13 ms·

This post, and how it explains that there's 30 people working there now, made me realize that if I care about signal continuing (and I do, since I really like i

This post, and how it explains that there's 30 people working there now, made me realize that if I care about signal continuing (and I do, since I really like it, especially that it has a dedicated desktop client), that I should see how it makes money and whether that's sustainable. Turns out it's donations, and now I'm a donor through monthly charges through the mobile app. I actually opted for that specifically because their web site noted that they can't give you a badge in the app if you donate online, and I thought showing the badge would be a good way for other people to see and inquire about, and hopefully realize they can donate too if they care to.

8ytecoder 5y ago
Amazon Smile also has signal foundation as a non profit.
JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> Turns out it's donations Are they still doing the crypto scheme? I stopped donating when that started, but would be more than happy to pick it back up if they reversed course.
- anonporridge 5y ago
  They just rolled it out globally, https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency-payments/ https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency...
  - frabcus 5y ago
    This feels more interesting than most cryptocurrency uses. One thing a cryptocurrency can be is an open protocol for payments - it makes sense to try and make one into such a protocol. The privacy preserving aspects of MobileCoin are interesting and feel like they fit with Signal too.
    - kelnos 5y ago
      I am ridiculously negative on all things "crypto", but person-to-person payments (in fiat) are currently pretty annoying and limited (at least in the US, even with things like Venmo and Zelle), and integrating private payments with a privacy-preserving messenger would seem to be a good thing. I don't know if MobileCoin is the best solution here, but I also don't see Signal starting partnerships with big traditional banks or payment processors, either (and wouldn't really want to see Signal in bed with those sorts of folks). So something like this might be the right move, even though I'm unlikely to use it myself.
      - XorNot 5y ago
        > and wouldn't really want to see Signal in bed with those sorts of folks Why? This has been ongoingly why we have bad encryption technology. No one wants to taint their ideological purity by trying to solve problems for organizations that can pay for them which would actually solve problems for private citizens, and simultaneously ensures that good technology doesn't secure important social interactions for private citizens. Why should I not be able to verify I'm talking to my bank through Signal? Why can't I have messages from my local government secured to me via Signal? It's a 2-sided problem, and one side is this bizarre rejection of any attempt at enterprise marketing for a platform with enterprise utility.
        zaptheimpaler 5y ago
        Because we all saw where it leads with Google/FB. They might start by just doing the simple things you proposed. But once a government or bank is a customer, they would be the largest/most powerful customers by far. Meaning Signal would begin to bend to doing what those customers want, maybe collecting analytics or personal information, or selling your contact data to advertisers. Maybe one of those banks donates money to Signal and wants favors in return. The biggest customers of a company inevitably shape the incentives and behavior's within that company. easy to dismiss as a "slippery slope fallacy" but it's historically true. No one who's using Signal to get away from the shitty enterprises that built/own FB Messenger wants a repeat of the same thing. Even if you don't agree, many Signal users probably do, and it would be silly for Signal to piss off their customers.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- kbenson 5y ago
  I'm not sure. I'm a bit torn on that. If they can sustain themselves though some method, that's good, but I would rather that method be aligned fairly closely with their initial goals of security and privacy, which crypto pays good lip service to but it's always the best at achieving, given public ledgers. I guess I'm just worried about perverting what makes it a good messaging client, and would rather they get money from people that support that cause so they aren't as tempted to chase some other path because the alternative is to shutter. That said, that can happen even if they can sustain themselves through donations if the management/board decide to do so. Just have to hope it stays the course.
- ScoobleDoodle 5y ago
  I did the same thing. I had setup a monthly donation to Signal several months before the crypto announcement. When I heard about the crypto thing I cancelled my monthly donation.
- autoexec 5y ago
  For me I stopped using Signal when they started permanently storing sensitive user data in the cloud, they were extremely unclear about doing it confusing many of their users, they ignored the objections and security concerns of their users who realized what they were doing and they never updated their privacy policy to reflect that information (and still haven't). For an app that insists that you be able to trust it, they just did not come off as remotely trustworthy.
  - uxcolumbo 5y ago
    Do you have anymore info on that? Good sources to read?
    - autoexec 5y ago
