[HN Gopher] Telegram: Voice Chats 2.0:Channels, Millions of List...
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       Telegram: Voice Chats 2.0:Channels, Millions of Listeners, Recorded
       Chats
        
       Author : malikNF
       Score  : 134 points
       Date   : 2021-03-20 12:42 UTC (10 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (telegram.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (telegram.org)
        
       | posedge wrote:
       | With each of those blog posts I'm fascinated by the pace at which
       | they release new features.
        
       | sdfhbdf wrote:
       | Telegram still missing message reactions. Kind of surprising at
       | this point with the speed at which they pump out features.
        
         | aiven wrote:
         | This is the kind of feature that can burn servers :) Especially
         | at telegram scale
        
           | rPlayer6554 wrote:
           | It's interesting to me that of all companies, Facebook has
           | not added reactions to WhatsApp, but Signal has them. I would
           | have thought the roles to be reversed.
        
       | newscracker wrote:
       | The feature set sounds like competing with Clubhouse in a sense
       | while providing a lot more, but discoverability is quite low and
       | the UX is not great. Telegram has started putting more features
       | behind the scenes in the last year or so - one could start a
       | secret chat from the chats list before, but now it's hidden in
       | the person's profile under a "..." submenu. This voice chats 2.0
       | feature is also implemented in the same way on groups and
       | channels. It could've been in the menu that comes up with the
       | audio/video recording button or in the attachment menu for
       | quicker access.
        
       | beigeoak wrote:
       | Does anyone know any details about the engineering and design
       | teams at Telegram? Encryption qualms aside, the UX and
       | performance of Telegram is so far ahead of WhatsApp, Facebook and
       | Signal that it's quite mindboggling.
       | 
       | Is there any reason why a behemoth like Facebook is unable to
       | achieve similar levels of polish? Is it a cultural issue,
       | bureaucracy or a fundamental difference in the attitudes of
       | developers in Eastern Europe vs those in the United States?
        
       | blue_box wrote:
       | I really like Telegram and these features but I don't use it
       | because they don't have end2end encryption as default. Also you
       | can't create a secret group chat that you can start from your
       | phone and continue from your Mac.
        
         | darthrupert wrote:
         | I think it would make it slightly more difficult for them to
         | profit from the chats.
        
         | TheChaplain wrote:
         | Just out of curiosity, what kind of discussion do you have that
         | require e2e?
         | 
         | Myself I use TG extensively with friends, family, girlfriend
         | and I think I've used secret chats once when the gf wanted to
         | send a naughty photo.
         | 
         | It's not that I don't have anything to hide, it's just I choose
         | what to say according to the environment and I feel the
         | features of telegram far outweigh the con of not having e2e at
         | all times.
        
           | TedShiller wrote:
           | Can you send me a zip archive of all your chats? It would be
           | fun for me to read and ok with you since you have nothing to
           | hide. You can contact me here.
           | 
           | If you don't send me your chats then I assume you want
           | privacy after all.
        
             | TedShiller wrote:
             | Still waiting
        
               | heyoni wrote:
               | Me too. It shouldn't take this long!
               | 
               | Ps: hard drive image clones should also do the trick.
        
             | samat wrote:
             | Not op, but what would you give him in return? Sending some
             | random purist on the internet my personal texts is one
             | thing.
             | 
             | Sending it to the company promising secure communication,
             | company which delivers the best convenience messaging UX in
             | the whole fucking world without any ads...
             | 
             | Well, if you can't see the difference...
        
               | samat wrote:
               | Don't get me wrong, I love complete e2e!
               | 
               | I am choosing iMessage with complete e2e every time I
               | can, but iMessage is iOS only and telegram is many years
               | ahead in user convenience even from it.
               | 
               | You might as well continue pushing for pgp for secure
               | email.
               | 
               | User convenience is not optional.
        
               | kitkat_new wrote:
               | you conflate iMessage with what is possible with e2ee
        
             | TedShiller wrote:
             | Ok, turns out he likes privacy after all. Don't lie please.
        
