- cross-posted to:
- reddit@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- reddit@lemmy.world
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isn’t that just every day?
Signal is centralized, loops is closed source and not accepting new users.
Loops will be open sourced later they say.
Is Loops open source? It will be! We plan on open sourcing the platform after it reaches a stable and easy to maintain state.
Loops is anti-libre software confirmed.
anti? is it against libre software? because it doesn’t seem so
Why does software have a political stance?
It’s missing a libre software licence text file.
That really is not a satisfying answer. It is incredibly nebulous and even if it did have a nice definition I guarantee most software developers will tell you a lot of software rarely reaches that state.
I can see why they might want to avoid 1000 GitHub issues bike shedding things but they could open source the code and just not have open contribution
Sometimes you’re ashamed of the ugly hacks you cobbled together to reach MVP, and you want to fix the stuff you know you need to fix first before being thrown to the wolves. I can respect that, for a limited time.
I mean maybe but you could also just say “we did some whacky shit here help us fix it please” and let the community help you in the effort. That’s the beauty of open source. Then again they may have their reasons and frankly I’m not even interested in a TikTok like social media so w/e as long as they don’t eat up their word it’s fine.
or they can also disable submitting issues for now
That means very little to me. Actions speak louder than words, and it would probably help the development of loops if it was actually open source.
Made by the same dev as Pixelfed, which did a similar thing.
Which I think dansup should deserve our trust on this for quite a long time for doing. It isn’t empty promises if they already made Pixelfed and opensourced it.
Like… I suppose it could be a grift, anything could but I see no reason to question their goals or motives.
So Matrix it is?
I was told that unless you self host, matrix is less secure because it leaks more metadata. Something to consider
Leaks more metadata? What does that mean?
sender, recipient, chatroom, what kind of event you sent (message, emoji, reaction, vote), if you responded to a message, room privilege changes, etc
but it’s a question how big of a problem is that. they want to tackle it in the future, but that’s far away for now I think
Damm, didn’t know that, good to know
it’s not even true information, the new tech stack is zero trust
What does this mean?
Zero trust means there’s no trust assumed on the protocol - I.e. it distrusts all actors and the protocol takes steps to work in that trustless environment. I don’t know how that applies specifically to matrix.
So the guy above the guy avobe me was supposedly wrong?
the new cryptographic protocol protects metadata, like signal. the servers know nothing about any encrypted chats
So the guy above the guy avobe me was wrong?
Loops.video isn’t accepting new users atm. Even if it was, I got in on early signup and I have next to zero functionality out of it rn. Just informing the curious masses
Yeah it’s no where near ready for mass adoption. It’s made a couple improvements, but it crashes every time I try to leave a comment.
Loops really isn’t ready for primetime. It’s too new and unpolished, and will need a bit more time.
I wonder if peertube can scale. YouTube has a whole sophisticated system for ingesting and transcoding videos into dozens of formats, with tradeoffs being made on computational complexity versus file size/bandwidth, which requires some projection on which videos will be downloaded the most times in the future (and by which types of clients, with support for which codecs, etc.). Doing this can require a lot of networking/computing/memory/storage resources, and I wonder if the software can scale.
Loops isnt even federated or open source yet. Deleted my account
I agree. If it’s not libre from the start, we should not trust it. The term “open source” is ambiguous; they could just put it under some restrictive open-source license and then revert to closed source later. If it’s put under a free software license like the GPL, then I’ll feel better.
That seems a little extreme. I would maybe agree if 1) it wasn’t being made by the guy who has already got an AGPL project in Pixelfed and 2) it was on open signups. Whilst software is invite-only or closed entirely I don’t really see a problem in it not being open-sourced.
Doesn’t it says gullible in their ToS?
Switching from WhatsApp to any other messaging service isn’t a realistic option for quite many places. I’d be more than willing to switch but of all the people in my contacts (including my entire customer base) there’s like 3 people using Signal but every single one of them has WhatsApp. Even the 60+ year olds.