      Here are a bunch of threads I found: https://community.signalusers.org/t/proper-secure-value-security-pins-are-too-easy-to-brute-force-sgx-is-not-reliable-enough/15096 https://community.signalusers.org/t/proper-secure-value-secu... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/gmwheu/introducing_signal_pins/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/gmwheu/introducing_... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkl914/welcome_to_the_cloud_signal_users/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkl914/welcome_to_t... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/giqxug/whats_happening_with_signal_recently/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/giqxug/whats_happen... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkle3d/forced_pin_bite_it_signal/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkle3d/forced_pin_b... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/ghsj5b/pin_cloud_storage_are_showstoppers/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/ghsj5b/pin_cloud_st... https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/hm2fwx/why_i_think_signals_increased_reliance_on_sgx_is/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/hm2fwx/why_i_think... Signal then announced that because of all the hate they'll make the feature optional, but opting out would just set a pin for you and upload your data anyway. This also caused a bunch of confusion. https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hnok10/moxie_on_twitter_based_on_the_feedback_weve/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hnok10/moxie_on_twi... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hrlmoe/pins_now_optional_in_signal/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hrlmoe/pins_now_opt... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hoh7e9/moxie_marlinspike_on_signals_pin_feature/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hoh7e9/moxie_marlin... /u/PriorProject has a comment far down which sums up my view pretty well in this one: https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/htmzrr/psa_disabling_pins_will_now_upload_nothing_to_the/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/htmzrr/psa_disablin... It's worth pointing out that they're collecting the type of data they still brag about not being able to turn over because they "don't keep user data". https://signal.org/bigbrother/eastern-virginia-grand-jury/ https://signal.org/bigbrother/eastern-virginia-grand-jury/ In fact, this was posted just one month before all this went down: https://signal.org/blog/looking-back-as-the-world-moves-forward/ https://signal.org/blog/looking-back-as-the-world-moves-forw... Between that and not updating their privacy policy it's a pretty massive red flag, but so many people don't even know about the data collection. Look at the answers this guy gets: https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/q5tlg1/what_info_does_signal_store_about_its_user/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/q5tlg1/what_info_do... same with the top comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/qpb8eh/mlat_order_from_luxembourg_for_signal_user_data/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/qpb8eh/mlat_order_... It's insane, and I hope every user who has to learn what signal is really collecting from some random internet comment thinks long and hard about what that says about how transparent and trustworthy signal is.
- aorth 5y ago
  > Are they still doing the crypto scheme? I stopped donating when that started, but would be more than happy to pick it back up if they reversed course. Yes it seems they are still doing the MobileCoin thing. I'm against cryptocurrencies, blockchain, NFTs, etc also, but nothing is forcing me to use it. I'd be curious to read some case studies or blog posts about how it is being used. For example, are people using it to pay for milk in rural India, send money to family in Myanmar, split dinner bills in New York? Regarding donations, I would be happy to donate, but it would be great to see some financial reports. Other initiatives like Software in the Public Interest (SPI) and the OpenStreetMap Foundation publish yearly reports, which makes it easy to see how the projects spend their money, how much cash they have in the bank, etc. Pardon me, but I don't want to donate to Signal if they still have $50 million in the bank, or if their CEO is taking home a huge salary, or if they spend the money on fuse-ball tables. ;)
  - giords 5y ago
    Also lichess.org publishes yearly reports
conroy 5y ago
While this is true, remember that the Signal Foundation was started with a sizeable investment from their new interim CEO Brian Acton. > In February of 2018, Acton invested $50 million of his own money to start the Signal Foundation alongside Moxie Marlinspike > > https://signalfoundation.org/en/ https://signalfoundation.org/en/ He's worth at least a billion dollars, so one imagines that Signal will continue as long as he's involved.
- daniel-cussen 5y ago
  You can't take him for granted like that. Yeah he donated a lot and yeah he has more and yeah he left $1B on the table after leaving Facebook, but he just can't do it all alone. If you're rich you get all kinds of people in your life soliciting your money, you gotta watch it like a hawk, it's easy to lose a billion dollars.
  - cpach 5y ago
    Good point. And he might also want to donate to other charities. There are many worthy causes besides Signal. And it’s probably sound for Signal to not rely on one single wealthy donor.
    - dheera 5y ago
      > There are many worthy causes besides Signal To be fair, that applies to non-billionaires as well.
      - cpach 5y ago
        Indeed!
  - rantanplan 5y ago
    > it's easy to lose a billion dollars :O
    - novok 5y ago
sdenton4 5y ago
The Signal Foundation is in Benevity, which powers lots and lots of corporate gift matching. I give a yearly matched donation each december as I try to reach the max matching for my company.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  Thanks for pointing this out, I had no idea it existed. Uggg I just made some donations last week which look like they could have benefitted from this.
  - sdenton4 5y ago
    For my company at least there's a very easy interface for declaring donations for matching post hoc; sometimes it asks for a receipt. Totally fine to use it in January, too; it's a head start on this year's donation goal...
