See the pinned post in !communityPromo for some tips on finding communities. If there isn’t one that fits, this is probably the best instance for you to make that community
It also works with opening up the info to anyone, not just you. That’s one of the key issues, even if a trusted party is accessing the info there’s a chance that a malicious party can get access too. Or the trusted party becomes malicious later (government changes, company changes hands, etc.)
People generally don’t want everything in their home live streamed 24/7. If anything it has the potential for abuse, like if someone knows when you’ll be out of home for a few hours
I have a few friends and family on Signal. Pretty much everyone uses other services too (including myself) but Signal is installed on a few
I talk to some friends / family on Signal exclusively. They either already cared about it, or they’re close enough that they trust my recommendation / still don’t care but want to put in the effort
I talk to some friends / family on Signal only when we want to have a more private conversation
Some people won’t ever be convinced, I talk to them on other services or in person when privacy is important. I set up boundaries to protect myself, and people usually respect that.
This way I protect myself while respecting other people’s choices.
For you I’d recommend focussing on the second option. When you need to talk privately, ask the person to install it and give a short explanation for why it’s better. If they do, then great it’s installed and it’ll get used once in a while. Maybe they will see other people and build up the network. If they don’t install it, then suggest an alternative like talking in person
It’s still helpful to talk about what’s going on elsewhere
see what we can do better
see what good features are worth adopting here
Calling out bad actions by other platforms. We don’t HAVE to help people that aren’t on the Fediverse, but there are a lot of experienced and knowledgeable people on here that can discuss issues and how we can address them
If the app needs a server component, a small subscription is justified. If it doesn’t, then a subscription isn’t justified.
If the subscription is optional, and it gets more frequent updates & support, that might be ok too as long as you can choose to just keep the product as is (and the product isn’t riddled with bugs)