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As an outsider--who doesn't use Telegram--it looks like they want to become like WeChat outside of China: Where you shop and do basically everything from withi

As an outsider--who doesn't use Telegram--it looks like they want to become like WeChat outside of China: Where you shop and do basically everything from within a single application (Telegram). They claim this is improved privacy but it doesn't look like that to me. Instead of my transaction being between myself and a merchant it's me, the merchant, and Telegram. Furthermore, Telegram can now aggregate all my purchases and info across multiple merchants (and whatever else I do). They say they store, "no payment information" but that's really only a small part of any given transaction. They may still record what you bought and how much it cost along with when it was purchased. All the, "no payment information" claim means is that they're not storing your credit card/account numbers.

newscracker 5y ago
> Instead of my transaction being between myself and a merchant it's me, the merchant, and Telegram. The part about a transaction being between you and a merchant is true only if you use cash and only if you physically buy something with a physical receipt or no receipt. If you use any digital payments, then the transaction metadata is known to several parties (beyond your card issuer and the merchant’s bank). If you buy something online, usually your email provider also has access to your entire purchase history. So the main question is whether you trust Telegram more or less than your email provider and/or all the parties who get your transaction data.
darthrupert 5y ago
Every payment processor you use can do the same. And they've been consolidating under the same roof for a while now. I wouldn't be surprised if they all sold their data to some central processors, too.
SPascareli13 5y ago
Whats App is doing the same, already in testing phase in Brazil.
- vishnugupta 5y ago
  ...and have rolled out to 100% users in India.
  - SPascareli13 5y ago
    And how is it going? Are people using it out in the wild?
    - vishnugupta 5y ago
      Not too well. The primary reason is Facebook hasn't spent any money (either on marketing or on cash-backs/discounts) to popularise it. The incumbents (PayTM, Google Pay, and PhonePe) are deeply entrenched to begin with.
Jiocus 5y ago
What they mean is that with Payments 2.0, Telegram can facilitate a transaction without sharing credit card details with your merchant. An underlying premise is that a user may have an established trust in Telegram and their services, perhaps more trust than the merchant.
gaudat 5y ago
WeChat actively traps you within its walled garden ecosystem with dark patterns and support from the government. A lot of shops or even government services only have an online presence in WeChat and Alipay. They are called "Mini-Apps" which I believe is unique to China and these 2 apps. It is practically impossible to find vendors or developers for these services as someone outside mainland China. It is completely possible to replicate this function of Telegram ourselves with ordinary web technologies and service providers. Not to mention Telegram is transparent in letting your data out of its ecosystem (at least for now). Provide that we still have the freedom to host any online service as website or an app on App Store / Play Store, I nelieve we will never decay into the dystopian state that is WeChat. TLDR: WeChat is way more evil than Telegram, even Facebook.
- em-bee 5y ago
  unlike facebook, wechat does not algorithmically decide which content i should see. i get all posts from all my connections in linear order. they are not pushed on me either (i can easily ignore them) unlike whatsapp, wechat also does not require me to share my phone number. (at least, for the brief time that i tried whatsapp, i could not find a way to hide my number) wechat also doesn't announce to everyone who happens to have my phonenumber, that i am now on wechat. wechat lets me control how people can contact me. the default is that people need to ask for my permission before they can add me as contacts and talk to me. miniapps are just fancy websites designed to display inside wechat, with easy access to my wechat id. but they actually have to ask permissions if they want to use that id for anything. a vender being only on wechat is no different than a vendor being only on facebook. or on telegram. it's simply a result of market dominance. not good, but not evil either. there is only one dark pattern that i noticed, that is it is no easy way to export all the content stored inside wechat.
  - r00fus 5y ago
    Can we all just agree that there are different variations on the theme of dark patterns and market domination and that one corporation isn't the "end all/be all" of evil? They're both bad. At least you can reasonably avoid FB but if you're in China, how do you avoid WeChat?
ComodoHacker 5y ago
>it looks like they want to become like WeChat Even if they don't want it, they have to. You either become a superapp, or users will flee to other superapps. >Instead of my transaction being between myself and a merchant it's me, the merchant, and Telegram. Don't forget about payment processor. That's where data aggregation takes place.
- jabroni_salad 5y ago
  It's kinda weird how this ecosystem goes, since the debundling of websites is also a common theme on HN. When does a superapp become a debundling target?
  - mason55 5y ago
    There are only two ways to make money in software: bundling and unbundling
    - orbital-decay 5y ago
      Not just money. It's a natural cycle. Modern web stack evolved in the same way. It was just hypertext in the beginning, then it expanded to fill the available volume and now we have Electron.
  - emteycz 5y ago
    Debundling comes when bundling fundamentally limits the feature, or the users desire to separate it from their chat identity. In case of chat apps, payments are IMHO one of the most natural chat app features and won't get debundled - the main point is to be able to send money as a chat message. There are unbundled payment solutions using phone numbers as user handles like Revolut (that's what I used up until now), but there's still friction in using it to pay back to my girlfriend or send lunch money to the colleague who paid.
    - alexvoda 5y ago
      I really don't see the friction in using an unbundled service like Revolut for the tasks you mentioned. Care to explain?
em-bee 5y ago
any payment that is not cash will have some sort of middleman. whether it is apple pay, visa, or your bank, or some other payment service. the key issue with digital payments is to verify the payer and the payee. the nice thing about having that built into wechat or telegram is that most payers or payees are already verified because i am already in contact with them

