[Dah00n]

I don't know what everyone use (feel free to provide a source but until then I'll treat it as an anecdote) but I live in Northern Europe (Denmark) and the only person I know that use WhatsApp regularly is my 63 year old British uncle (to keep up with his family in the UK). Everyone else use SMS, old and young (well actually more and more of the younger contacts in my phone doesn't even own a smartphone and refuse to use MMS. Hipsters I say!).

I can't see a single thing WhatsApp or Facebook messenger can do for me that signal can't do better because I simply don't need SoMe on my phone. I need encrypted SMS. Anything more than that is worse than what I already got.

To paraphrase someone young from my family: "Facebook is for old people". So is WhatsApp and Facebook messenger. But of course it's just an anecdote that covers 100% of the people I happen to know. So from my bubble I don't believe for a second that they have a future. Signal might. As encrypted SMS but not otherwise.

[jve]

Welcome to Latvia where I have to think hard to find someone that doesn't use WhatsApp.

I find that whatever number I call from the "local craiglist" where people sell items, I find them on whatsapp.

Nearby "home depot" accepts orders over whatsapp. I can even send pics for what I want!

Kindergarden - all parents and teachers form a group and communicate there, ask questions, make announcements. Teachers may share pictures what kids are doing.

School classrooms form groups.

...

SMS unfortunately cannot share pics and videos, and location which is sometimes handy and cannot form groups.

So getting out of whatsapp is, well... big inconvenience. No one has even invited me to Signal.

[goatinaboat]

Welcome to Latvia where I have to think hard to find someone that doesn't use WhatsApp.

Same here in Wales. We are in the insane situation where local taxpayer-funded bodies such as schools compel people to use foreign, tax-evading commercial services in order to fully participate.

[Dah00n]

I'm not doubting it is different in other places and circles. I personally just haven't seen it.

>SMS unfortunately cannot share pics and videos, and location

MMS can. Not only that but it is only old people that use these things according to the younger people I know. Just today I read an article about emojis: It's only for old people. Matches my experience perfectly. These chatsnsill soon die out and be replaced by something different.

[dan-robertson]

I live in the U.K. Basically everyone I know uses WhatsApp. My friends mostly use WhatsApp (it was to be a pretty reasonable choice even for the privacy conscious). My family use WhatsApp. My landlord uses WhatsApp. Some of my colleagues use signal but I work in tech so they aren’t very representative. I might use text to contact a stranger for some reason (say arranging pickup of something bought on eBay or Gumtree, or some other service) but they might also use WhatsApp. Some of my friends use Facebook messenger so maybe I shouldn’t care that much about WhatsApp’s privacy policy if messenger’s is so much worse.

[axiomattik]

Also in the UK and I've just opted to flat-out refuse to use WhatsApp. I think a lot of people want to stop using WhatsApp but are afraid to do so because of the imagined repercussions or a fear of missing out. I say to hell with that and I've found that, since there are, in fact, plenty of alternatives that work, people who need to communicate with me are able to do so perfectly well. A few non-tech oriented contacts have even installed Signal as a result of my stubbornness, including my landlord funnily enough.

[Jiocus]

There's an app, Silence[1], which encrypts your SMS if your contact uses it as well. It does so over the actual telecom SMS network, and doesn't break non-Silence user messaging either. Been using it for years.

[1]: https://silence.im/

edit:

F-droid: https://f-droid.org/packages/org.smssecure.smssecure

Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.smssecure....

[rakoo]

There once was an app called TextSecure, who pioneered E2EE on phones, that used to work both with SMS and its own network. When they realized maintaining both networks was hard, they ditch SMS and remained on their own network. Some unhappy devs wanted to keep SMS compatibility so they forked the app, focused on that, removed the custom network named their fork SMSSecure and, after some time, called it Silence. The original devs used the opportunity of a groundbreaking change to rename their app... Signal.

[commoner]

Signal/TextSecure dropped encrypted SMS/MMS because it leaks more metadata, is less reliable, and is not allowed on iOS.

https://signal.org/blog/goodbye-encrypted-sms/

[Jiocus]

You are absolutely right. I started out with TextSecure myself. I switched over to what became Silence eventually.

I'm not a Signal user though after giving them several tries, and that decision seems more final by each passing days. I find I disagree too much with how their leadership and organization have behaved in relation to other projects and the direction they continue to take Signal.

Each to their own though.

[windthrown]

Was Silence removed from the Google Playstore? The link on silence.im does not work for me: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.smssecure....

[Jiocus]

It's in the Play store as far as I can see.

Also here for F-droid users: https://f-droid.org/packages/org.smssecure.smssecure

[LordAtlas]

I'm Indian. Everyone here uses Whatsapp. And our population is many times yours.

[Dah00n]

Yes, it was like this here back when WhatsApp was new too. Not anymore though, so the point stands: around here young people see these apps as being for old people. Just today I read that they also see emojis as something grandmothers use. Matches my experience as everyone I know younger than me will at most use "(:" and not any emojis (yes, they are upsidedown too). I know many with no smartphone (old Sony Ericssons are getting expensive!).

I get the feeling from your comment that you are proud of the fact many in India use these awful apps. It's not something to be proud of. You are paying with your privacy and in India that can cause you harm a lot easier than in Denmark.

[dheerajvs]

Not me. I've NEVER installed any app owned by Facebook including WhatsApp. Never missed it, but then I'm not a social person. My stubbornness forced a few acquaintances to install Signal.

[anyfoo]

https://twitter.com/martinlewerentz/status/11767946856937144...

I don't know anything about the source, but on the bottom left I can see it says "Source: Facebook internal [something]". Various other searches corroborate similar numbers. There are about 80 Million people in Germany, so this is substantial.

It also matches my (anecdotical, yes) experience of pretty much all my friends and family in Germany using WhatsApp, and me having done so as well before I moved to the US. I remember the impetus being that at that time (long before they were acquired by Facebook), SMS were expensive in Germany, but WhatsApp over data was (effectively) "free". I believe this to be the main reason why WhatsApp took hold in many countries, while it didn't so much in others (e.g. the US, where I think individual SMS were always free, but not sure).

Nowadays, some of my folks in Germany at least use Signal or iMessage.

[lawl]

Afaik this applies exactly like this to most of/all of europe.

I still pay $0.15 per sms. Ok i'm on a prepaid plan but still, that's ridiculous. And my separate (very slow, but more than good enough for HN, voip etc.) mobile internet only sim is $4/month. Of of course with signal that is effectively almost a flatrate for all calls and texts.

[Dah00n]

I don't know where you are at but here in Denmark I have unlimited/free SMS and using Netflixs test servers (Fast) I get 80mbit/s right now, inside my house out in the country.

Many I know have basically zero data in their plan as they don't need it for anything so there's no way WhatsApp or FB messenger can be cheaper than SMS. I think the price with only 1gb data and free SMS/MMS is something like $6.

[anyfoo]

I mean, by now several people have pretty much told you that things were and are different in other (and larger) parts of Europe than they seem to be in Denmark, likely having a big effect on the initial proliferation of WhatsApp and potentially other messengers.

[emptysongglass]

Most metropolitan areas of Denmark use Facebook Messenger primarily. People will just as gladly speak to you over SMS. Contrary to the experiences of many others in this thread, I've experienced virtually no resistance to asking close friends to install Telegram to speak to me. One close friend has flat out refused because they are a Signal diehard so we just SMS.

[Dah00n]

Clearly not as they use SMS only in my circles. I can't even send a picture to some of my younger friends as they refuse to use even MMS. It's all Nokias and Sony Ericssons.

[alvarlagerlof]

Young people in Sweden only use Snapchat