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I forgot email. Even better, integrate messages with my email client and then they would all be in one place. Can't wait. Don't care how they are sent, just wan

by willyt 4y ago

I forgot email. Even better, integrate messages with my email client and then they would all be in one place. Can't wait. Don't care how they are sent, just want to know if I write something to someone it gets there. Don't want random strangers to be able to write to me without my consent. That's my spec for the ideal setup.

djtango 4y ago
I had a globally distributed family and WhatsApp was literally a life changer for me back in 2009/2010. I'm sure other people in a similar position will also know what I'm talking about. It was super lightweight, cheap, multiplatform - when I was interning in Singapore in 2012, I was able to stretch a 2MB pay as you go SIM plan over 2 months using WhatsApp over WAP on a Symbian iPhone. There are few things I will be more loyal to. Now, with my biases declared, I am genuinely open to understanding why SMTP/IMAP based chat didn't take off. I don't know much about the protocols but as you say, email should have solved this problem. But somehow it lacked that immediacy of instant messaging that made me feel that much more connected to my family halfway across the planet. Maybe that's what it was - email delivered in 1-5 seconds is completely fine, but instant messaging needs to be delivered in under 500ms ideally. Is there something about the email protocol that makes it slower due to some tradeoffs?
- guestbest 4y ago
  Is whatsapp data traffic free, but email traffic isn’t?
  - djtango 4y ago
    No, it was more a case that the whatsapp client was exceptionally lightweight - especially in 2012 when WhatsApp was basically free global SMS The email client was much clunkier, presumably because it had to support all the other usage patterns of email. Worth noting this was a phone that didn't have a touch screen and I was inputting via the numpad
jodrellblank 4y ago
Twenty two minutes ago you cared about groups, pictures and emojis. Email clients don't do emojis well or groups well, SMS doesn't do any of them, and IIRC Blackberry did everything in one program 15 years ago. Downvoted because this is the comment equivalent of the manager walking into a technical discussion of how something should work and demanding "just make it work" and leaving. Or commenting on a war topic "I just want peace I don't care how it happens". Like, you and everyone? But that doesn't make concerns like "people who don't use Facebook don't want their photos routed through Facebook servers without their knowledge or consent" magically vanish. There's a reason federated open protocol multi-service clients never became dominant and it's not because the problem space is trivial. "Just make it work" gets you iMessage, and that slurped your SMSs through Apple servers without telling you, which is still one of the cheekiest most unbelievable things I'd heard of at the time, despite that being tame by big tech company standards today.
- pbhjpbhj 4y ago
  Users just want simple direct communications to work (yes, with more features than that, E2EE, image sending, and such; but those features are not the focus). Companies want to get users into a walled-garden where they can target them for financial and political gains. Democracy trying to push things away from the latter seems good. Do you agree?
  - tekknik 4y ago
    What about this is a walled garden. SMS exists, this is an attempt to get green bubbles painted blue, and reactions to attach to a bubble. These are all visual changes and not at all required for functionality. Explain how this is such a problem that a government decided to focus any effort on this. It seems like they have nothing better to do.
  - jodrellblank 4y ago
    Apple's walled garden of the app store, no sideload apps, is a way they can profit. What financial or political gain is Apple getting from people using iMessage instead of WhatsApp?
- 4y ago

by willyt 4y ago

djtango 4y ago

I had a globally distributed family and WhatsApp was literally a life changer for me back in 2009/2010. I'm sure other people in a similar position will also know what I'm talking about. It was super lightweight, cheap, multiplatform - when I was interning in Singapore in 2012, I was able to stretch a 2MB pay as you go SIM plan over 2 months using WhatsApp over WAP on a Symbian iPhone. There are few things I will be more loyal to. Now, with my biases declared, I am genuinely open to understanding why SMTP/IMAP based chat didn't take off. I don't know much about the protocols but as you say, email should have solved this problem. But somehow it lacked that immediacy of instant messaging that made me feel that much more connected to my family halfway across the planet. Maybe that's what it was - email delivered in 1-5 seconds is completely fine, but instant messaging needs to be delivered in under 500ms ideally. Is there something about the email protocol that makes it slower due to some tradeoffs?

guestbest 4y ago
Is whatsapp data traffic free, but email traffic isn’t?
- djtango 4y ago
  No, it was more a case that the whatsapp client was exceptionally lightweight - especially in 2012 when WhatsApp was basically free global SMS The email client was much clunkier, presumably because it had to support all the other usage patterns of email. Worth noting this was a phone that didn't have a touch screen and I was inputting via the numpad

jodrellblank 4y ago

Twenty two minutes ago you cared about groups, pictures and emojis. Email clients don't do emojis well or groups well, SMS doesn't do any of them, and IIRC Blackberry did everything in one program 15 years ago. Downvoted because this is the comment equivalent of the manager walking into a technical discussion of how something should work and demanding "just make it work" and leaving. Or commenting on a war topic "I just want peace I don't care how it happens". Like, you and everyone? But that doesn't make concerns like "people who don't use Facebook don't want their photos routed through Facebook servers without their knowledge or consent" magically vanish. There's a reason federated open protocol multi-service clients never became dominant and it's not because the problem space is trivial. "Just make it work" gets you iMessage, and that slurped your SMSs through Apple servers without telling you, which is still one of the cheekiest most unbelievable things I'd heard of at the time, despite that being tame by big tech company standards today.

pbhjpbhj 4y ago
Users just want simple direct communications to work (yes, with more features than that, E2EE, image sending, and such; but those features are not the focus). Companies want to get users into a walled-garden where they can target them for financial and political gains. Democracy trying to push things away from the latter seems good. Do you agree?
- tekknik 4y ago
  What about this is a walled garden. SMS exists, this is an attempt to get green bubbles painted blue, and reactions to attach to a bubble. These are all visual changes and not at all required for functionality. Explain how this is such a problem that a government decided to focus any effort on this. It seems like they have nothing better to do.
- jodrellblank 4y ago
  Apple's walled garden of the app store, no sideload apps, is a way they can profit. What financial or political gain is Apple getting from people using iMessage instead of WhatsApp?
4y ago