newscracker 5y ago

> Instead of my transaction being between myself and a merchant it's me, the merchant, and Telegram. The part about a transaction being between you and a merchant is true only if you use cash and only if you physically buy something with a physical receipt or no receipt. If you use any digital payments, then the transaction metadata is known to several parties (beyond your card issuer and the merchant’s bank). If you buy something online, usually your email provider also has access to your entire purchase history. So the main question is whether you trust Telegram more or less than your email provider and/or all the parties who get your transaction data.

darthrupert 5y ago

Every payment processor you use can do the same. And they've been consolidating under the same roof for a while now. I wouldn't be surprised if they all sold their data to some central processors, too.

SPascareli13 5y ago

Whats App is doing the same, already in testing phase in Brazil.

vishnugupta 5y ago
...and have rolled out to 100% users in India.
- SPascareli13 5y ago
  And how is it going? Are people using it out in the wild?
  - vishnugupta 5y ago
    Not too well. The primary reason is Facebook hasn't spent any money (either on marketing or on cash-backs/discounts) to popularise it. The incumbents (PayTM, Google Pay, and PhonePe) are deeply entrenched to begin with.

Jiocus 5y ago

What they mean is that with Payments 2.0, Telegram can facilitate a transaction without sharing credit card details with your merchant. An underlying premise is that a user may have an established trust in Telegram and their services, perhaps more trust than the merchant.

gaudat 5y ago

WeChat actively traps you within its walled garden ecosystem with dark patterns and support from the government. A lot of shops or even government services only have an online presence in WeChat and Alipay. They are called "Mini-Apps" which I believe is unique to China and these 2 apps. It is practically impossible to find vendors or developers for these services as someone outside mainland China. It is completely possible to replicate this function of Telegram ourselves with ordinary web technologies and service providers. Not to mention Telegram is transparent in letting your data out of its ecosystem (at least for now). Provide that we still have the freedom to host any online service as website or an app on App Store / Play Store, I nelieve we will never decay into the dystopian state that is WeChat. TLDR: WeChat is way more evil than Telegram, even Facebook.

em-bee 5y ago
unlike facebook, wechat does not algorithmically decide which content i should see. i get all posts from all my connections in linear order. they are not pushed on me either (i can easily ignore them) unlike whatsapp, wechat also does not require me to share my phone number. (at least, for the brief time that i tried whatsapp, i could not find a way to hide my number) wechat also doesn't announce to everyone who happens to have my phonenumber, that i am now on wechat. wechat lets me control how people can contact me. the default is that people need to ask for my permission before they can add me as contacts and talk to me. miniapps are just fancy websites designed to display inside wechat, with easy access to my wechat id. but they actually have to ask permissions if they want to use that id for anything. a vender being only on wechat is no different than a vendor being only on facebook. or on telegram. it's simply a result of market dominance. not good, but not evil either. there is only one dark pattern that i noticed, that is it is no easy way to export all the content stored inside wechat.
- r00fus 5y ago
  Can we all just agree that there are different variations on the theme of dark patterns and market domination and that one corporation isn't the "end all/be all" of evil? They're both bad. At least you can reasonably avoid FB but if you're in China, how do you avoid WeChat?

ComodoHacker 5y ago

>it looks like they want to become like WeChat Even if they don't want it, they have to. You either become a superapp, or users will flee to other superapps. >Instead of my transaction being between myself and a merchant it's me, the merchant, and Telegram. Don't forget about payment processor. That's where data aggregation takes place.

jabroni_salad 5y ago
It's kinda weird how this ecosystem goes, since the debundling of websites is also a common theme on HN. When does a superapp become a debundling target?
- mason55 5y ago
  There are only two ways to make money in software: bundling and unbundling
  - orbital-decay 5y ago
    Not just money. It's a natural cycle. Modern web stack evolved in the same way. It was just hypertext in the beginning, then it expanded to fill the available volume and now we have Electron.
- emteycz 5y ago
  Debundling comes when bundling fundamentally limits the feature, or the users desire to separate it from their chat identity. In case of chat apps, payments are IMHO one of the most natural chat app features and won't get debundled - the main point is to be able to send money as a chat message. There are unbundled payment solutions using phone numbers as user handles like Revolut (that's what I used up until now), but there's still friction in using it to pay back to my girlfriend or send lunch money to the colleague who paid.
  - alexvoda 5y ago
    I really don't see the friction in using an unbundled service like Revolut for the tasks you mentioned. Care to explain?

em-bee 5y ago

any payment that is not cash will have some sort of middleman. whether it is apple pay, visa, or your bank, or some other payment service. the key issue with digital payments is to verify the payer and the payee. the nice thing about having that built into wechat or telegram is that most payers or payees are already verified because i am already in contact with them