Which messaging app do you prefer to use?
Displaying poll results.18439 total votes.
Most Votes
- When will AGI be achieved? Posted on April 24th, 2025 | 13717 votes
Most Comments
- When will AGI be achieved? Posted on April 24th, 2025 | 49 comments
Signal (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting point, but is that the only basis for using it? I'm seeing it as another FP failure caused by trying to be quick. However there is some evidence that the Slashdot side is doing something to generally improve the quality of the FPs these days. Is it a secret? If so, I can understand why, though "security through obscurity" is one of those Bullwinkle tricks that never works.
So that leads to the obvious question of whether Signal is provably secure through disclosure of its security protocols. I wo
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Signal (Score:5, Funny)
Rule 1 of slashdot polls ( don't complain about the lack of options).
Myself I miss the cowboy neal option ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Since you raised the question, what "messenger app" does Cowboy Neal use?
But that's why I asked what the poll was supposed to be about. I thought WhatsApp was one of the biggest ones, but maybe I'm misunderstanding the question.
Or maybe it was a political decision to ignore WhatsApp because 'Chinese users don't count'? Sure has been a lot of political intrusions into the tech world in recent years... I hope The AI Does Not Hate You avoids going there. Just started reading it, but I can already see where p
Re:Signal (Score:4, Funny)
Since you raised the question, what "messenger app" does Cowboy Neal use?
Based on the technology in use on the site, I would say AOL.
Re: (Score:3)
I think you meant ICQ
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Good enough for Snowden
And Elon.
Re: Signal (Score:2)
Re:Signal (Score:4, Informative)
Owned by twitter, though. So pick your poison.
Signal Foundation is registrered 501(c) non proffit https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2F... [wikipedia.org]
Re: Signal (Score:3)
They are not owned by Twitter. You are openly, actively and deliberately lying. Or delude to a point of being mentally ill with a psychosis.
In any case, you are not living in our reality. And fail to make basic arguments or provide basic evidence to convince even the smartest among us.
So you are now disqualifies from this discussion.
You shall receive your final reply here:
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fm.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D... [youtube.com]
Re: (Score:2)
That's as wrong as saying that Mozilla is owned by Google.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Signal (Score:2)
Smoke signals (Score:2)
Re:Smoke signals (Score:4, Funny)
May be slower, but no one can read them these days. ;)
Well technically there's a shitload of vape signals, but they're like the 5GHz of smoke. Range sucks.
Re:Smoking Guns signals work for me (Score:2)
Follow the money.
Never underestimate the bandwidth of pigeons (Score:2)
Avian carriers have good bandwidth even though the latency is a bit slow.
Re: Smoke signals (Score:2)
Where's IRC?
None (Score:2)
Do not use Telegram! (Score:3, Interesting)
It does not do end-to-end encryption by default!
It only does end-to-end if you enter a special mode that can only be entered when both parties are currently online for a direct connection (obvious facepalm), and leaving it deletes its history.
It does not offer any privacy or security in any other case. Let alone for groups and bots. It's a trap of bad self-knitten security theater.
If you love Trump, please use Telegram though!
Re: (Score:2)
That all sounds like safety features that actually makes the encryption work. End-to-end encryption that doesn't require extra steps is not end-to-end encryption, just obfuscation and means the service provider can decode your messages if they so choose.
Re: Do not use Telegram! (Score:2)
Thanks for posting, I've read it before, likely from you, but I think not too many people are aware yet. Supposedly lots of Trump fans are on there, so they'll find their haven there.
Missing option: wall/write (Score:2)
On a box with no wires going outside whatsoever, and broad spectrum EM radiatiom resistant walls all around.
The ONLY reliable security.
Until you enter, with that Five Eyes bug on your clothes.
Which ones do not require phone numbers? (Score:2)
I want to use Signal, but it requires phone numbers. :(
Re: Which ones do not require phone numbers? (Score:5, Interesting)
Check out Session, which is based on Signal.
https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgetsession.org%2F [getsession.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Matrix is a great options for situations where you don't want to use your phone number as your username.
That said, I would like to gently push back against theidea that Signal should be completely ruled out because of it's phone number requirement. Do you ever use standard SMS/MMS texting? Is there any reason not to opportunistically encrypt those messages when possible? Then if you are on Android, there is no reason not to use Signal in place of the standard texting app.
On iOS it is a bit more complicated,
Re: (Score:2)
Threema has no such requirement: it's possible to create a completely anonymous account, not tied to any other identifier.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks. I have never heard of it. I wonder how popular it is.
