[majormajor]

> The way I've been presenting it to people is that Telegram can look at more data than WhatsApp can. But WhatsApp will use the data they have more than Telegram will. That's the tradeoff.

I think you should look at the odds of that "can" turning into a "will" over time. After an acquisition, or a change in business fortunes, or a change in leadership...

[benhurmarcel]

It will happen. So far Telegram has developed without consideration for revenue, but it cannot last too long.

According to his own numbers [1], Durov's entire net worth [2] can only sustain Telegram for about a decade.

[1] https://t.me/s/durov/142 [2] https://www.forbes.com/profile/pavel-durov/

[jakub_g]

Durov recently announced they will smart monetizing through ads, but only in "channels" of people with huge subscriber count (which generates a lot of costs). Channels are 1:N public broadcasts, a bit like Twitter.

[hanniabu]

That's how it all starts. And how will they know what ads to show you? By mining your conversations.

[daredevil_kohai]

No. He confirmed that the ads will be generic. Not targeted to people based on their data.

[andreareina]

> 500 million active users

> A project of our size needs at least a few hundred million dollars per year to keep going.

Is it just me or does order of $1 per user sound like a lot?

[Jaxkr]

$1 per user/year sounds about right. I use Telegram more than any other chat app. People send lots of media (and even large files) and Telegram archives them forever. One group Telegram I’m in is 6 years old and has 500+ VIDEOS (and 10,000s of images) permanently archived in it.

I’d estimate I cost over $10/yr to telegram.

[benhurmarcel]

I could imagine a backup solution being built on top of that free storage. Uploading encrypted blobs of data.

[llimos]

It's true, and it's part of the consideration. But the current mass emigration from WhatsApp seems to show that it's not as hard to jump platform as everyone thought it would be.