There are plenty of desktop wrappers available for the Web version. I don’t use WhatsApp often but from my experience it seems fairly similar to the Windows desktop app
Afaik they created a Windows client that’s native sort of recently and I’m pretty sure it’s a better experience than the web version because that’s one slow as hell to initially load for me.
I think a lot of tech-savvy adults care about E2E on blue iMessage bubbles. I won’t talk about sensitive information via green, that’s all going to signal.
This just comes off as defensive and needy. I’m not even sure if encryption is affected by syncing with icloud, I was just raising a concern if that was a real reason for using it
Imma burst your bubble (pun intended) but that’s such a small part of the population and even such a small part of the tech savvy population that I don’t think it’s much of an argument.
That’s fair! I’m just going by my own experiences. But I have a lot of tech-savvy friends and acquaintances and even many non-tech-savvy mates are into Signal vs SMS because it’s secure, has great audio/video chat, and it’s not owned by shudders Facebook. I personally do not touch any google or Facebook products or services.
Apple gives it funny colours? Google messages just change saturation. Also for some reason I can’t send RCS (and e2e encrypted) messages to my relatives with apple phones. But I got most of them to use Signal :>
But WhatsApp have a really good app on windows which can attend calls and stuff . I think recently in Mac too . I’m using WhatsApp inside waydroid container in Linux so that I can at least attend calls
Technically you could run an Android container on Linux like with Waydroid and get WhatsApp too, it’s just that there’ll probably be more Android users
You shouldn’t use this app in the first place. It had many data breaches and it copy everything from Telegram (maybe everyone copies, but I don’t use other apps). I only mainly use Telegram and Matrix.
It’s impossible to convince that to friends and family. In my country everyone use WhatsApp as primary messaging app . It’s kind of like iMessage situation in US
It’s nice that a lot of my surroundings have finally jumped to Telegram. Previously it was Viber (bleh). But it’s much hard to go to Matrix because it’s much much less feature rich and less polished then Telegram. I can easily use it as a basic text messenger, but that’s about it. So Telegram is a solid middle ground. Can’t wait for the multi server Matrix accounts.
But please tell your contacts that you’re using bridges, if you haven’t already.
You are effectively giving away encryption keys to a third party, since those messages need to be decrypted and re-encrypted mid-transit.
Everyone who is part of the chats you use bridges with deserves to know about that fact, at least.
I don’t like WhatsApp, but some people simply refuse to use anything else (“better”) and the web clients can bridge the gap but it’s extremely annoying not being able to answer a call with a person you are texting
Easy, I don’t talk to such people. They can have my email or phone number if truly necessary. Yes, same for family or work, just not using Meta products for communication. Surprisingly enough people do understand.
OK provocation aside yes, you actually have to stand for what you believe in. For some people it means not going to a meat restaurants, for others, like me, it means not accepting a WhatsApp chat or a Google Drive share. You also do that but because it’s either so ingrained or socially accepted you do not even notice anymore. Your standards are definitely not mine but if neither of us do push back, then we as a society go backward IMHO (even knowing my standards are not yours, assuming at least some of us do think and act based on new knowledge rather than random beliefs). So… yes it means my circle of acquaintances is not the most inclusive but I do accept boundaries and if it means someone is toxic according to my perspective, they are out, simple.
PS: you actually have no idea what my social life is. You literally can not judge if it’s “richer” or “poorer” than anyone else.
It’s because the vast, vast, VAST majority of people have no idea that many apps are just showing a website. Also, the app version is almost always more efficient in terms of precious phone screen real estate compared to a browser. Apps also remember who you are so you don’t have to login. It isn’t hard to understand why people like them.
That said, many apps are horrible from a privacy perspective. But that is largely hidden from the average user, most of whom simply don’t think much about online privacy anyway.
I hope the ubiquity of irritating ads are the thin edge of the wedge that gets more people interested in ad-blocking, and then perhaps online privacy more generally.
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