I would say it’s a step by step work. I have moved my family from Whatsapp to Signal years ago and then to Matrix. I forced them in some way but I just said “sorry if you want to keep contact we will have to find another app, I don’t accept Whatsapp ToS.” It took some time but my close family and friends are there and I regularly get someone to join, friend or family. It’s still close circle but it’s also a good thing. Same went with work. Colleagues wanted to do a whatsapp group for a project and I basically said “No, best I can do is Signal.” and they went with it.
Yeah I don’t want to be that guy telling others to install an app to stay in contact with me. That would be extremely hypocritical on my part as I’m the one those people who refuses to install any apps people tells me to and it wouldn’t solve the issue anyway as then I’d still be using WhatsApp as well but now I just have one more additional app to communicate with certain people.
Nowdays doesn’t seem to matter where ever you go there’s always an app you need to install to do XY and Z. I don’t even have a Lemmy app as I only use it via browser. Same applies to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Pixelfed, Reddit and so on.
in these groups theres often someone that just cannot install a new app because their phones storage is full and they can’t afford a better phone (or just don’t want to spend money on it). i wouldn’t insist with these people and just accept using whatsapp
You are wrong on that: It would be a start to solving the issue! Every little step forward counts.
As for 1000 apps replacing website, I could not agree more… In addition you get much better control on a website like adblocks and javascript control.
There is always SMS for these.
Hey, wouldn’t it be great if Signal still supported SMS?
Personally I see no benefit in it.
There benefit would be exactly what this top comment is about. For all those people in your contacts who don’t use signal, you could still use signal to message them, it would just be an SMS message. It would therefore also become more enticing for people to switch from their stock SMS app to signal, because it would make no difference in terms of who you can send SMS messages to. It would allow for the signal user base to grow, solving the issue of “no one uses signal”
At least WhatsApp is encrypted and let you have propre group chat
WhatsApp’s a scam, anti-libre software.
Yes but it is still better than SMS.
Saying it’s secure feeds their scam. At least we don’t pay for it like SMS.
You still pay for SMS? Wtf, what country do you live in? Most postpaid mobile plans these days only charge for data usage. In which case, your still paying to use WhatsApp.
Are you from the global south? Because it’s still a common thing for SMS to be chargeable in many countries. And no one should be using SMS anyway. It’s horribly insecure. At least use RCS.
I did not say it was secure, I actually spend a lot of time explaining to people that it is secure and they should switch to Signal. However, I will not tell them to go back to SMS for the reason aforementioned.
Saying it’s
secureencrypted feeds their scam. At least we don’t pay for it like SMS.
This doesn’t help.
And yet it gets repeated (and upvoted) in every thread.
Acts like a psyop to stop us finding solutions, so I will call it out more and you should too.
That’s Lemmy in a nutshell. Guillotine and Luigi memes are constantly repeated because they know that no one’s actually going to act on that stuff, but any time anyone suggests a practical means to weaken the oligopoly people come out of the woodwork to shut it down.
You think? I consider these memes more like a reminder of our global to-do list. It doesn’t mean we can’t selfhost a matrix server at the same time.
Help with what?
I got my family out after some high profile data breaches on WhatsApp. We feel a lot safer sharing personal info over Signal and the switchover was painless. Even the video calls are great on signal.
There’s inertia, for sure, but once you highlight that some evil corp isn’t the one handling grandma’s inheritance data, it makes for a compelling case.
We all still have WhatsApp because we need to talk to the others. But our family chat only exists on Signal now.
My trouble as well, I’d love to switch from Whatsapp, but literally every person I talk to and most people in my city/estate/country uses It.
There’s a “vendor lock” term, maybe this would be a “social lock”?
It has to start with someone. I made my entire family switch to signal by boycotting WhatsApp. I just said, of you want to contact me your can either SMS, email or install signal. It was surprisingly easy. For non family members, I tell people to switch all the time. Most of my contacts now use signal. It was worth the trouble.