           | proactivesvcs wrote:
           | About the weather. Cute manitee gifs. Politics. Jokes. Rants.
           | About life, the universe and everything.
        
           | randomhodler84 wrote:
           | Oh no. No. "You have nothing to share." E2e by default or
           | GTFO. This isn't about your secrets. It's about making your
           | regular discourse indistinguishable from secrets. There is no
           | con to e2e, and many cons for snake oil/plaintext.
        
             | AnyTimeTraveler wrote:
             | Actually, there are many cons to e2e, especially with
             | bigger groups. I've read a lot about Signal's and Matrix's
             | development and there are many problems that don't exist
             | when sending data over a simple SSL connectiom to a server.
             | 
             | For example: You have a group with 100 Members, do you
             | encrtpy each message you send 99 times for each recipient?
             | Not likely. So you use a send key that everyone else can
             | decrypt.
             | 
             | But then what if the group changes? Does everyone has to
             | replace their send-keys, because the party that left can
             | still decrypt all those messages otherwise.
             | 
             | That means you have to do n-1 key exchanges whenever a
             | party leaves or joins. Otherwise it wouldn't be secure
             | anymore.
             | 
             | There are some clever ideas about key exchanges, but so far
             | the messengers that implement them are not widely used and
             | since there is no profit in it, no one is in a hurry to
             | compete.
        
             | xorcist wrote:
             | > There is no con to e2e,
             | 
             | No multi device support.
             | 
             | No transcoding for video.
             | 
             | No shared history for group chats.
             | 
             | Scaling get progressively harder with increasing
             | participants.
        
               | rakoo wrote:
               | > No multi device support.
               | 
               | That's an issue with your client and protocol, not with
               | e2e
               | 
               | > No shared history for group chats.
               | 
               | Same
               | 
               | > Scaling get progressively harder with increasing
               | participants.
               | 
               | Same
               | 
               | > No transcoding for video.
               | 
               | Now that's a more palpable issue. Also no size reduction
               | of photos which is probably more used as a media.
        
               | vetinari wrote:
               | > That's an issue with your client and protocol, not with
               | e2e
               | 
               | That's issue with distributing the keys among multiple
               | parties.
               | 
               | > No shared history for group chats.
               | 
               | > Same
               | 
               | Exactly. What's e2e good for, if you give keys to the
               | entity that does the archiving?
        
               | rakoo wrote:
               | If you have 2 devices, one device can send messages to
               | the other, all e2e encrypted. It's the same for group
               | chats: if you are part of a chat, any participant can
               | send you the history of the chat.
               | 
               | All those issues are protocol-related. E2E only
               | stipulates that the message can't be read between the two
               | ends, it doesn't say you can't send a technical message
               | for making a better UX.
        
               | vetinari wrote:
               | > if you are part of a chat, any participant can send you
               | the history of the chat.
               | 
               | Re-sending parts of the chat kind of removes the
               | guarantees of the secret chat (just like backups defeat
               | the purpose of e2e). These apps have also expiring and
               | non-screenshotable messages, you don't want to resend
               | that.
               | 
               | Ideally, all messages sent should be only decryptable by
               | given set of keys (i.e. one key for each device used by
               | each party of the chat; or, depending on the size of the
               | message, ephemeral key used for message encryption,
               | decryptable by each device that is supposed to receive
               | it). Now the key distribution is the non-solved part.
        
               | rakoo wrote:
               | "Secret chat" is something only Telegram and pseudo-
               | private messengers have. No application can ever provide
               | assurance that messages aren't backed up. When it's sent,
               | it's sent; you don't control it anymore. Re-sending the
               | message is something you can only assume can be done. The
               | experience given with expiring messages is just that: an
               | experience.
               | 
               | Now, secret chats don't necessarily mean "this message
               | can only be read by one device". To answer your second
               | paragrah I disagree: a message shouldn't be sent to a
               | given set of keys but to a given set of participants.
               | Each participant may have one or more devices and should
               | be able to read messages whatever way they want.
               | 
               | Also key distribution is "solved" by not counting on the
               | user to do it but doing it for them: see what Matrix,
               | Signal, Deltachat, XMPP (OMEMO) and probably others are
               | doing.
        
