some really interesting upsides. Not sure why anyone wanted to move away from it.
Yeah, it really sucks that the closest feature parity and ui/ux parity in messengers is proprietary services.
Even signal isn’t there. Mind you, they can’t offer all the same options by virtue of prioritizing encryption as the default, not afaik, with things like the easier syncing of messages.
I like matrix and it’s various apps fine overall, but they are definitely behind in polish and usability features. They just aren’t great as a primary messaging option. That’s ignoring the difficulty of onboarding people, which is tangential to this, but still relevant since it doesn’t matter how great a messenger is if you can’t use it with anyone. Since the lack of features and ui/ux issues prevent onboarding, it’s a real problem.
matrix
IMO getting Matrix’s UI to work like apps people are familiar with is an order of magnitude less effort than any other option, and possibly an order of magnitude better than other options in terms of meeting the design goal of private messaging.
OTOH I don’t make UI’s 🤪
I’ve heard that from some code minded folks before though, so I don’t think you’re wrong. ElementX is better than regular element in that regard already. Been a while since I tried anything else since I only have one person that I communicate regularly with on there. Everyone else is more sporadic, so I haven’t had as much impetus to keep up on apps as much as I used to.
Signal has numerous well-documented flaws, a history of slow fixes to vulnerabilities, and is highly centralized. It can really only be positively compared to Telegram.
I don’t disagree tbh.
However, in terms of ui/ux it is still the closest comparison that’s not wholly dominated by capital drives. Things like WhatsApp have better ui, but I don’t think anyone remotely interested in things like signal would use those at all if not forced to it.
Right now, matrix, arcane chat, xmpp, and similar options are better than signal under the hood (supposedly, I don’t have the knowledge base to verify for myself), but the ui is anywhere from outdated to outright horrible.
I’m Russian, have a good knowledge about protest activity. Amount of people being unlawfully arrested, prosecuted, and jailed, is abnormally big. Yet, with this amount of cases you’d guess there will be at least some links or evidence of Telegram being a career, or a link that allowed to find certain users and arrest them. Such a case would be a huge deal for a lot of people. There is no such case as far as I’m aware.
Telegram is a platform that is used by both prey and a hunter. It doesn’t actively try to protect the prey. It does contain abilities that one could utilize to protect themselves. But it certainly does not help the hunter. Hunter can try to utilize various tools that would use Telegram, and help them get the data on the prey. But that data would not be exclusive. It won’t be a result of Telegram saying “we got your request for this user, here is the data that they hide, enjoy”. It would be a public data from public chats, or data that has been manufactured using social engineering. Telegram is not a side in this process, it’s a field.
There are other platforms that really provide data (private data, or data not easily reachable) by request from authorities, we know it and avoid them. That would be VK. It was created by Durov, but now it’s operated by authorities basically.
So when I see stuff like “owner of Telegram servers had some links to FSB”, “someone could get your data if they monitor your traffic” etc., it doesn’t strike me. Those have nothing to do with the “Telegram shares your data with authorities” narrative, which remains unproven. Durov is a creator of VK that now haunts on Russians, he is not a genius I would like him to be. But Telegram administration doesn’t seem to share the data I want to keep secret with anyone, for now.
your argument boils down to “the fully functional and loaded gun is in this weirdo’s holster and he won’t use it”.
the whole point is not relying on the benevolence of the weirdos out there and not letting them even be in the position to do any harm. encrypt my 1on1 comms and I don’t give a fuck what happens in the pedo/terror/carding/etc public groups. ample time to implement that in the past decade+ and be on par with practically every messenger out there. but he/they won’t implement it, they insist on all your shit being in the “cloud”, in plaintext, forever. there is no scenario where there’s not a malicious intent behind that.
I’ve been using Telegram since the early days. it was phenomenal vs the crap of its day - magical, even. like many, I was enamored with the vision of durov the folksy hero battling the forces of evil (in a bozo nightmare) and bequeathing us this tech marvel.
but I can’t trust it with anything any more. if weirdo can’t be trusted about some stuff, then he can’t be trusted with anything. enough for me, YMMV.
No, my argument is “this argument about a gun being used is invalid. It’s not used for now”.
I’m pretty sure if there would be enough demand for strong encryption there would be OTR forks of Telegram that would become popular. There is no such thing now. People use Telegram for stuff that is not “1on1 talks that I want to be strongly protected” in overwhelming majority of cases. People choose convenience. Encryption is useless when you are getting reported on by people in your chats or when you don’t know what you’re doing. Stupidity breaks any encryption, see that latest Signal case.
except, implementing E2EE via 3rd party FOSS clients is explicitly against Telegram’s TOS, which I’m gonna assume you already know as you’re parroting weirdo’s stance “all crypto is broken by NSA, so we’re better off without”. take care.
Nice propaganda, from those who wants people to stop using apps that they can’t control.