Same (Brazil), Whatsapp is pretty much a requirement and I hate that I’m forced to give Meta my information by using their shitty app.
I’ll link my previous comment and add that it’s easier for Brazil.
Lembra de quando prenderam uns políticos pelos bate-papos do Telegram? É só lembrar a tua família que o WhatsApp tem a mesma fraqueza. Pergunta se eles confiam no Zuckerberg outra mandar os dados bancários que toda família manda de vez em quando. Documentos escaneados, dados pessoais…
Não consegui convencer os meus amigos mas confesso que poderia ter sido um pouco mais insistente. Quando o pessoal manda screenshot de transação bancária pelo wpp pra acertar conta de bar, dá pra dar uma instigada de leve. “A AI do Zuckerberg adorou ver os teus dados.” E deixa assim, vez por outra um comentário curto pra elevar a consciência de privacidade das pessoas. Uma hora vem. Ou não, mas tás fazendo tua parte.
Great graphic! The only things I use on this list are reddit and youtube. Trying peertube now. I’m confused about whatsapp and facebook messenger - don’t people just use the texting app that comes with their phone?
Any chance you’re American?
Sms is bad if you care about privacy, but great for voyeurs.
I frequently send dick pics between two of my phone numbers with fake messages about selling drugs and blowing things up attached, triggering them for a manual review in the government/carrier’s office.
Signal is very useful for minorities and anyone who’s actually planning a terrorist attack.
Briar is better for particular dangerous situations, SimpleX is a ‘more confy’ great alternative.
I don’t send dick pics or plan terrorist attacks, so if voyeurs or Big Gubmint snoop on my texts they’ll be disappointed.
SMS is so ass, I can’t even.
No one pays for SMS.
SMS is generally free and unlimited with almost any postpaid mobile plan. If you’re still paying for SMS then you should switch providers.
postpaid
You can’t text abroad for free. I guess texting is fine if you only communicate within the country.
This is such a beautiful guide!
Blasted out on my dead social media accounts. Except shitter, which I actually deleted lol
I support the cause in general but: Signal is not federated at all. It may seem like a decent alternative to WhatsApp but is it really? It still falls under the same US jurisdiction. Let’s say the US gov starts agressively prosecuting dissidents and certain minorities (they already do): can and should we still use signal in this case? I don’t think so. Sadly i can’t name a much better alternative. Maybe matrix. But it has other issues.
What does signal have to do with anything?
technically nothing but it serves as a privacy respecting alternative to meta/google controlled messengers.
things like mastodon and pixelfed are rather easy to wrap your head around and replace their big tech counterparts with if you are the average user.
there is no real replacement for an instant messaging/sms like experience. matrix is at the moment still a bit too complicated to get into if you have come to expect a workflow like: download an app -> write your phone contacts a message.
so although it is not federated it is the best we have got at the moment in my opinion
I get that but the image is referring to it as part of the “fediverse” which it is not as it doesn’t use ActivityPub.
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Thanks for bringing it to my attention. It really looks like they managed to make an ID less chat as simple as possible. But the undeniable benefit of using one’s phone as ID is that when people switch, their contacts are already there. I think that friction alone will prevent normies from adopting it.
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I know, I’m not even going to try. I can already hear the crying and gnashing of teeth.
The post is really about abandoning the tech oligarchy more than specifically using federated technology.
Feel like Matrix or Email would have made more sense as a federated service for communication, but get Signal is a lot more well known.
Also an entirely different thing, email is nothing alike to IMs.
E-mail is an excellent protocol for messaging, see delta.chat
Oh sure, if you’re using something like that I can get behind it. But then you’re back to the network effect. Probably slightly mitigated since everybody has email, even if they’re not getting it in a pretty IM format and won’t be replying to it on the spot.
How so? Seems like just a slightly different UI for the same thing to me?