SkyMarshal 5y ago
Thanks for pointing that out, wasn't aware of it, just subscribed too.
phgn 5y ago
Hearing about Wikipedia's deceptive fundraising messaging [0] made me question all donations to large non-profits -- but I guess a 30-people org is a different matter. Plus, Signal doesn't seem to be aggressive about it. [0] https://www.dailydot.com/debug/wikipedia-endownemnt-fundraising/ https://www.dailydot.com/debug/wikipedia-endownemnt-fundrais...
- ekanes 5y ago
  This deserves more attention.
- wrycoder 5y ago
  When the WMF announced the creation of an endowment with the Tides Foundation in January 2016, on Wikipedia’s 15th birthday, its goal was to accumulate $100 million over 10 years, as “a permanent source of funding to ensure Wikipedia thrives for generations to come.” Just five years later, the endowment passed $90 million, and the $100 million mark, now described as an “initial goal,” will be reached this year. https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/tides-foundation/ https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/tides-foundation/ Which partly explains Wikipedia's political stance.
  - Gareth321 5y ago
    This is extremely interesting, and explains my experiences with the obvious shift in moderation to an Americanised left-leaning perspective. It has been quite jarring to see something I had so much trust in undermined by America's identity war.
  - kodah 5y ago
    > The Tides Foundation is a major center-left grantmaking organization and a major pass-through funder to numerous left-leaning nonprofits. The fact that they declare themselves center-left is not a violation of 501(c)(3)?
    - calcifer 5y ago
      No? What provision do you think are they violating?
lmeyerov 5y ago
Oh wow, I read the post and thought congrats Moxie, job indeed done. We are still not there, so a lot of empathy for the feelings behind that :) ... Except if it is donations and esp. Brian Acton's, or even say Firefox with most of their money being one Google or Bing search bar deal... the sustainable business isn't there yet. A replacement CEO can be good just for that. Marlin as a CEO found amazing product/user fit, and as a tech leader, hired enough and built enough for a great dev culture. But there is no sustainable product/customer fit yet, esp if they view the user as not the established product: the market isn't paying. A CEO focused on solving that would be quite healthy for achieving sustainability! Hopefully Brian and his successor will have more room now to figure that out, it's not easy, esp given their privacy mission! (And still congrats and a lot of respect to Moxie for building something people want & helps security, and growing a team to deliver it, and everyone else for pushing into the next phase!)
zwass 5y ago
I too took to donating through the app so that I could get the icon. My donations continue through their website, but it's also important to spread the word to folks like you that Signal needs funding to continue its mission!
brylie 5y ago
Thanks for the suggestion. I just set up an in-app recurring donation to get my profile badge too
gojomo 5y ago
With the integration of MobileCoin, Signal has a potential web3-style path to sustainability. https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency-payments/ https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency...
- ForHackernews 5y ago
  No, this is very bad news and could end up with end-to-end encryption being outlawed in the name of preventing money laundering https://www.theverge.com/22872133/signal-cryptocurrency-payments-encryption-invite-regulator-scrutiny https://www.theverge.com/22872133/signal-cryptocurrency-paym...
  - gojomo 5y ago
    No, this is very good news, because it reveals the essential equivalency between privacy-for-speech & privacy-for-commerce.
    - Dylan16807 5y ago
      Personal privacy for commerce is great, but for money laundering I'd compare that to paying for political influence in the way that it mixes up speech and money in a bad way.
      - gojomo 5y ago
        And yet, both kinds of privacy depend on the same freedom-of-technology. If you give up your privacy-of-commerce based on fears of 'money laundering', your privacy-for-speech is probably already dead.
        _heimdall 5y ago
        100% agree with you here! Privacy is privacy, it doesn't matter what the activity is. Most money today is just digital information, no different than that text message being sent. It seems impossible to allow complete privacy when sending one type of digital information but not another. I could send someone the recovery keys for a bitcoin wallet and launder money via any messaging service. If we need to regulate that then privacy goes out the window, you'd have to know what the content of my message was to know if it was allowed.
cbsmith 5y ago
I went through the same process. Acton gave them a huge foundational base, but you want it to be a viable model in its own right.
e40 5y ago
I just stopped my signal donation today, which I've been doing monthly last year due to this: https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-crypto-project-linked-to-its-own-creator-moxie-marlinspike/ https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-... Was it an overreaction? I don't think so. I feel dumb stuff like this, massive conflicts of interest, happens too often these days, and I'm voting with my wallet.
Accacin 5y ago
I just went to donate but at least on Calyx, I do not have Google Pay installed. I just checked their blog post and they will add other payment methods in the future so I hope I can become a sustainer too.
shp0ngle 5y ago
They are planning to integrate their own sketchy crypto-coin, I think they will get money from that. Although not sure how is that going, haven’t heard about MobileCoin for months now
PaywallBuster 5y ago
I'd like to see an annual report before donating a single buck