Anything decentralized (Score:3)
Ditto (Score:2)
Conversations and Gajim fully support OMEMO encryption. Why would I download a product from a corporation that limits how people can communicate?
Re: Anything decentralized (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Anything decentralized (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yaxim (based on XMPP) is fine for legacy Android phones.
Telegram and WickrMe (Score:2)
Yup, said all that I wanted on the subject line.
Other: Slack, then anything else (Score:2)
Missing option: Slack - I use it both for work, for open source projects, and for a good chunk of my personal messaging too (I've talked to a lot of my friends more during the pandemic because we've gotten them on Slack).
But there are definitely times when Signal, SMS, iMessage, etc. get used â" either because some folks don't want to use Slack, or you want to be more confident in the privacy of the messages.
-esmé
Re: (Score:2)
Why not add Microsoft Teams or even freakin' IRC to the list while we're at it?
All but one of my contacts are on Mac/iPhone/iPad, so we use iMessage.
The one not on iMessage doesn't trust Apple, so I have to use SMS with him. The ironic part is that he uses an Android phone with an OS made by Google and he also has Facebook and Twitter accounts.
KakaoTalk (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Is this one related to LINE? Perhaps the parent company?
I did try Kakao for a while but found it quite intrusive. I'm still using LINE, but with most of the intrusive notifications turned off. The default is quite annoying. However my recollection is that the English support was actually better for Kakao, though LINE has international ambitions. (But based on my experiences, "ambitions" should be "delusions" or something worse.)
Re: (Score:2)
I've used LINE for many years; it was fantastic... and has been on a slow downhill slope since then.
The problem seems to be that they don't care at all about the core messaging product. I'd rather pay for that and have it maintained well than only be able to support them through the occasional sticker purchase.
Re: (Score:2)
No, Kakao is Korean and LINE is Japanese.
Re: (Score:2)
LINE has a parent company in Korea, but it turns out that it's a competitor of Kakao. My memories were garbled or confabulated, but I'm still not sure how much I trust Wikipedia on this. https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2F... [wikipedia.org] (But the article is annotated as needing to be updated.)
It's further confused because I think there is an international version of LINE that might be from a subsidiary of the Japanese company. I think the google is basically blocking me from using the international version. Anyway, Kakao an
Re: (Score:2)
I know LINE has a dev team in Kyoto, Tokyo, and Fukuoka (Kyushu somewhere, anywhere). I met the team in Kyoto. Cool people.
Re: (Score:2)
Which version of LINE do you use? If the Japanese version, then how fluent is your Japanese, especially your reading?
(Just today I had another extremely negative experience with LINE, though I always blame my own limited Japanese skills.)
Re: (Score:2)
I use the Android version. It's mostly in English, but it has some Japanese. I can read fairly well, James Heisig's "Remembering the Kanji" was helpful.
Re: (Score:2)
Not between Android and iOS, but between geographies. However I found Henshall much more useful than Heisig for the kanji part of the language. But mos of my study was the Kumon stuff.
However it sounds like you're using the same version of LINE that I am, but your feelings towards the program are much more favorable than mine. I basically started using LINE at my wife's insistence. But maybe my negative feelings are because I have pushed into too many other diversionary areas of the app? Have you looked muc
Re: (Score:2)
Not between Android and iOS, but between geographies.
I downloaded it while I was in Japan, I don't know what version it is though.
However it sounds like you're using the same version of LINE that I am
The main thing I really like is the sticker stuff haha. I feel like it's really nicely integrated. But it sounds like you don't like that part.
Re:[LINE versus] KakaoTalk (Score:2)
Should have changed the Subject a couple of replies ago, but I think my main point this time is also central to Kakao. As I fuzzily recall it when I was using Kakao, that app was also big on stickers. (Also I think Kakao had a number of non-messaging features that matched up against LINE's features. Many of the features mentioned below may be present in Kakao, though I'm not going to reinstall it to check. The main differences were that Kakao was much noisier and harder to mute.)
But my reaction to stickers
Depends who I need to talk to (Score:3)
For some of my friends I use Hangouts, for family and people in other countries usually WhatsApp
Missing option : WhatsApp (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know anyone who uses WhatsApp. :/
Re: (Score:3)
You must be American. In Europe, it is nearly the opposite : on the top of my head, I don't know anyone who doesn't have a WhatsApp account.
