[codethief]

When Signal integrated MobileCoin last year (in the UK), there was a lot of uproar here on HN – some well-founded ("Why equip a slick and lightweight standalone app for privacy-preserving messaging with payments, a feature that adds bloat and will likely attract government regulation and oversight?"), some less so ("The Signal developers are just scamming everyone"). Given WhatsApp's move toward a WeChat-like app now, I think some of the criticism against Signal/MobileCoin needs to be reconsidered: Moxie et al. might have seen that coming (which I guess wasn't too difficult in light of WhatsApp's involvement in payments in India) and they are possibly just trying to stay competitive in the long term.

Addendum: Not that I'm a huge fan of the idea of crypto payments in Signal – I am not. But if the market (and especially the network effect of messaging apps) dictates it, what can they do? Moreover, I'm sure the Signal people looked into whether it'd be better/possible to move the payments feature into a second, optional app but there might have been architectural or security reasons not to do so(?)

[RL_Quine]

There's nothing to reconsider, MobileCoin/Signal is still a terrible idea and was responsible for them withholding their open source code, for a year, with absolutely no explanation at the time or in retrospective. It's nothing but a money grab with zero expectation that this is something users want, or will use.

[fragmede]

> zero expectation that this is something users want, or will use.

Facebook Messenger already has this feature using fiat, Apple lets you send money via iMessage, Telegram already has this feature. Seems like adding payments is staying competitive with features other messaging utilities has. It might also be a money grab, but something can be two things at once.

[RL_Quine]

Payments in yet another currency is not useful. Apple letting you send payments in iMessage makes sense, MobileCoin in signal absolutely does not. What do you do with them once you have MobileCoins? You have to exchange them, potentially at some wildly varying exchange rate, rather than what Apple is offering which is just USD. Apple's solution not something I would use but it makes some sense given the relative difficulty of sending personal amounts of USD in the United States.

If you just wanted to send cryptocurrency, great, you use your normal method of doing it, making it something built into a chat client is at best nonsensical. It didn't need its own cryptocurrency offering, that part is just a cash grab that taints Signals mission.

[RL_Quine]

We can look at the interface for MobileCoin in Signal to get an idea of how bad this is. We're prompted to "add funds" by sending MobileCoin, and the "learn more" button leads to an article telling you to buy a "supported currency" (only MobileCoin) on some exchange. So it's fundamentally useless unless you are already into the cryptocurrency speculation sphere, in which case you almost certainly have something better to use that MobileCoin.

https://a.uguu.se/BWssrjlJ.jpeg

Remember the Signal PIN which is used for recovery of your account? It now lets you recover all of your money too, so that's going to be a great target for spear phishing attacks. That feature got a lot of pushback because nobody could really work out what it was supposed to be adding to the software, turns out, useless cryptocurrency.

https://a.uguu.se/YOGwpUcQ.jpeg

[crtasm]

> It now lets you recover all of your money too

Just the PIN? Or do you need control of the phone number associated with the account?

[fragmede]

Their UX is shite, you'll get no argument from me against that

[fragmede]

The various cryptocurrencies may all look fairly similar from the outside but there are, actual, material differences between them. Whether or not there was an existing cryptocurrency that met Signal's needs requires more in-depth knowledge of the world of cryptocurrency than I have. Their whitepaper lays some of this out.

If your other complaint is that Signal tried to make money, I hate to break it to you, but that's kind of, like, how capitalism works? If Signal runs out of money, Signal stops working.

[RL_Quine]

> The Signal Foundation, officially the Signal Technology Foundation, is an American non-profit organization founded in 2018 by Moxie Marlinspike and Brian Acton.

[TomSwirly]

Sending money is something that almost everyone needs. Sending cryptocurrencies is something almost no one needs. And if you did need it, why wouldn't you just send it directly from your wallet, without the middleman? Isn't that the point of cryptocurrencies?

[codethief]

> And if you did need it, why wouldn't you just send it directly from your wallet, without the middleman? Isn't that the point of cryptocurrencies?

That's a good point but: Do you know the wallets of all your friends? The advantage of Signal is that it knows your social network.

[RL_Quine]

I sign up for a mobilecoin exchange, do aml/ykc, buy cryptocurrency in some way, make a wallet in signal, have my friend make a wallet, then I send them mobilecoin, which is useless to them unless they also sign up for an exchange to turn it back into something something sensible. Yeah that's made so much easier by Signal being in the loop.

[codethief]

> was responsible for them withholding their open source code, for a year, with absolutely no explanation at the time or in retrospective

I fully agree with you here but I'm 50-50 on your other statement:

> [There is] zero expectation that this is something users want, or will use.

[monocasa]

I thought the point of Signal was not go follow every dark pattern of the other apps looking to monetize their userbase. Zuckerberg thinking it's a good idea doesn't help Signal here, because Signal has a different mission than Zuckerberg.

[RL_Quine]

They lasted a couple of years before selling out, which is unfortunately not that impressive.

[tmalsburg2]

You’re sneaking in the presupposition that the market dictates support for crypto payments. But isn’t that a complete fantasy?

[codethief]

No, but the market seems to dictates support for payments. And if you want to support payments while preserving privacy, what options do you have other than looking at crypto currencies?

[tmalsburg2]

1. What's the evidence for the market dictating support for payments in messengers? 2. Privacy is exactly not a good selling point for most cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. Arguably even Paypal and credits cards offer better privacy.

[oblio]

> But isn’t that a complete fantasy?

It's not when you're invested in cryptocurrency.

As they say, cui bono?

[tw04]

>Given WhatsApp's move toward a WeChat-like app now, I think some of the criticism against Signal/MobileCoin needs to be reconsidered: Moxie et al. might have seen that coming (which I guess wasn't too difficult in light of WhatsApp's involvement in payments in India) and they are possibly just trying to stay competitive in the long term.

So given that Facebook is also now mining data on every user of Whatsapp, should we reconsider Signal's stance on privacy? Or should the fact a horrible company is further ruining a once great app be irrelevant to what Signal should or shouldn't do?

[codethief]

This is a strawman. Signal doesn't have to reconsider its stance on privacy, but due to network effects Signal does have to worry about market share or otherwise it will be back to being a niche app. Remember that Signal wants to improve privacy for the masses. It does not attempt to protect individual people targeted by any of the three-letter agencies.

[vineyardmike]

> So given that Facebook is also now mining data on every user of Whatsapp

Is this true? I thought they still had minimal insight into the data on the app.

[monocasa]

https://www.newframe.com/whatsapp-has-been-mining-your-data-...