               | vetinari wrote:
               | I disagree; if you are sending to participants instead of
               | devices, you don't really have e2e. Any private key
               | should never leave any device. If the user want to use
               | several devices, his client should enroll multiple keys
               | for him and the message should be decryptable by each of
               | these keys. Also, the user should have visibility into
               | which keys can decrypt the message, to avoid enrolling
               | any keys behind his back.
               | 
               | That the user won't see on his device any messages sent
               | before enrolling the new key? That's the point.
               | Otherwise, the user should use the normal/non-e2e
               | messages.
               | 
               | Thus, the key distribution as it is "solved" is being lax
               | with them.
        
               | est31 wrote:
               | Doesn't even have to send the full history of the chat,
               | it can only send you the encryption key while the history
               | is stored on the server.
        
               | vetinari wrote:
               | (At least Threema does it this way): Server doesn't
               | really store the messages long term; only until the
               | receiver picks it up. With just two devices - sender and
               | receiver - you have a guarantee that once the single
               | receiver picks it up, there's none else to do the same
               | and can be safely dropped.
        
               | rakoo wrote:
               | Indeed, and you can go even further: with e2ee there is
               | no need for central server beyond dumb distribution of
               | opaque blobs. So the history can be exchanged by the
               | whole network and the encryption keys shared recipient by
               | recipient on a need-to-know basis. That's what bitmessage
               | is doing, for example
        
             | parhamn wrote:
             | > There is no con to e2e, and many cons for snake
             | oil/plaintext.
             | 
             | Is this true? From anecdata every e2e encrypted platform I
             | used is much lower quality than the alternatives (iMessage,
             | Signal, etc). Things like multi-device sync don't work that
             | well. Is this really just a coincidence? Telegram claims
             | they can't provide the same quality chat (and snappy cross
             | platform crispness is really their competitive advantage)
             | with e2e. Is this just a fake limitation?
        
               | newscracker wrote:
               | Technically, E2E increases the complexity of the
               | applications and servers, but it shouldn't really affect
               | quality of chats or messages. One area where this will be
               | a problem is in search. Telegram claims that is can
               | search chats faster because those are on its servers, and
               | anecdotally, I have seen Telegram's search being better
               | and faster than the other platforms I use or have tried
               | (they have to search only on the local device, which then
               | has an impact on battery life for phones and tablets).
               | 
               | The other bigger drawback with E2E is that the servers of
               | those platforms don't store the chats permanently (they
               | store it for about 30 days or so to deliver the messages
               | to devices when they come online, depending on the
               | platform). So syncing chat history across devices gets
               | affected by this choice (it could still be done, but the
               | complexity and speed of syncing grows a lot).
               | 
               | Wire does E2E for all chats and syncs all chats across
               | devices. But it too doesn't sync chat history on newer
               | linked devices. It also took the (what I consider as
               | inferior) choice of using Electron for its desktop apps,
               | which makes it quite sluggish.
        
               | kitkat_new wrote:
               | > he other bigger drawback with E2E is that the servers
               | of those platforms don't store the chats permanently
               | (they store it for about 30 days or so to deliver the
               | messages to devices when they come online, depending on
               | the platform).
               | 
               | Not true: Matrix is fine with storing messages
               | permanently
        
           | sarakayakomzin wrote:
           | > Just out of curiosity, what kind of discussion do you have
           | that require e2e?
           | 
           | Where as your conversations couldn't possibly be made illegal
           | by your government in the future?
        
