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Reducing service can also be a strong-armed way to force customers to advocate for them. "Want to keep talking to grandma? Better tell your government to leave

Reducing service can also be a strong-armed way to force customers to advocate for them. "Want to keep talking to grandma? Better tell your government to leave us alone"

leipert 6y ago
I am actually using this argument in the inverse: “hey grandma, do you still wanna see baby pictures, please install <other-messenger>”
- behnamoh 6y ago
  If only grandma could use Signal, etc. The problem is that Telegram has by far the best UI and UX IMO, and yet we cannot trust it. Then there are applications which we could trust more (like Signal) but they are ridiculously hard to use and lack many features. Actually, I would say FB Messenger also sucks a lot and apparently FB does not care.
  - IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
    not accurate. I was able to get grandma on Signal precisely because it was the little secret between us. She knew that a signal coming in was from me, and only me. I was using it to talk to her. And she thought it was cool that we talked via signal to her before any other family member caught on the signal craze. I was able to get my SO to use signal on the same principle. Pick the people in your life that care about you - and care back. You are available via signal, while you ingnore whatsapp et al. You answer right away on signal whereas on other stuff, you wait. Its funny how far along you can take a feature-lacking app provided its simple for others to use, and there is an emotional attachment in its use.
    - jackson1way 6y ago
      You could also customize the notification sound for incoming messages in whatsapp and mute (or just use a short plop sound for) anyone else for grandma. Now grandma can focus on learning to use only one app for all her grand children and will find all the pictures from all her relatives in one place and will more likely be able to even forward pictures to other people on her whatsapp. Assuming Grandmas in their 80s.
      - feanaro 6y ago
        But then grandma is using WhatsApp, which is what we're trying to avoid. The point is not that it's possible to make her use WhatsApp. The point is that it's possible to make her use a better alternative.
        pvorb 6y ago
        But how is it better for Grandma? Does she really care on her own or did you talk to her until she accepted that she cannot receive messages from you unless she uses Signal?
        bonoboTP 6y ago
        She likely wouldn't know to care. But she most likely trusts the judgment of her grandson (mine does) in what's best.
        IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
        I didnt have to spell out instructions. I just told her to dowload the app. At its core, signal is still a messenger app. Its not hard to use. I dont think you realize how powerful are simple things like "good morning" and "i love you" to your family and loved ones. Give a little of it, and see the results.
        rakoo 6y ago
        Signal is an E2EE messenger app with as little shared metadata as possible. Unless Grandma uses the "Status" feature, or wants to know at what time a message was received or read, it provides the same features as Whatsapp with an increase in privacy. It's fair to say that it's a better alternative in her case.
        feanaro 6y ago
        In the global and indirect sense, it's for better for grandma in the same sense as it is better for the whole of society and the entire world. Privacy is something well worth preserving instead of selling to a large corporation and/or overreaching governments. In the local and direct sense, it is no worse for grandma, and that is the point everyone is arguing. It will work for her use case while also being better in the global sense.
  - ohlookabird 6y ago
    I don't know, my grand parents (80+ years) get along well with Signal. We have been using it actively over the past years and they can text, call, videocall and share pictures without issues. I am sure the UI can be improved, but it's not unusable at all.
  - viraptor 6y ago
    That whole UX issue really needs more explanation. For low-tech usage: you open signal, you select who you want to talk to, you see/type a message. The interface is almost the same as WhatsApp which people of all ages use every day. What's "ridiculously hard to use" here?
  - Siira 6y ago
    I trust Telegram, with its open API and third-party clients, more than a company that bans alternative clients. Why do they want me to use their client? Does it have some alterations from the source code?
- noja 6y ago
  Is Grandma happy that none of the pictures are saved to her camera roll? This seems to be a gaping lack of a feature amongst people I know.