You think email’s UI is only “slightly” different than the UI of chats? I disagree very strongly. The two are extremely different. Email is this weird amalgamation of messages and forums depending on how your client displays it and everyone in the email thread is using it. You can have arbitrarily styling in messages. You can send messages to whoever whenever. Chats are much more focused and linear by comparison.
Not sure what to say to that. Nobody in my group would consider classic email and IMs equivalent, unless you’re layering an extra UI layer on top like what the other commentor mentioned.
Agreed most others wouldn’t use email as a replacement for casual chat, but its always seemed like an arbitrary choice. So many people waste so much space in emails because they treat them like letters, so the biggest difference seems to be the culture around them rather than the medium itself. If people formatted all text messages as
"Hello Dear Friend,
Here is stuff to waste space.
Here’s what I actually want to say.
More extra stuff.
Sincerely, Walrus"
I doubt we would see that much of a difference between them.
They are treated like letters because they arent instant, like letters. Hell, some emails could take full minutes to send.
BlueSky is the transfer from X. Mastodon isn’t it bro
Unfortunately, I don’t know a single person who uses Friendica, and that is also, unfortunately, self-defeating because there’s no way I could convince them to go without more than just me using it.
Apparently it makes a good RSS feed aggregator if nothing else.
And that makes it a Facebook replacement how? Facebook is terrible and the only reason I ever go there is to check in on people I know. I don’t understand Friendica at all. I can get all the social interaction I need from Mastodon, BlueSky and Lemmy if my goal isn’t people I know and just like minded people.
Funny, when Facebook started there was almost no one I knew there either. It was its doom. It crashed and burned before it even got off the ground. Orkut still reigns supreme.
I’ve never heard of Orkut, the only Google social network I ever used was Google+. When I first heard about Facebook I couldn’t even sign up because my college wasn’t a supported .edu…lol and I guess the Facebook format/design isn’t inherently bad, just the algorithm is horrendous. There are more adds and post from suggested groups than people and groups I follow on my feed. Then the post from Threads a social network I don’t even use forced on me and adds in the notifications. It’s just a garbage experience and way of going about things. Although it’s still hard to see the point of an alternative that the people I know IRL aren’t on when I have Mastodon, BlueSky and Lemmy for like minded people.
The point is that you can invite the people in your life to try it out. Just like Facebook in the early days. Except it doesn’t have the hostile UX of Facebook.
Good point, thats the correct way to look at it.
why signal?
Because atm is the most adopted alternative but isn’t any better then SimpleX.
but it is not federated. that would be matrix
Anyone know if loops has a good app out, or if there’s one in the works thats coming out soon?
The app worked for me when I first downloaded it but hasn’t since
The app is really bare bones. It’s also not federated (yet, but use a product for what it is right now, not what it promises to be).
Has potential but also dansup keeps running head-first into controversial takes.
Oh, i see. Still interesting, thanks for the info
My favourite Dansup line is " It’s coming this weekend" not sure when this weekend is supposed to come around tho.
From what I’ve seen on the loops discord he’s about to open source the app and self hosted backend real soon, he’s been reaching out for people to set up and test out the server code.
Same with federation, that’s not far away, I think he wants to test how the different instances connect to each other first before the wider federation.
He’s finally starting to look for coders to help him with the backend and app tho, so that’s a good start.
And I really do appreciate that. He’s doing some good stuff and really hope pixelfed and loops (and sup) continue on the momentum that they’ve got and gain a substantial enough Userbase that they’re really enjoyable to use. Just wanted to add the extra context because I think that’s relevant too!
He just really needs to let people help him more, he makes good stuff but it’s kinda obvious it’s getting a bit much for him sometimes, which is how we ended up with the stuff in your link lol.
A few times I’ve jumped in to the pixelfed discord before he split loops into its own one and he’d be in some crazy long rant, then you’d see him delete all his messages, dude needs a break or to delegate some of his work to the people who keep asking to help.
Good dude tho, just needs a rest I think, the tik tok thing kinda put some pressure on him to get it going quicker I think.
