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This is why I moved to Signal after the whole brexit/us election saga. open source and not run by an advertising company

nafey 8y ago
I have been hearing a lot of good things about signal... How are their servers paid for though if it's a free service?
- FigmentEngine 8y ago
  "supported by grants and donations" according to their site.
  - majidazimi 8y ago
    Why is everyone doing business with a black and white strategy? On one extreme, everything is free and funded by selling user information and on the other extreme, everthing is free but funded by donation. What is wrong with 2$/year model? Everyone (I mean truly everyone) is willing to pay that.
    - mrep 8y ago
      I disagree, some very poor people most likely prefer the ads then parting with 2$. One thing people forget about advertising it is a pretty good at price discriminating. Ads to rich people are worth more than ads to poor people so advertisers can make more money from those with more money to spend while still serving everyone.
      - ascorbic 8y ago
        WhatsApp's $1/year charge only applied in certain (rich) countries.
    - nbluth 8y ago
      It's hard enough to get people to switch from whatsapp when signal is free.
    - Jonovono 8y ago
      Messaging apps, like social media services need your friends to be on the platform for it to be useful. If you start putting friction into that process then the services are instantly not useful. Everyone of your friends that doesn't join makes that thing much less useful for you. You say "everyone" is willing to pay that. I'll tell people about an amazing app that solves their problems they are complaining about and they go and see it's a couple dollars (one time purchase) and still complain and usually don't buy it. There will never be a popular messaging service or social network that relies on subscriptions (maybe subscriptions for additional features though)
      - alagappanr 8y ago
        Would agree with your sentiment, but Whatsapp itself is an example of a messaging service that relied on their 1$/year model and had around 200 million active users before it went free.
        1024core 8y ago
        They started charging after they had achieved scale.
        soziawa 8y ago
        No, it cost 1$ from the very beginning on iOS.
        Jonovono 8y ago
        I wouldn't say they "relied" on it. It was not enforced at all (lots of people used it without paying $1) and they sold out to Facebook. It would have been interesting to see how things played out if they had stayed independent.
    - jjrh 8y ago
      I think the issue is more if you ask for any amount of money it immediately turns people off. The process of putting in your creditcard number, entering your password for google play/paypal/etc is just enough of a barrier to go 'whatever!'.
    - theyinwhy 8y ago
      Threema is doing something like that: https://threema.ch/en https://threema.ch/en

nafey 8y ago

I have been hearing a lot of good things about signal... How are their servers paid for though if it's a free service?

FigmentEngine 8y ago
"supported by grants and donations" according to their site.
- majidazimi 8y ago
  Why is everyone doing business with a black and white strategy? On one extreme, everything is free and funded by selling user information and on the other extreme, everthing is free but funded by donation. What is wrong with 2$/year model? Everyone (I mean truly everyone) is willing to pay that.
  - mrep 8y ago
    I disagree, some very poor people most likely prefer the ads then parting with 2$. One thing people forget about advertising it is a pretty good at price discriminating. Ads to rich people are worth more than ads to poor people so advertisers can make more money from those with more money to spend while still serving everyone.
    - ascorbic 8y ago
      WhatsApp's $1/year charge only applied in certain (rich) countries.
  - nbluth 8y ago
    It's hard enough to get people to switch from whatsapp when signal is free.
  - Jonovono 8y ago
    Messaging apps, like social media services need your friends to be on the platform for it to be useful. If you start putting friction into that process then the services are instantly not useful. Everyone of your friends that doesn't join makes that thing much less useful for you. You say "everyone" is willing to pay that. I'll tell people about an amazing app that solves their problems they are complaining about and they go and see it's a couple dollars (one time purchase) and still complain and usually don't buy it. There will never be a popular messaging service or social network that relies on subscriptions (maybe subscriptions for additional features though)
    - alagappanr 8y ago
      Would agree with your sentiment, but Whatsapp itself is an example of a messaging service that relied on their 1$/year model and had around 200 million active users before it went free.
      - 1024core 8y ago
        They started charging after they had achieved scale.
        soziawa 8y ago
        No, it cost 1$ from the very beginning on iOS.
      - Jonovono 8y ago
        I wouldn't say they "relied" on it. It was not enforced at all (lots of people used it without paying $1) and they sold out to Facebook. It would have been interesting to see how things played out if they had stayed independent.
  - jjrh 8y ago
    I think the issue is more if you ask for any amount of money it immediately turns people off. The process of putting in your creditcard number, entering your password for google play/paypal/etc is just enough of a barrier to go 'whatever!'.
  - theyinwhy 8y ago
    Threema is doing something like that: https://threema.ch/en https://threema.ch/en