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    > Is Grandma happy that none of the pictures are saved to her camera roll? Why would they be? If I mail you a bunch of pictures in an envelope, they don't magically convert to negatives and transfer themselves to the roll of film inside your analog camera. <rant> Snark aside, "camera roll" must be one of the most confusing attempts at "user-friendly" abstractions I've seen in widely-deployed software, especially with so many apps shipping their own implementations (in addition to the OS/camera gallery), some of which mix together some combination of pictures downloaded to (but not taken by) the phone, pictures existing only in the cloud, pictures existing only in a different app's cloud... There's skeuomorphism, and there's building a bad abstraction on top of a limitation of ancient tech, seemingly forgetting the ~10+ year period between analog cameras and smartphones with good imaging sensors, where everyone got used to digital cameras shooting photos to a "memory card". My non-tech-savvy relatives are definitely more confused about "camera rolls" in their phones than they were about managing JPGs on SD cards using standard desktop OS filesystem tools. Hell, number one support request I get from family these days is, "How do I copy ${these photos from a "camera roll" of some app} to ${OS gallery app} and to ${this USB stick}? We want to show all photos of ${grandchild} to ${neighbor} without Internet. And we want to have them in ${a folder on a PC} so it's safe, and we can view it on a large screen." The process isn't that involved, just confusing, and somewhat different for every other app. It's like vendors really don't want people to store their photos as files anymore :). </rant>
    - noja 6y ago
      > Why would they be? Because they were saved to the central photo place with WhatsApp, and she likes seeing all of her photos there.
    - d110af5ccf 6y ago
      > It's like vendors really don't want people to store their photos as files anymore In case you haven't noticed, there seems to be an active effort to do away with the notion of files. Because making things more abstract is supposed to reduce confusion somehow.
- dspillett 6y ago
  That is only going to work if you are prepared to be seen as unhelpful. The likelihood is that she'll just as someone else to show her the photos and complain about you while doing so. Personally I'd be fine with that, but it depends upon your family dynamic. I took a similar tack over malware & backups some years ago. I was spending far too much time being family tech support in "oh shit" moments, trying to remove crap from people's laptops and other, then (when I gave up doing it that way) hunting down all their files and backing them up before hosing and reinstalling the OS, hunting out the correct drivers, and each time giving advice on keeping backups, avoiding malware, telling them that they must keep any driver discs (or generate them from the machine) when they get a new device so they can be identified & reinstalled later, etc, each time being completely ignored because once things were restored they completely forgot the issue. Once I stopped rolling over and being infinitely and immediately helpful, instead saying "without the backups and such I asked you to keep it might take a few hours to sort this out, I can do it for you but I probably can't fit it in for a couple of weeks" most stopped asking me to help - not because they see my time as having value or because they've started to get less dim about letting malware in, but because I'm seen as grumpy and unhelpful.
DeliriumTrigger 6y ago
That's exactly what they are doing right now...https://www.welivesecurity.com/2021/05/11/whatsapp-limit-features-users-reject-new-data-sharing-rules/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2021/05/11/whatsapp-limit-fea...
- valenterry 6y ago
  That happened before though and it didn't work out. I don't know why it should be different that time. Also, telegram is used a lot in Germany (compared to other countries) and together with Signal & others it got used much more recently. I don't think Whatsapp has much leverage here. Not sure if Telegram is better for the users though.
  - sneak 6y ago
    Telegram is not end to end encrypted, and thus is not really "secure" in the sense that we mean when we say "secure messenger".
mrtksn 6y ago
This probably won't fly in Germany as Germans are very privacy cautious. Germany is a hole in the Google Street View Europe coverage because of this. They can limit some functionality and the Germans might be O.K. with it, however the margin in functionality would be someone else's opportunity.
- durnygbur 6y ago
  Germans are NOT privacy conscious or cautious - see SCHUFA, Rundfunkbeitrag debt collection, countless Inkasso, Payback, applying for apartment rental, invasive copyright predators. They simply hate anything which smells internet. Germans hate the internet.
  - zelphirkalt 6y ago
    You are both kind of right. I would say that we Germans like our privacy perhaps more than some others, but that we do have many blind spots and are generally not well educated about the issues with Facebook and similar. There is also a difference between the uninformed young user (useds) and the people, who have been around long enough and have an attention span long enough to recognize the patterns.
  - mrtksn 6y ago
    When I was traveling across Europe, I had hard time taking photos of regular houses that I liked. People will get out and ask why I was photographing. Maybe it is the way it is because Germans like it that way, not everyone needs to have photo of their house. Not necessarily hating the internet. Also, I hated the fact that Germany did not have Street View, used it extensively at other places to pick neighbourhoods to go or not to go. When I asked people I met how comes you don’t have Street View here, they all said that they liked their privacy and it has to do with the times when the government was watching everyone, so they are more cautious about it.
    - herbst 6y ago
      That's just what they tend to think. From a closer outside view Germans are not too picky with their data. As someone mentioned above, to many private companies who are allowed to access, process and use your data.