           | rakoo wrote:
           | There are two kinds of things someone may want to hide: legal
           | stuff and illegal stuff. It's a real shame that governments
           | have succeeded in conflating the two and forcing us to take a
           | position that is not the one we really have. Truly a
           | brilliant move.
           | 
           | Of course you have something to hide, it's called privacy.
           | There is absolutely no reason your private life should be
           | public by default, so why accept it ?
        
             | TheChaplain wrote:
             | I fully understand. Privacy is important to me, but it's
             | not a binary state.
             | 
             | What I talk about to my friends, girlfriends and family are
             | all on different "privacy levels". If the chats with my
             | friends were disclosed, I'd probably be made a laughing
             | stock at most but it's no big deal. My family ones would
             | probably be most boring, and the ones with my girlfriend
             | could be material for a soap opera, and embarrassing.
             | 
             | But it's not the end of the world if someone at Telegram
             | can read them of if they were disclosed by some hacker
             | group.
             | 
             | My point is that it is an amazing chat app and have way too
             | many benefits for me to not use it, but I _am_ fully aware
             | that there are a chance what I write can be read by someone
             | else, and therefore I take care what I write about.
             | 
             | Oh, and thank you for keeping the discourse on a respectful
             | level. :)
        
               | dschuessler wrote:
               | > If the chats with my friends were disclosed, I'd
               | probably be made a laughing stock at most but it's no big
               | deal.
               | 
               | That's a privilege many people don't have. Think about
               | sexual preferences, controversial opinions or health
               | problems that can be disadvantageous in their career or
               | when obtaining insurance. Or that aren't problematic now
               | but might be in the political climate in 20 years.
               | 
               | You could argue that people worrying about this still
               | have the choice to use an E2E encrypted messenger. After
               | all different needs are served by different products. But
               | if this behavior becomes the norm, people who hide
               | possibly disadvantageous information can be identified
               | simply by their messenger use, partially defying the
               | purpose of hiding their information in the first place.
               | 
               | I consider this a very strong argument for privacy as the
               | default regardless of particular people's lack of a need
               | for privacy.
               | 
               | EDIT: Removed remarks that could be misunderstood as
               | snark.
        
               | rakoo wrote:
               | I have never used Telegram but not once have I ever read
               | anyone being displeased with the experience; it's always
               | about how it is the pinnacle of messengers. I'm a bit
               | jealous about that because I want to experience it but I
               | don't want to be tied to an app that doesn't do privacy
               | by default.
               | 
               | Privacy is definitely not binary, but to me it is a bit
               | like using Libre software. You can't realistically expect
               | to live on the 21st century internet with the entirety of
               | services and viewpoints it offers and only use Libre
               | software. At this point you have to either follow your
               | values and stick to a very small part of it that is
               | guaranteed to work on your browser rejecting non-Free
               | javascript, or you can make concessions and accept a bit
               | of proprietary bits here and there. But you can still
               | decide to be Libre-first and accept non-Libre from there,
               | on a bit-by-bit basis. That is what I and others are
               | talking about with e2ee first: Instead of asking "what is
               | worth being hidden and being made public", I feel the
               | more just mindset should be "supposing everything is
               | private by default, what can I disclose and to whom".
               | Your threat assumption regarding your conversations is a
               | good example: of course every software has bugs and all
               | your messages could be read by Telegram. But you're
               | behaving as if Telegram _might_ read it one day, when I
               | believe you should believe as if Telegram _is_ reading it
               | every day. The danger is not that Telegram can make a
               | soap opera out of your drama but that the whole world
               | can.
               | 
               | As you say you take care what you write about and that is
               | a good thing to do. So, following up: if you don't want
               | anyone to be able to read it, then let's go to the end of
               | this and make sure no one physically can read it, by
               | default. Instead of asking what kind of conversations
               | require e2e, let's ask what kind of conversation _doesn
               | 't_ require e2e
        
           | Krasnol wrote:
           | I don't know how one can't be aware that Telegram is pretty
           | well known for it's illegal content 2021.
        
