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WhatsApp had half a billion active users before Facebook. They were doing just fine. That’s why Facebook paid over $20 billion for it.
by austincheney 6y ago
WhatsApp had half a billion active users before Facebook. They were doing just fine. That’s why Facebook paid over $20 billion for it.
- ignoramous 6y ago> They were doing just fine. The YouTube video I linked to is Neeraj Arora, early WhatsApp employee, on what Facebook's acquisition meant for WhatsApp.
- mr_woozy 6y agoDoes it discuss the part where Brian Acton (co-founder of WA) donated 50million to Signal because of how badly Facebook will distort Whatsapp's user base and tech?
- mr_woozy 6y agoexactly this. arguably they've probably trojaned or backdoored the e2e encryption by now, after buying it too.
- amurthy1 6y agoe2e encryption was only added after being acquired. Not sure why FB leadership would undermine the effort that they helped support in the first place
- evgen 6y agoPerhaps because FB leadership had nothing to do with the decision in the first place? When WA was acquired they maintained fierce independence and would not interact with FB unless absolutely necessary. No code was shared, WA kept its old offices away from the FB campus, they were for all intents and purposes operating as individual companies. After WA added e2e it became politically possible within FB to add the same to Messenger (as long as it behind a few conversation gateways that made it hidden for most users) but FB leadership did _not_ support adding e2e to WA and certain groups continued to fight against adding it to Messenger because it was going to close off a channel for the ads team to pick up signal by spying on user conversations.