Reducing service can also be a strong-armed way to force customers to advocate for them. "Want to keep talking to grandma? Better tell your government to leave us alone"

leipert 6y ago

I am actually using this argument in the inverse: “hey grandma, do you still wanna see baby pictures, please install <other-messenger>”

behnamoh 6y ago
If only grandma could use Signal, etc. The problem is that Telegram has by far the best UI and UX IMO, and yet we cannot trust it. Then there are applications which we could trust more (like Signal) but they are ridiculously hard to use and lack many features. Actually, I would say FB Messenger also sucks a lot and apparently FB does not care.
- IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
  not accurate. I was able to get grandma on Signal precisely because it was the little secret between us. She knew that a signal coming in was from me, and only me. I was using it to talk to her. And she thought it was cool that we talked via signal to her before any other family member caught on the signal craze. I was able to get my SO to use signal on the same principle. Pick the people in your life that care about you - and care back. You are available via signal, while you ingnore whatsapp et al. You answer right away on signal whereas on other stuff, you wait. Its funny how far along you can take a feature-lacking app provided its simple for others to use, and there is an emotional attachment in its use.
  - jackson1way 6y ago
    You could also customize the notification sound for incoming messages in whatsapp and mute (or just use a short plop sound for) anyone else for grandma. Now grandma can focus on learning to use only one app for all her grand children and will find all the pictures from all her relatives in one place and will more likely be able to even forward pictures to other people on her whatsapp. Assuming Grandmas in their 80s.
    - feanaro 6y ago
      But then grandma is using WhatsApp, which is what we're trying to avoid. The point is not that it's possible to make her use WhatsApp. The point is that it's possible to make her use a better alternative.
      - pvorb 6y ago
        But how is it better for Grandma? Does she really care on her own or did you talk to her until she accepted that she cannot receive messages from you unless she uses Signal?
        bonoboTP 6y ago
        She likely wouldn't know to care. But she most likely trusts the judgment of her grandson (mine does) in what's best.
        IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
        I didnt have to spell out instructions. I just told her to dowload the app. At its core, signal is still a messenger app. Its not hard to use. I dont think you realize how powerful are simple things like "good morning" and "i love you" to your family and loved ones. Give a little of it, and see the results.
        rakoo 6y ago
        Signal is an E2EE messenger app with as little shared metadata as possible. Unless Grandma uses the "Status" feature, or wants to know at what time a message was received or read, it provides the same features as Whatsapp with an increase in privacy. It's fair to say that it's a better alternative in her case.
        feanaro 6y ago
        In the global and indirect sense, it's for better for grandma in the same sense as it is better for the whole of society and the entire world. Privacy is something well worth preserving instead of selling to a large corporation and/or overreaching governments. In the local and direct sense, it is no worse for grandma, and that is the point everyone is arguing. It will work for her use case while also being better in the global sense.
- ohlookabird 6y ago
  I don't know, my grand parents (80+ years) get along well with Signal. We have been using it actively over the past years and they can text, call, videocall and share pictures without issues. I am sure the UI can be improved, but it's not unusable at all.
- viraptor 6y ago
  That whole UX issue really needs more explanation. For low-tech usage: you open signal, you select who you want to talk to, you see/type a message. The interface is almost the same as WhatsApp which people of all ages use every day. What's "ridiculously hard to use" here?
- Siira 6y ago
  I trust Telegram, with its open API and third-party clients, more than a company that bans alternative clients. Why do they want me to use their client? Does it have some alterations from the source code?
noja 6y ago
Is Grandma happy that none of the pictures are saved to her camera roll? This seems to be a gaping lack of a feature amongst people I know.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  > Is Grandma happy that none of the pictures are saved to her camera roll? Why would they be? If I mail you a bunch of pictures in an envelope, they don't magically convert to negatives and transfer themselves to the roll of film inside your analog camera. <rant> Snark aside, "camera roll" must be one of the most confusing attempts at "user-friendly" abstractions I've seen in widely-deployed software, especially with so many apps shipping their own implementations (in addition to the OS/camera gallery), some of which mix together some combination of pictures downloaded to (but not taken by) the phone, pictures existing only in the cloud, pictures existing only in a different app's cloud... There's skeuomorphism, and there's building a bad abstraction on top of a limitation of ancient tech, seemingly forgetting the ~10+ year period between analog cameras and smartphones with good imaging sensors, where everyone got used to digital cameras shooting photos to a "memory card". My non-tech-savvy relatives are definitely more confused about "camera rolls" in their phones than they were about managing JPGs on SD cards using standard desktop OS filesystem tools. Hell, number one support request I get from family these days is, "How do I copy ${these photos from a "camera roll" of some app} to ${OS gallery app} and to ${this USB stick}? We want to show all photos of ${grandchild} to ${neighbor} without Internet. And we want to have them in ${a folder on a PC} so it's safe, and we can view it on a large screen." The process isn't that involved, just confusing, and somewhat different for every other app. It's like vendors really don't want people to store their photos as files anymore :). </rant>
  - noja 6y ago
    > Why would they be? Because they were saved to the central photo place with WhatsApp, and she likes seeing all of her photos there.
  - d110af5ccf 6y ago
    > It's like vendors really don't want people to store their photos as files anymore In case you haven't noticed, there seems to be an active effort to do away with the notion of files. Because making things more abstract is supposed to reduce confusion somehow.
dspillett 6y ago
That is only going to work if you are prepared to be seen as unhelpful. The likelihood is that she'll just as someone else to show her the photos and complain about you while doing so. Personally I'd be fine with that, but it depends upon your family dynamic. I took a similar tack over malware & backups some years ago. I was spending far too much time being family tech support in "oh shit" moments, trying to remove crap from people's laptops and other, then (when I gave up doing it that way) hunting down all their files and backing them up before hosing and reinstalling the OS, hunting out the correct drivers, and each time giving advice on keeping backups, avoiding malware, telling them that they must keep any driver discs (or generate them from the machine) when they get a new device so they can be identified & reinstalled later, etc, each time being completely ignored because once things were restored they completely forgot the issue. Once I stopped rolling over and being infinitely and immediately helpful, instead saying "without the backups and such I asked you to keep it might take a few hours to sort this out, I can do it for you but I probably can't fit it in for a couple of weeks" most stopped asking me to help - not because they see my time as having value or because they've started to get less dim about letting malware in, but because I'm seen as grumpy and unhelpful.