         | newscracker wrote:
         | Actually, you can't start a secret group chat at all in
         | Telegram. It supports secret chats only for chats between two
         | people, and that's where it's tied to the devices used for
         | initiating the chat.
        
           | vetinari wrote:
           | Secret chat with multiple devices or with group has the key
           | distribution problem - what's good to receive the message, if
           | you cannot read it? When there are exactly two devices, you
           | avoid that problem.
           | 
           | That's why it is not on by default and why it doesn't work
           | for groups. Most users favor convenience over strict e2e.
        
             | kitkat_new wrote:
             | > Secret chat with multiple devices or with group has the
             | key distribution problem
             | 
             | which is solvable
             | 
             | Signal and Matrix have two distinct approaches to this
        
               | vetinari wrote:
               | Sure, it is. But it has its own problem.
               | 
               | Signal, for example, copies the received messages into
               | per-device queues that belong to the same identity. The
               | problem for the user is that the user has no visibility
               | into what is really assigned to his identity and where
               | copies of his messages are routed encrypted by which
               | keys; it could be used to implement anything between
               | CALEA to Prism access.
               | 
               | I'm not familiar with the Matrix approach, so I won't
               | comment on it.
        
       | nikivi wrote:
       | Curious how this can work for recording podcasts.
        
         | hojjat12000 wrote:
         | That is the first thing that I thought about. I know a lot
         | influencers (political and not) on telegram. They can host live
         | radio shows (and record it and call it a podcast). It's great.
         | I'm curious what the community comes up with these new
         | features.
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | I assume as well as any VoIP system, which (in my experience)
         | is "meh", although the results can be very tolerable with a
         | little knowledge, care, and post-processing.
         | 
         | An ideal system would automate a "double ender"[1] setup,
         | streaming low-bitrate voice for the conversation itself but
         | also recording uncompressed/losslessly-compressed audio at both
         | ends, then delivering high fidelity sync'd audio as one file
         | per participant (for easier editing) to the podcaster.
         | 
         | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phone-sync
        
       | pearjuice wrote:
       | This is what I would expect. Though Clubhouse is a novel idea,
       | it's relatively easy for a plethora of social networks to
       | implement something similar and immediately have the network
       | effect of their already immense userbase. On
       | Instagram/Youtube/Facebook people can already go live with video.
       | I think we will very quickly see similar audio-rooms on these
       | platforms.
        
         | rvz wrote:
         | > On Instagram/Youtube/Facebook people can already go live with
         | video. I think we will very quickly see similar audio-rooms on
         | these platforms.
         | 
         | Exactly what happened to Slack being killed by Microsoft Teams,
         | Meerkat killed by both Periscope (Twitter), Instagram Live.
         | Snapchat suffered the same thing with Instagram Stories; but
         | although they survived, user growth slowed.
         | 
         | We will see lots of audio-rooms on IG, Facebook, Twitter, etc
         | and Clubhouse will join Meerkat as another victim of this VC
         | hype machine, who ironically are hyping them on Twitter!
        
           | uniformlyrandom wrote:
           | > Slack being killed by Microsoft Teams
           | 
           | The rumors of Slack demise are greatly exaggerated. Mostly by
           | Microsoft.
        
         | dangoor wrote:
         | e.g. [Twitter Spaces](https://help.twitter.com/en/using-
         | twitter/spaces)
         | 
         | I already have access to Spaces and have been considering
         | trying it. It's not clear to me that anyone would show up,
         | though: they have to be using the mobile app, and I only have
         | ~1800 followers. Maybe people will get used to it? The thing
         | about something like Clubhouse is that the audio chat is _why_
         | people are there.
         | 
         | I am curious to see how it plays out.
        
         | kitkat_new wrote:
         | Element seems to implement it as well: https://matrix.org/open-
         | tech-will-save-us/11
        
         | behnamoh wrote:
         | IG (and then FB) stole the "stories" idea from SnapChat. I
         | don't see why they wouldn't do the same with this feature.
        
