So what’s the opinion here between Signal and SimpleX?
Signal gets all the attention, and seems more approachable but ties to a phone number which can be a big deal.
SimpleX ties to nothing but I could absolutely see people I know fucking it up and wondering where their “account” went.
So, Signal as an common man’s adoptable compromise and SimpleX to nerd out with full “opsec” and disposability? That about right?
SimpleX sounds like herpes.
So now we know what he kid’s nickname will be when he gets herpes in high school
I’m trying to use simplex, mainly for the instance’s chat. 2 things to say:
- notifications work perfectly even without play store
- every device has a separate account - I can’t reuse the same one. Not the end of the world, but it’s really annoying
From the looks of it, the variety of ways you can purposefully or accidentally destroy your local database, and the strict limits on accessing your profile, really gives me the feeling SimpleX is intended to be extremely disposable and deniable.
After playing with it I just don’t see it being used for anything expected to be convenient or ongoing. Regarding the one device per account thing, I think the whole point is you just protect your one app, nobody is sneaking in your laptop or tablet, no remote leaks possible from a sync engine. On iOS you can link to a desktop app, but your phone must remain not just on, but in the app and on the pair screen. One twitch out, PC disconnects.
Feels like something for journalists, whistleblowers, protesters, and all the bad ones. It’s a burner app for your burner phone.
Signal has been under way more scrutiny than SimpleX. In both academic papers and security audits.
You know, for a free speech supporter, he sure seems to hate it when people speak freely.
“Free speech absolutist”*
He wants to speak freely, but he doesn’t want to afford anyone else the same right.
It’s not an uncommon stance, but it’s a hypocritical one.
And when you say freely you mean hate.
In his case.
Not really true. His supporters are allowed to speak freely as well.
hes quite the selective speech supporter
He absolutely wants to support the speech he agrees with. The rest can get fucked.
Only the cool kids know where to get FOSS.
Is signal foss?
Yeah look: https://github.com/signalapp
Their backend is closed source.[EDIT: Incorrect, see below]
https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Server
On Wikipedia it says the servers are open source but spam prevention is proprietary.
Thanks for the correction. That’s pretty rad. Now I’m wondering if that’s a wrong memory or if it was released in the last few years.
There was a fuss a while back since the released source appeared to be waaaay out of date compared to what was being used.
They came out and said that they wanted the usernames feature to be developed fully before it got pushed public. Which they then did.
It’s source-available
They also block any content, even private messages that contain Bluesky for example.
I think we need laws against platforms censoring discussion of their rivals, particularly with shadow bans and shadow delistings.
You wish. It’s not gonna happen with these douchebags in power.
That’s the sad truth.
like anti-competitive laws? We have those. They tend to rely on certain people enforcing them though
Time to create redsky, yellowsky, and pinksky URL forwarders
Redground
I was waiting for such endorsement, maybe my friends will switch now.
Agree this reinforce that signal is good for now.
In kinda pissed with them not agreeing to the chat app interoperability protocolo though, i want to delete whatsapp so bad…
It was never about free speech
Very free speech absolutist of him.
Didn’t Signal get big after Musk endorsed it? What gives?
4years ago yeah https://mashable.com/article/elon-musk-signal
Yes, but then last year he started saying it had known vulnerabilities that weren’t being fixed, around the same time Telegram was attacking Signal’s credibility. I seem to remember him outright endorsing Telegram but have only done a quick search and that hasn’t popped up.
saying there are unspecified “known vulnerabilities” within Signal
His source: Trust me bro
Not really. It’s still not big. It definitely got bigger after he supported it though.
Yup. I started using it in part because of his tweet
Been using Signal for years. Love it.
Makes sense than an anti-free speech dipshit like Elon Musk would oppose it.
same. No stupid gimmicks and whatever. Just secured messaging.
It’s not easy to leave WhatsApp. I’ve transitioned to Signal a month ago and lost contact with a lot of people. My friends and family think I’m going crazy for attitudes like these. “You can’t change the world on your own”… like that was the plan 😅
Thanks Musk, that was the motivation I needed to keep away from WhatsApp.
Obviously not a X/Twitter user, I’m not a fkin idiot.
You can’t change the world if you don’t try at all. What a braindead take…
And they wouldn’t be alone if their family came with them
Literally this
“You can check out any time you like… But you can never leeeave.”
Leaving is never really an option. But running the two apps side by side still works.
It varies, I guess. Some people might not be able to leave due to their job for example.
I left, it’s an option for me. And I’m not coming back, I don’t want to admit defeat.
I’m in an island now, it’s annoying how these companies penetrated our lives.
What about using Matrix ?
I’m pretty sure that you can bridge Matrix with WhatsApp.
I’ll check that out. Thanks!
Welcome
If someone is only willing to communicate with you through WhatsApp, they don’t value your friendship.
If someone is not technical enough tk use Signal or Telegram they are not my friends. But not everyone I communicate with is my friend.
It’s a slow and constant process of onboarding people to signal. I managed to onboard my local gaming group into using Signal after Trump got elected.
I managed to get my parents and brother to switch to signal two years ago, never switched back and it’s always working, very easy to use. I’m pretty sure whatsapp will enshitify at such a rate that signal will absorb the users.
Keep on pushing, I’ve been transitioning to Signal and now I’ve got a handful of good friends on there. People are realising what’s going on but be mindful that a lot of people have businesses and work that depend on it… They are hostages. But if everyone changes gradually it will reach a point they won’t be anymore. Keep on preaching brother!
Here are some workarounds:
- Don’t use Xitter
- Use your phone number
- Use a URL shortener
He’s not doing anything except getting more bad press for himself.
Free speech but no Signal? Red flag.
I’ve blocked Twitter on my Adguard Home DNS already last year, so no “X” shit in my house/our mobile devices anywhere.
I don’t think it is a good idea to block twitter completely. Some countries use twitter for official announcements, including emergency warning.
That’s a weird reason to keep using X. Hopefully these places also does other forms of communications, otherwise it’s a sad state of affairs.
They do have other ways such as SMS if it is critical, but most people simply share the twitter link via WhatsApp and you can be more updated by using twitter. Most people haven’t moved to Bluesky or Mastodon, so if there is flooding or heavy rain most people will share updates on their location via twitter and WhatsApp like for example flooded streets.
My country doesn’t and hopefully others will follow.
I hope so too, twitter is awful.
It’s always a good idea to block racist platforms lorded over by a troll who will delete comments that oppose him.
Supposedly they’re unblocked again, but there’s been no explanation from Xitter about the issue. Definitely seems suspicious that this happened while DOGE is having trouble with whistleblowers using Signal, though.