8ytecoder 5y ago

Amazon Smile also has signal foundation as a non profit.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago

> Turns out it's donations Are they still doing the crypto scheme? I stopped donating when that started, but would be more than happy to pick it back up if they reversed course.

anonporridge 5y ago
They just rolled it out globally, https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency-payments/ https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency...
- frabcus 5y ago
  This feels more interesting than most cryptocurrency uses. One thing a cryptocurrency can be is an open protocol for payments - it makes sense to try and make one into such a protocol. The privacy preserving aspects of MobileCoin are interesting and feel like they fit with Signal too.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    I am ridiculously negative on all things "crypto", but person-to-person payments (in fiat) are currently pretty annoying and limited (at least in the US, even with things like Venmo and Zelle), and integrating private payments with a privacy-preserving messenger would seem to be a good thing. I don't know if MobileCoin is the best solution here, but I also don't see Signal starting partnerships with big traditional banks or payment processors, either (and wouldn't really want to see Signal in bed with those sorts of folks). So something like this might be the right move, even though I'm unlikely to use it myself.
    - XorNot 5y ago
      > and wouldn't really want to see Signal in bed with those sorts of folks Why? This has been ongoingly why we have bad encryption technology. No one wants to taint their ideological purity by trying to solve problems for organizations that can pay for them which would actually solve problems for private citizens, and simultaneously ensures that good technology doesn't secure important social interactions for private citizens. Why should I not be able to verify I'm talking to my bank through Signal? Why can't I have messages from my local government secured to me via Signal? It's a 2-sided problem, and one side is this bizarre rejection of any attempt at enterprise marketing for a platform with enterprise utility.
      - zaptheimpaler 5y ago
        Because we all saw where it leads with Google/FB. They might start by just doing the simple things you proposed. But once a government or bank is a customer, they would be the largest/most powerful customers by far. Meaning Signal would begin to bend to doing what those customers want, maybe collecting analytics or personal information, or selling your contact data to advertisers. Maybe one of those banks donates money to Signal and wants favors in return. The biggest customers of a company inevitably shape the incentives and behavior's within that company. easy to dismiss as a "slippery slope fallacy" but it's historically true. No one who's using Signal to get away from the shitty enterprises that built/own FB Messenger wants a repeat of the same thing. Even if you don't agree, many Signal users probably do, and it would be silly for Signal to piss off their customers.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
kbenson 5y ago
I'm not sure. I'm a bit torn on that. If they can sustain themselves though some method, that's good, but I would rather that method be aligned fairly closely with their initial goals of security and privacy, which crypto pays good lip service to but it's always the best at achieving, given public ledgers. I guess I'm just worried about perverting what makes it a good messaging client, and would rather they get money from people that support that cause so they aren't as tempted to chase some other path because the alternative is to shutter. That said, that can happen even if they can sustain themselves through donations if the management/board decide to do so. Just have to hope it stays the course.
ScoobleDoodle 5y ago
I did the same thing. I had setup a monthly donation to Signal several months before the crypto announcement. When I heard about the crypto thing I cancelled my monthly donation.
autoexec 5y ago
For me I stopped using Signal when they started permanently storing sensitive user data in the cloud, they were extremely unclear about doing it confusing many of their users, they ignored the objections and security concerns of their users who realized what they were doing and they never updated their privacy policy to reflect that information (and still haven't). For an app that insists that you be able to trust it, they just did not come off as remotely trustworthy.
- uxcolumbo 5y ago