DeliriumTrigger 6y ago

That's exactly what they are doing right now...https://www.welivesecurity.com/2021/05/11/whatsapp-limit-features-users-reject-new-data-sharing-rules/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2021/05/11/whatsapp-limit-fea...

valenterry 6y ago
That happened before though and it didn't work out. I don't know why it should be different that time. Also, telegram is used a lot in Germany (compared to other countries) and together with Signal & others it got used much more recently. I don't think Whatsapp has much leverage here. Not sure if Telegram is better for the users though.
- sneak 6y ago
  Telegram is not end to end encrypted, and thus is not really "secure" in the sense that we mean when we say "secure messenger".

mrtksn 6y ago

This probably won't fly in Germany as Germans are very privacy cautious. Germany is a hole in the Google Street View Europe coverage because of this. They can limit some functionality and the Germans might be O.K. with it, however the margin in functionality would be someone else's opportunity.

durnygbur 6y ago
Germans are NOT privacy conscious or cautious - see SCHUFA, Rundfunkbeitrag debt collection, countless Inkasso, Payback, applying for apartment rental, invasive copyright predators. They simply hate anything which smells internet. Germans hate the internet.
- zelphirkalt 6y ago
  You are both kind of right. I would say that we Germans like our privacy perhaps more than some others, but that we do have many blind spots and are generally not well educated about the issues with Facebook and similar. There is also a difference between the uninformed young user (useds) and the people, who have been around long enough and have an attention span long enough to recognize the patterns.
- mrtksn 6y ago
  When I was traveling across Europe, I had hard time taking photos of regular houses that I liked. People will get out and ask why I was photographing. Maybe it is the way it is because Germans like it that way, not everyone needs to have photo of their house. Not necessarily hating the internet. Also, I hated the fact that Germany did not have Street View, used it extensively at other places to pick neighbourhoods to go or not to go. When I asked people I met how comes you don’t have Street View here, they all said that they liked their privacy and it has to do with the times when the government was watching everyone, so they are more cautious about it.
  - herbst 6y ago
    That's just what they tend to think. From a closer outside view Germans are not too picky with their data. As someone mentioned above, to many private companies who are allowed to access, process and use your data.