As a user, I prefer to be notified of updates and given an opportunity to not update or postpone it (the latter is possible with the former by just declining).

As a user, I prefer to be notified of updates and given an opportunity to not update or postpone it (the latter is possible with the former by just declining). One point that doesn’t seem to be considered so far in the comments is that updates, at least on the desktop, can be heavy in terms of size. How can a software developer (even that of a free one) decide unilaterally to force an update on the user without knowing what connection the user is using, the cost of downloads, how slow it is and how this auto-update affects other important things the user may be in the midst of? Some security patches may be critical and require an urgent update, but it’s certainly not all updates that would be so. If Signal thinks of itself as the private and secure platform for people who are struggling against systems in which they live, this must be a big consideration for the application. Signal advertises itself as secure software or security focused software. So it’s also of utmost interest for at least some users to know what’s coming in an available update before the update is downloaded. This is about user freedom. I hope the Signal developers take this issue with the right perspective and solve it.