> WhatsApp only exists because Carrier incumbents are unwieldy and stupid Honestly, I'm glad. The less involved telcos are in my instant messaging, the better.

> WhatsApp only exists because Carrier incumbents are unwieldy and stupid Honestly, I'm glad. The less involved telcos are in my instant messaging, the better. Using my phone number as a universal identifier is bad enough. I feel like we peaked with XMPP in the early 2000s (federated, end-to-end encrypted, not phone-number-based) and are now just regressing into various silos. > If you're old enough, you'll might recall 10 cent WAP pages. I'm alive enough to experience 10 cent calls and texts to neighboring countries right now.