       | barbazoo wrote:
       | More and more I appreciate Signal for what it is. A no nonsense
       | (okay, stickers) messaging tool for people that know each other
       | in real life. I hope it never changes into something "social".
        
         | eptcyka wrote:
         | Yeah, but I can't get my family to switch if the UX is subpar.
        
           | rPlayer6554 wrote:
           | How long ago did you use signal? The UX is on par with
           | WhatsApp. In fact I've found tiny things that signal does
           | better (it groups sending multiple pictures into on "album"
           | message instead of sending one message per picture like
           | WhatsApp)
           | 
           | The only place I could agree WhatsApp has a significantly
           | better UX is with backing up messages.
        
             | StavrosK wrote:
             | WhatsApp does the album thing as well.
        
               | rPlayer6554 wrote:
               | Hmmm interesting. It hasn't been doing it for me
               | recently. Maybe it's a setting.
        
             | dawnerd wrote:
             | Telegram also does "albums"
        
               | rPlayer6554 wrote:
               | Yes but UI/UX around E2E is not good.
        
             | sofixa wrote:
             | > The UX is on par with WhatsApp
             | 
             | So as the GP said, subpar.
        
             | isatty wrote:
             | No it's not. Does it even have a native app yet?
        
             | eptcyka wrote:
             | I use it everyday. Its just not. Video calls are strictly
             | worse, forwarding images is strictly worse, no ability to
             | share history in group chats, the UI is just inferior. Some
             | of these, I can live without, others are really preventing
             | my friends and family from using the app.
             | 
             | Also, scheduled messages. Ability to message people without
             | exposing ones phone number (a real blocker from using
             | Signal for some group chats that are privacy minded).
             | Default camera is very bad, image picker is slow and picks
             | images from all dorectories instead of my main camera dir.
             | My gf wasn't even aware its possible to send multiple
             | images in a single message until I pointed it out. Telegram
             | has none of these issues :/ I really want to love signal,
             | its my daily driver. But its incredibly hard.
        
             | fnord123 wrote:
             | Signal on desktop is very slow. It's a very unpleasant
             | experience.
        
               | rPlayer6554 wrote:
               | That is fair, the startup time takes forever.
        
               | eptcyka wrote:
               | The desktop app has managed to corrupt its database
               | multiple times since I started using it a couple of
               | months ago. Its really bad for an app to do that in this
               | day and age, mind you. This is btrfs levels of bad.
        
         | jiofih wrote:
         | I and a ton of friends use Telegram purely for messaging, none
         | of this gets in the way.
        
           | barbazoo wrote:
           | You're 100% right. I'm just worried that by going more
           | "social", chances increase of Telegram going the same way as
           | WhatsApp and Instagram.
        
             | tmp538394722 wrote:
             | Getting bought by Facebook for billions?
        
               | barbazoo wrote:
               | Personally I rather it didn't, yes. Being sold to
               | Facebook just means I have yet to switch messengers
               | again.
        
         | simias wrote:
         | I'm all for no-nonsense, but I'd qualify Signal as barebones in
         | some regards. Two features that routinely annoy me: no way to
         | synchronize previous messages when linking a new client, no way
         | to change the spellchecker language in the desktop app.
         | 
         | I want Signal to succeed but I always hesitate to recommend it
         | because it always feels like an early beta product to me, not
         | something ready for prime time.
        
       | Scene_Cast2 wrote:
       | I'd love to fully switch to Telegram - it's snappy and has a nice
       | UI. However, video calls are low quality at the moment, and
       | that's the one thing holding me back.
        
       | cordite wrote:
       | Looks like they are prioritizing a path towards being a social
       | influencer platform. To displace Twitter, Youtube, Instagram,
       | does facebook even count anymore?
        
         | 88840-8855 wrote:
         | I know nobody who is still using facebook. I wonder that it
         | still exists.
        
       | katsura wrote:
       | I've been using Telegram for a few years now, but I wish they
       | allowed you to use it without phone number.
        