Re: (Score:2)
Yup. USA.
Re: (Score:2)
I live in Europe and I know only two persons who don't use Whatsapp.
For the curious: I know many more than two persons.
Wire or Wickr (Score:3)
USPS (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Whoa that's cheap! In my country post is twice as expensive - and rising 10% every year, far above the inflation.
Discord (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Discord (Score:3)
Yup. More popular than many in the poll list.
Why the Telegram hate? (Score:3)
Okay, I know the "encryption" isn't exactly great, but it is better than SMS and keeps most people out of my messages. For 99.9% of what I want to communicate that is good enough. For the things I need actual security for, I wouldn't trust any app. If you need real security, using a phone is a bad idea. If I need faux security, like probably not giving my stuff to any script kiddie who is curious, then it has a slightly less insecure mode. (Maybe.)
Why use Telegram? It is easy and fast and not completely terrible like SMS. Actually that is about it. I like knowing when a message has been seen which is missing from some of the others. I like how handy the graphics are. I like how friends who joined pop up in my contacts. I like how generally frictionless it manages to be. I like how seamless it is from the computer to the phone to the next computer. I've tried several others and if I wanted to try to be more secure, I could deal with it, but I have little confidence in the device security let alone the app. There are times when I actually care and for those I drag out real encryption tools.
If you're expecting security on a phone that doesn't allow you or experts to examine the code, you shouldn't be using any of the suggestions, but if you must, Signal is probably the least horrible. On the other hand, if you want convenience with slightly less than horrible security, then maybe Telegram isn't the worst.
Re: Why the Telegram hate? (Score:2)
Telegram won't let you add someone from your contacts without syncing your whole contact list to their servers.
Matrix (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. Many of the problems with the Internet today can be traced back to there being too few and too large companies. https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpbs.twimg.com%2Fmedia%2FEr... [twimg.com]
WeChat (Score:5, Interesting)
This same poll happened like half a year ago and one of the included messengers was WeChat. Now, here we are again asking the same junk questions and ignoring this elephant in the room. WeChat is literally the largest messenger in the world by consumer base. It's also likely one of the largest mobile pay apps. Also likely one of the largest mobile app markets. It's basically like if you slammed together GooglePlay, PayPal, Facebook, and more of these other niche messenger, it to one mega best ("Ultra mega chicken"). Yet here we are a bunch of nerds who are isolated from the half of the world that has some of the most integrated services for mobiles and they ignore this mammoth... 2538 votes and Viber and Silence have zero votes... but hey here I am waving my arms that I use WeChat and maybe I don't live in the western world anymore but hell, I personally think in many ways WeChat nailed it. Is it a bit bloated, sure. Maybe the API docs for writing apps for English speakers is lacking (I never found it). Yet... really we are just sticking our fingers in our ears over what is the most widespread internet/mobile messenger in existence... touché /.
Re: WeChat (Score:2)
I use WeChat. It scares me how much (monopoly) power it has, but it's kinda cool to use.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh yeah. It's totally a monopoly.
There was recently a /. story about no killer apps in software. When they said killer apps what I thought of was a relative monopoly -- an app that has a super majority market share. This is totally what WeChat is. I think that this reflects a cultural phenomena more than anything. In Chinese culture, for Chinese consumers, killer apps are still being developed like WeChat but in most western cultures, things have effectively stagnated.
This being said... WeChat seems to have
Re: WeChat (Score:2)
I have thought before now that many Chinese would be just fine with only Wechat so the OS ourself is mostly irrelevant. The exceptions are the camera and perhaps one or two other apps.
Why only one? (Score:2)
I currently use WhatsApp - because that is what most of the people I communicate with use - but am currently evaluating Telegram and Signal. I'm going to have to make a decision on/around 9th February.
WhatsApp - stupid to exclude (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It was a stupid and petty move to exclude WhatsApp from the list just because whoever created this poll doesn't approve. How many billions of people use it? Anyway, I use WhatsApp because of the large user base.
FTFY.
Textra (Score:3)
Textra is my weapon of choice
Discord not an option? (Score:3)
I like Discord because it fills all the roles, voice chat, text messenger, IRC like.
Missing the three most common messenger apps (Score:2)
Whatsapp, WeChat and Facebook Messenger are probably the three most widely used messaging apps in the world. It would obviously be interesting to see how much of the /. crowd actually uses them. I personally checked Signal, having been a user and trying to promote its adoption for years.