  Do you have anymore info on that? Good sources to read?
  - autoexec 5y ago
    Here are a bunch of threads I found: https://community.signalusers.org/t/proper-secure-value-security-pins-are-too-easy-to-brute-force-sgx-is-not-reliable-enough/15096 https://community.signalusers.org/t/proper-secure-value-secu... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/gmwheu/introducing_signal_pins/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/gmwheu/introducing_... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkl914/welcome_to_the_cloud_signal_users/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkl914/welcome_to_t... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/giqxug/whats_happening_with_signal_recently/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/giqxug/whats_happen... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkle3d/forced_pin_bite_it_signal/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hkle3d/forced_pin_b... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/ghsj5b/pin_cloud_storage_are_showstoppers/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/ghsj5b/pin_cloud_st... https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/hm2fwx/why_i_think_signals_increased_reliance_on_sgx_is/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/hm2fwx/why_i_think... Signal then announced that because of all the hate they'll make the feature optional, but opting out would just set a pin for you and upload your data anyway. This also caused a bunch of confusion. https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hnok10/moxie_on_twitter_based_on_the_feedback_weve/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hnok10/moxie_on_twi... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hrlmoe/pins_now_optional_in_signal/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hrlmoe/pins_now_opt... https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hoh7e9/moxie_marlinspike_on_signals_pin_feature/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/hoh7e9/moxie_marlin... /u/PriorProject has a comment far down which sums up my view pretty well in this one: https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/htmzrr/psa_disabling_pins_will_now_upload_nothing_to_the/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/htmzrr/psa_disablin... It's worth pointing out that they're collecting the type of data they still brag about not being able to turn over because they "don't keep user data". https://signal.org/bigbrother/eastern-virginia-grand-jury/ https://signal.org/bigbrother/eastern-virginia-grand-jury/ In fact, this was posted just one month before all this went down: https://signal.org/blog/looking-back-as-the-world-moves-forward/ https://signal.org/blog/looking-back-as-the-world-moves-forw... Between that and not updating their privacy policy it's a pretty massive red flag, but so many people don't even know about the data collection. Look at the answers this guy gets: https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/q5tlg1/what_info_does_signal_store_about_its_user/ https://old.reddit.com/r/signal/comments/q5tlg1/what_info_do... same with the top comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/qpb8eh/mlat_order_from_luxembourg_for_signal_user_data/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/qpb8eh/mlat_order_... It's insane, and I hope every user who has to learn what signal is really collecting from some random internet comment thinks long and hard about what that says about how transparent and trustworthy signal is.
aorth 5y ago
> Are they still doing the crypto scheme? I stopped donating when that started, but would be more than happy to pick it back up if they reversed course. Yes it seems they are still doing the MobileCoin thing. I'm against cryptocurrencies, blockchain, NFTs, etc also, but nothing is forcing me to use it. I'd be curious to read some case studies or blog posts about how it is being used. For example, are people using it to pay for milk in rural India, send money to family in Myanmar, split dinner bills in New York? Regarding donations, I would be happy to donate, but it would be great to see some financial reports. Other initiatives like Software in the Public Interest (SPI) and the OpenStreetMap Foundation publish yearly reports, which makes it easy to see how the projects spend their money, how much cash they have in the bank, etc. Pardon me, but I don't want to donate to Signal if they still have $50 million in the bank, or if their CEO is taking home a huge salary, or if they spend the money on fuse-ball tables. ;)
- giords 5y ago
  Also lichess.org publishes yearly reports