         | qecez wrote:
         | At least you can hide it.
        
       | antihero wrote:
       | This looks bloody neat - Clubhouse seemed annoying and exclusive,
       | whereas Telegram feels a lot more inclusive.
        
         | rvz wrote:
         | Clubhouse is yet to release an Android app whilst their main
         | competitors are already there and copying them quickly to
         | death.
         | 
         | When the VC hype brigade knows that Clubhouse is losing steam,
         | they will aggressively push for another company to acquire them
         | or worse; they shut down.
         | 
         | Might as well remove the invite system now to allow the rest of
         | the small iOS userbase in, I guess.
        
         | behnamoh wrote:
         | Exactly. I don't like how CH was only introduced for iOS and
         | follows the same annoying strategy that Gmail used before
         | (invitation).
        
           | newscracker wrote:
           | What's even more annoying is that Clubhouse requires access
           | to the entire contacts list/address book if you as a user
           | would like to invite someone else. You can't invite someone
           | by just entering their phone number (since a phone number is
           | the only way to register for it). It doesn't have to be this
           | way, but the Clubhouse team doesn't seem to care.
        
             | qecez wrote:
             | I deleted my account the moment I realized this. It's
             | incredible most people don't seem to care.
        
             | behnamoh wrote:
             | Seems like the CH team is more after your data than provide
             | a useful platform.
        
           | malikNF wrote:
           | We call it the Cartmanland[1] approach. Although I think CH
           | is a really nice idea, that too much exclusive thing kept me
           | away from getting an account there even if I have an invite
           | to the platform.
           | 
           | [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartmanland
        
       | throwawaysea wrote:
       | Does Telegram perform any censorship or deplatforming like
       | Twitter when it comes to controversial topics (like illegal
       | immigration, trans issues, race issues, etc)? I see from this
       | post they have public groups but I also worry that these tech
       | companies are all too willing to deplatform those that disagree
       | with the progressive political platform, especially when they try
       | to make the turn towards monetization. That's really my deciding
       | factor for adopting something new, as I don't wish to give any
       | power to those who are against free speech principles.
       | 
       | It seems like Telegram has had their own pressures from the anti-
       | speech/anti-freedom crowd so maybe they're on the other side of
       | this?
       | 
       | Apple sued for not banning Telegram
       | https://reclaimthenet.org/apple-sued-by-pressure-group-for-n...
       | 
       | Google sued for not banning Telegram
       | https://reclaimthenet.org/now-its-googles-turn-to-be-sued-fo...
       | 
       | Telegram CEO says reject being "held hostage by tech monopolies"
       | https://reclaimthenet.org/telegram-adds-25m-users/
        
         | newscracker wrote:
         | Telegram can and will remove content and users who violate its
         | policies. Since the content is not end to end encrypted by
         | default (except in one to one secret chats), Telegram has
         | access to scan/listen/process the content. There is also a
         | content moderation team that works on handling content removal,
         | though it seems like it has mostly focused on terrorism in the
         | past. The FAQ [1] has more details. So does the ToS. [2]
         | 
         | [1]: https://telegram.org/faq
         | 
         | [2]: https://telegram.org/tos
        
       | kyriakos wrote:
       | Telegram has by far the best desktop experience from all
       | messengers. Smallest memory footprint and snappy UI.
        
         | whistlecow wrote:
         | It would be of such niceness if telegram was fully end-2-end
         | encryption.
        
           | vetinari wrote:
           | That's exactly what secret chats are.
        
             | tridenrake wrote:
             | I am still waiting for the day when I can initiate a secret
             | chat from my desktop client.
        
               | kennydude wrote:
               | At least on macOS you can
        
           | kitkat_new wrote:
           | what about being federated?
        
         | timvisee wrote:
         | Their mobile app is fantastic as well.
        
