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Considering that the app has been created by Russians (albeit ones who claim to oppose the current government of Russia), and it is popular mostly in countries

by kozak 6y ago

Considering that the app has been created by Russians (albeit ones who claim to oppose the current government of Russia), and it is popular mostly in countries that surround Russia, this is not surprising at all that it's the default choice for young people in Belarus. Telegram is a strong indicator of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_world https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_world these days.

hojjat12000 6y ago
To be fair. It's the best messaging app out there (feature-wise). It got banned in Iran because it was so influential in the protests. The channels are great for being up to date on the latest news and seeing what is happening in different cities. Groups are awesome for coordinating gatherings. It allows you to send huge files and documents. It has bots (which people used to get info on the current police location, or get VPN and proxy information). It's a great app. I wish the people behind it and its security was more transparent.
- samat 6y ago
  The word ‘platform’ is being abused so much it does not mean anything today, but telegram is a platform indeed: 1. Bots allow you to develop automations and services inside 2. Channels allow publishers to have very easy to use blogs 3. Chats (with bots! Admin bots!) allow unlimited collaboration. Have you ever seen tens of thousands people in a chat? Public chats with anonymity protections? It is a real platform.
- maqp 6y ago
  Facebook is also filled with great features, but since they're not private we don't really consider those features but tasty baits for stealing our personal data. The question is, why should Telegram whose author is literally called the Mark Zuckerberg of Russia, be exempt and handed all that data. Of course he wants to make the app that gives him all that valuable data easy and fun to use. The real engineering starts when you want to achieve those fun features in a secure way -- people should ask WHY is it that it takes a bit of time from Signal developers to implement same features. That's precisely why. They're actual features with painstaking security design with clear rationale and security proofs, not a dish of spyware served with the side plate of bullshit that is damage control. I guess it's because Durov attended the St. Petersburg military academy and studied propaganda and information warfware that makes him such a chef when it comes to the latter.
deleted 6y ago
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chromedev 6y ago
You forget to mention the desktop and mobile apps both are open source, so anyone can build their own network.
- kozak 6y ago
  I have never seen anyone actually doing that. The popularity of Telegram consists 100% of the popularity of its own network.
  - chromedev 6y ago
    If for some reason they were caught doing something worthy of changing the network, then I could see it happening. With their recent addition of video messaging, they pretty much have the best messenger app to date.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    A nice thing is that you're allowed to use that network without using the official client. Unlike Signal, they're okay with third party clients, and there are libraries for multiple languages to help build your own client.
- adityasaky 6y ago
  Unfortunately (this may have changed in recent times), they often don't update the public repos in line with their releases. They put them out all at once later. Also, last I checked only the clients are open source? Has that changed?
  - chromedev 6y ago
    You can find the releases here, and if there is a delay it is only a few days at most: https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/releases https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/releases Only the clients are open source, but anyone could use the source code to create their own network.
    - 6y ago

by kozak 6y ago

hojjat12000 6y ago

To be fair. It's the best messaging app out there (feature-wise). It got banned in Iran because it was so influential in the protests. The channels are great for being up to date on the latest news and seeing what is happening in different cities. Groups are awesome for coordinating gatherings. It allows you to send huge files and documents. It has bots (which people used to get info on the current police location, or get VPN and proxy information). It's a great app. I wish the people behind it and its security was more transparent.

samat 6y ago
The word ‘platform’ is being abused so much it does not mean anything today, but telegram is a platform indeed: 1. Bots allow you to develop automations and services inside 2. Channels allow publishers to have very easy to use blogs 3. Chats (with bots! Admin bots!) allow unlimited collaboration. Have you ever seen tens of thousands people in a chat? Public chats with anonymity protections? It is a real platform.
maqp 6y ago
Facebook is also filled with great features, but since they're not private we don't really consider those features but tasty baits for stealing our personal data. The question is, why should Telegram whose author is literally called the Mark Zuckerberg of Russia, be exempt and handed all that data. Of course he wants to make the app that gives him all that valuable data easy and fun to use. The real engineering starts when you want to achieve those fun features in a secure way -- people should ask WHY is it that it takes a bit of time from Signal developers to implement same features. That's precisely why. They're actual features with painstaking security design with clear rationale and security proofs, not a dish of spyware served with the side plate of bullshit that is damage control. I guess it's because Durov attended the St. Petersburg military academy and studied propaganda and information warfware that makes him such a chef when it comes to the latter.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

chromedev 6y ago

You forget to mention the desktop and mobile apps both are open source, so anyone can build their own network.

kozak 6y ago
I have never seen anyone actually doing that. The popularity of Telegram consists 100% of the popularity of its own network.
- chromedev 6y ago
  If for some reason they were caught doing something worthy of changing the network, then I could see it happening. With their recent addition of video messaging, they pretty much have the best messenger app to date.
- luckylion 6y ago
  A nice thing is that you're allowed to use that network without using the official client. Unlike Signal, they're okay with third party clients, and there are libraries for multiple languages to help build your own client.
adityasaky 6y ago
Unfortunately (this may have changed in recent times), they often don't update the public repos in line with their releases. They put them out all at once later. Also, last I checked only the clients are open source? Has that changed?
- chromedev 6y ago
  You can find the releases here, and if there is a delay it is only a few days at most: https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/releases https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/releases Only the clients are open source, but anyone could use the source code to create their own network.
  - 6y ago