conroy 5y ago

While this is true, remember that the Signal Foundation was started with a sizeable investment from their new interim CEO Brian Acton. > In February of 2018, Acton invested $50 million of his own money to start the Signal Foundation alongside Moxie Marlinspike > > https://signalfoundation.org/en/ https://signalfoundation.org/en/ He's worth at least a billion dollars, so one imagines that Signal will continue as long as he's involved.

daniel-cussen 5y ago
You can't take him for granted like that. Yeah he donated a lot and yeah he has more and yeah he left $1B on the table after leaving Facebook, but he just can't do it all alone. If you're rich you get all kinds of people in your life soliciting your money, you gotta watch it like a hawk, it's easy to lose a billion dollars.
- cpach 5y ago
  Good point. And he might also want to donate to other charities. There are many worthy causes besides Signal. And it’s probably sound for Signal to not rely on one single wealthy donor.
  - dheera 5y ago
    > There are many worthy causes besides Signal To be fair, that applies to non-billionaires as well.
    - cpach 5y ago
      Indeed!
- rantanplan 5y ago
  > it's easy to lose a billion dollars :O
  - novok 5y ago

sdenton4 5y ago

The Signal Foundation is in Benevity, which powers lots and lots of corporate gift matching. I give a yearly matched donation each december as I try to reach the max matching for my company.

stjohnswarts 5y ago
Thanks for pointing this out, I had no idea it existed. Uggg I just made some donations last week which look like they could have benefitted from this.
- sdenton4 5y ago
  For my company at least there's a very easy interface for declaring donations for matching post hoc; sometimes it asks for a receipt. Totally fine to use it in January, too; it's a head start on this year's donation goal...

SkyMarshal 5y ago

Thanks for pointing that out, wasn't aware of it, just subscribed too.

phgn 5y ago

Hearing about Wikipedia's deceptive fundraising messaging [0] made me question all donations to large non-profits -- but I guess a 30-people org is a different matter. Plus, Signal doesn't seem to be aggressive about it. [0] https://www.dailydot.com/debug/wikipedia-endownemnt-fundraising/ https://www.dailydot.com/debug/wikipedia-endownemnt-fundrais...