         | Barrin92 wrote:
         | Recently I migrated off Whatsapp like many others and the Linux
         | desktop experience is really good, in particular the
         | performance of search impressed me. Compared to the Whatsapp
         | Web client it is much faster. If I'm not mistaken it's a Qml +
         | Qt app which is actually very pleasant to write. Not sure why
         | not more stuff is built with it these days.
        
         | rvz wrote:
         | The simplest explanation for this is the fact that the desktop
         | apps are native apps and not based on the massive and sluggish
         | electron framework.
        
           | kyriakos wrote:
           | Even for a native app it seems to be well developed because,
           | on Windows, for example I have it running at the moment and
           | uses 25mb of ram, the most I've seen it at was 45mb.
        
           | pelagicAustral wrote:
           | This is so accurate I feel like I can just die now.
        
           | WolfRazu wrote:
           | I don't think this necessarily has to hold true (Discord for
           | instance have implemented their apps really well), but in
           | reality this holds true for most electron apps in my
           | experience.
        
             | jeroenhd wrote:
             | Could just be me, but the Discord app is full of glitches
             | and random pauses for me. The app is better on my phone,
             | but on several Linux distros the feel of the application is
             | just off to me. Switching servers and channels has a tiny
             | but noticeable delay that I haven't seen native
             | applications have.
             | 
             | Unfortunately, there aren't many native applications any
             | more. At this point I'd prefer a Windows application that
             | works in Wine over yet another "cross-platform" Electron
             | webbrowser-with-builtin-website.
        
             | mtgx wrote:
             | Didn't Discord rewrite the app in Rust a year or so ago?
        
             | tridenrake wrote:
             | Discord is unusable at times too. But compared to other
             | Electron shits, Discord is above average when it comes to
             | performance. But in the end, when compared to Native apps,
             | performance wise, Discord is still shit. It's nowhere near
             | Telegram.
        
             | Strum355 wrote:
             | As a heavy discord user, its performance is just nothing
             | compared to a native app (gtk etc). Its notably not native
             | in performance
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | WolfRazu wrote:
               | True, but it is acceptable rather than having a
               | noticeable delay etc. which I observe in other apps.
        
               | e12e wrote:
               | I don't know - clicking links seem really sluggish in
               | discord - both on Android and on my surface 4 pro. It's
               | odd, clicking on an image link in a browser is
               | instantaneous on either device.
        
               | sudosysgen wrote:
               | It has a lot of noticeable delays, they're just hidden by
               | the interface.
        
             | 4ad wrote:
             | > Discord for instance have implemented their apps really
             | well
             | 
             | No they haven't. The discord electron app is a trash fire.
             | I use discord in Safari. It's just as bad UI and UX and
             | slowness as the electron crap, but at least I get a few
             | more hours of battery life...
             | 
             | Since I removed the electron garbage from my phone, my
             | battery life tripled from one day at most to three days...
        
         | forgotmypw17 wrote:
         | It is very nice indeed. I only wish some keyboard accessibility
         | was better.
        
       | mrccc wrote:
       | I'm hoping that messaging apps will add a feature that allows you
       | to transcribe voice messages after you received them. I find it
       | rather annoying to listen to five minutes of audio when I could
       | read a message in less than a minute.
        
         | Nux wrote:
         | Or at least ffwd 2x 3x like YouTube does, this would be easier
         | to implement.
        
           | nethunters wrote:
           | You can change the speed to 2x currently.
        
         | SXX wrote:
         | It's will take some effort to use, but actually someone made
         | Telegram bot to do exactly this: @transcriber_bot
         | 
         | It's open source, but works through Yandex Translation API:
         | 
         | https://github.com/charslab/TranscriberBot
        
           | antirez wrote:
           | There is also thr voicy bot.
        
       | vezycash wrote:
       | Recorded chats
       | 
       | Before opening the link, I thought it would be a replay of chats
       | - simulated live chat.
       | 
       | Instead of being overwhelmed with 100s of past chats, chats come
       | in one at a time. (Speed up, pause, play)
        
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       (page generated 2021-03-20 23:02 UTC)