However I also very grudgingly used Whatsapp until recently as my international contacts all used it exclusively. I have finally been able to erase my account and delete the app this month because people are finally waking u
I don't use them (Score:2)
Voice (Score:2)
Beats all of the other choices, especially when used in combination with beer and snacks..
Which one DOES use telephone numbers correctly? (Score:2)
My app of choice: POTS. Nuff said.
I rarely check the other 11 social messaging apps I have installed unless someone calls me that I have to take a look or when I'm bored. Whatsapp, Signal, Telegram, Discord, Slack, Hanguits, the SMS app, Meet, Facebook messager, Zoom, Jitsi...Oh.. the SteamApp, so that makes 12...
BBS -- yeah, I'm old-skool. (Score:2)
30+ years on, and ISCA BBS (telnet://bbs.iscabbs.com) is still going strong with a couple dozen active users, most of whom have been on since the early 90's. And, yeah, we have eXpress messages as part of the Citadel code the BBS runs on, and I gotta say, ain't no pop-ups in BBS land. But lots of good discussion.
$.02,
-Slarty (a/k/a user "Kena" on ISCA)
Whatsapp (Score:3)
It's the pioneer, and the best.
Groupme (Score:2)
I use Groupme. It supports app, web and/or SMS only. The SMS support is great for users that don't understand apps. Security is not a concern for my use case.
Matrix (Score:2)
Functionally, it's more or less like XMPP except based on HTTPS/JSON instead of Raw-TCP-Sockets/XML. You can even run your own instance and still have it intercommunicate
Element / Matrix (Score:2)
I self-host an instance for my personal / family use. It's federated, so I can still engage with others; the UI keeps getting better and better; it supports voice and video calls as well as messaging (using Opus for audio, so the voice quality is good); and it's end-to-end encrypted.
Outside that ecosystem, I've used Signal as my default SMS app on Android since it was known as TextSecure. I've been surprised by how many people in my Contacts list have started using Signal since Parler was cancelled.
Hangouts (Score:2)
not using anything based on phone number (Score:2)
I don't own the phone number. The carrier does. It's like an IP address. Shouldn't be used directly by humans. It totally suck as an identifier for messaging.
Also I want cross devices message history synchronization, a web based client, and it must work from my PC even when my phone is off or with no signal. It pretty much rules out the whole list.
Smoke Signals! (Score:2)
IRC (Score:2)
IRC
Re: I feel bad for ppl using Signal (Score:2, Flamebait)
This comment was rated 2.71 Trumpists on the Dunning-Kruger skala.
This software recommends not even wasting energy on a reply. As a person with a level of willful ignorance necessary to manage holding those opinions will not be able to integrate any conflicting input from reality.
Prescription: Haldoperidol+Chlorpromazine. A whole boatloat.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re: I feel bad for ppl using Signal (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You use it as a replacement for the phone's default text message and dialing apps. It doesn't ask for access to anything those apps didn't already have.
Since it's all open source anyway, I suppose you could build a version with a segregated address book?
What's more alarming is that Signal used to send you messages "X is now on SIgnal!" whenever someone in your address book joins Signal. It was quite funny to see a guy I knew in high school, who was quite friendly and reasonable then, but is now apparently a
Re: I feel bad for ppl using Signal (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Uninstall Signal and then reinstall it, but this time don't give it permission to read your contacts. It won't let you send any messages.
Now try it with Telegram. Wow, that works. Didn't need to invade the privacy of my contacts.
And try WhatsApps. Again, wow that works. Didn't need to invade the privacy of my contacts.
If something is supposed to protect my privacy, why does it refuse to work until it invades my privacy? Why can't it just, you know, let me sen
Re: I feel bad for ppl using Signal (Score:2)
Re: IRC (Score:2)
I thought the same, but I'm glad IRC isn't an "app".
Re: (Score:2)
"frictionless easy" communication does not suit me well. I like the time to consider my replies and I like to plan in advance.
There's always pen, paper, and the Post Office.
Re: (Score:3)
Threema indeed is open source [threema.ch].
Code is available here if you wish to review: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2Fthreema-ch [github.com]
Threema wasn't open source until somewhat recently but kudos to them for making the promise and sticking with it: https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zdnet.com%2Farticle%2F... [zdnet.com]
Re: (Score:2)
But how can we be sure the binary version available on the app store corresponds to the source code of the repository?
Re: (Score:2)
Seconded. I love keybase. The problem is that it is hard to get anyone else to manage their own private keys.