ekanes 5y ago
This deserves more attention.
wrycoder 5y ago
When the WMF announced the creation of an endowment with the Tides Foundation in January 2016, on Wikipedia’s 15th birthday, its goal was to accumulate $100 million over 10 years, as “a permanent source of funding to ensure Wikipedia thrives for generations to come.” Just five years later, the endowment passed $90 million, and the $100 million mark, now described as an “initial goal,” will be reached this year. https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/tides-foundation/ https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/tides-foundation/ Which partly explains Wikipedia's political stance.
- Gareth321 5y ago
  This is extremely interesting, and explains my experiences with the obvious shift in moderation to an Americanised left-leaning perspective. It has been quite jarring to see something I had so much trust in undermined by America's identity war.
- kodah 5y ago
  > The Tides Foundation is a major center-left grantmaking organization and a major pass-through funder to numerous left-leaning nonprofits. The fact that they declare themselves center-left is not a violation of 501(c)(3)?
  - calcifer 5y ago
    No? What provision do you think are they violating?

lmeyerov 5y ago

Oh wow, I read the post and thought congrats Moxie, job indeed done. We are still not there, so a lot of empathy for the feelings behind that :) ... Except if it is donations and esp. Brian Acton's, or even say Firefox with most of their money being one Google or Bing search bar deal... the sustainable business isn't there yet. A replacement CEO can be good just for that. Marlin as a CEO found amazing product/user fit, and as a tech leader, hired enough and built enough for a great dev culture. But there is no sustainable product/customer fit yet, esp if they view the user as not the established product: the market isn't paying. A CEO focused on solving that would be quite healthy for achieving sustainability! Hopefully Brian and his successor will have more room now to figure that out, it's not easy, esp given their privacy mission! (And still congrats and a lot of respect to Moxie for building something people want & helps security, and growing a team to deliver it, and everyone else for pushing into the next phase!)

zwass 5y ago

I too took to donating through the app so that I could get the icon. My donations continue through their website, but it's also important to spread the word to folks like you that Signal needs funding to continue its mission!

brylie 5y ago

Thanks for the suggestion. I just set up an in-app recurring donation to get my profile badge too

gojomo 5y ago

With the integration of MobileCoin, Signal has a potential web3-style path to sustainability. https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency-payments/ https://www.wired.com/story/signal-mobilecoin-cryptocurrency...

ForHackernews 5y ago
No, this is very bad news and could end up with end-to-end encryption being outlawed in the name of preventing money laundering https://www.theverge.com/22872133/signal-cryptocurrency-payments-encryption-invite-regulator-scrutiny https://www.theverge.com/22872133/signal-cryptocurrency-paym...
- gojomo 5y ago
  No, this is very good news, because it reveals the essential equivalency between privacy-for-speech & privacy-for-commerce.
  - Dylan16807 5y ago
    Personal privacy for commerce is great, but for money laundering I'd compare that to paying for political influence in the way that it mixes up speech and money in a bad way.
    - gojomo 5y ago
      And yet, both kinds of privacy depend on the same freedom-of-technology. If you give up your privacy-of-commerce based on fears of 'money laundering', your privacy-for-speech is probably already dead.
      - _heimdall 5y ago
        100% agree with you here! Privacy is privacy, it doesn't matter what the activity is. Most money today is just digital information, no different than that text message being sent. It seems impossible to allow complete privacy when sending one type of digital information but not another. I could send someone the recovery keys for a bitcoin wallet and launder money via any messaging service. If we need to regulate that then privacy goes out the window, you'd have to know what the content of my message was to know if it was allowed.

cbsmith 5y ago

I went through the same process. Acton gave them a huge foundational base, but you want it to be a viable model in its own right.

e40 5y ago

I just stopped my signal donation today, which I've been doing monthly last year due to this: https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-crypto-project-linked-to-its-own-creator-moxie-marlinspike/ https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-... Was it an overreaction? I don't think so. I feel dumb stuff like this, massive conflicts of interest, happens too often these days, and I'm voting with my wallet.

Accacin 5y ago

I just went to donate but at least on Calyx, I do not have Google Pay installed. I just checked their blog post and they will add other payment methods in the future so I hope I can become a sustainer too.

shp0ngle 5y ago

They are planning to integrate their own sketchy crypto-coin, I think they will get money from that. Although not sure how is that going, haven’t heard about MobileCoin for months now

PaywallBuster 5y ago

I'd like to see an annual report before donating a single buck