[Freak_NL]

My wife and I will have to buy one soon, because it is pretty much the only way we can establish a line of communication with other parents of my young son's peers at kindergarten (he's nearing 3). Not doing so would stunt his growth on an emotional level, because we would deprive him of things like play dates and such. Not due to malice on the part of other parents, but because not having WhatsApp (here in the Netherlands) is not something other people can always grasp. We can choose who we interact with, but we can't choose my son's friends parents.

It's so incredibly silly how owning a smartphone isn't even a matter of preference any more; people just expect everyone to have one. I don't really need one, despite loving train travel and independent exploration on holidays. Paper maps work fine, preparation using a normal computer too.

[Beltalowda]

Yeah, social stuff like that is an issue. I currently use Telegram to keep in touch with some friends; the big upshot of Telegram is that after registering, you can use web.telegram.org or the desktop app without having your smartphone (or in my case, emulator) powered on. There's no E2E encryption, but that's fine. WhatsApp, Signal, and most other solutions really are tied to the smartphone: web.whatsapp.com will route messages through your phone; it's really annoying; I wish they would just E2E directly from your laptop, but I guess that's too obscure of a "market" to cater too.

You can still use it with the Android Emulator though; there's a bunch of solutions for this but I just use the Android Studio one. It works, but you need to keep the emulator running and isn't especially convenient.

I feel like tying a lot of things to these proprietary platforms that are impossible to integrate with independently is essentially redoing the mistakes of the 90s and 00s that we had with Microsoft where you more or less had to have Microsoft Office or you'd have a hard time reading/editing those .doc files sent to you (eventually OpenOffice.org was kind-a okay at it, but still far from perfect).

I don't even mind non-free software as a matter of principle, I just want the freedom to use an "alternative" system like my Linux desktop or maybe some eclectic device like PinePhone or those modern PDA things or whatnot to participate in basic stuff, instead of being forced to shell out money to one of those huge tech giants with a bazillion dollars to purchase thingies I don't even like.

[Freak_NL]

> […] but I guess that's too obscure of a "market" to cater too

Oh no, this is on purpose. WhatsApp, Signal, etc. want to maintain control of the clients at all costs because of user tracking and monetization. If this wasn't the case, they would allow some form of non-smartphone access. As it is they keep their API's closed and ban anyone trying to use any form of third party tools.

In the case of Meta (WhatsApp) this is about keeping their silo-suite closed. People may hate Facebook, but if they can keep these users via the popular WhatsApp, they can keep up their numbers. What Signal really wants is anyone's guess. Something to do with that shifty cryptocoin I guess.

> I just want the freedom to use an "alternative" system like my Linux desktop or maybe some eclectic device like PinePhone or those modern PDA things or whatnot […]

Absolutely.

[Beltalowda]

Maybe; I don't know. Telegram has the same incentives (and I believe they have some crypto wazamabob as well). I think it's much more likely that it's just easier for them: abuse is a serious issue and the more "closed" a platform is, the harder (not impossible, just harder) it becomes to abuse it (see: email). And not having to worry about third party integration/APIs, compatibility, documentation, etc. also makes their lives just easier.

Getting all of this to work well with E2E requires extra thought (how do you make messages available on two devices?); Telegram hasn't nailed that either. I don't especially care about this, but a lot of people do.

Essentially, there are basically no practical upshots for them, and it's just more effort.

[zephyr9]

> It's so incredibly silly how owning a smartphone isn't even a matter of preference any more; people just expect everyone to have one.

Most of society has transitioned now to just being custodians of smartphones -- moving the smartphones around, feeding the smartphones their various diet of information and imagery, tending to their demands for attention and updates etc. Surely it will be an unfamiliar experience to have just a regular person walk among them.

[darkwater]

> It's so incredibly silly how owning a smartphone isn't even a matter of preference any more; people just expect everyone to have one. I don't really need one, despite loving train travel and independent exploration on holidays. Paper maps work fine, preparation using a normal computer too.

It's just like electricity, or having/not having a landline phone 40 years ago.

[sneak]

We will never be free of WhatsApp if we continue caving and using the service, making it more valuable to others.

Every time you cave and use Facebook spyware, you make it harder for the next person.

Stop using tools that make the world worse. Tell your contacts to install Signal instead.

You must be unreachable on WhatsApp, so that the utility of the app is not increased for others.

[Beltalowda]

Signal is just as smartphone-tied as WhatsApp. It's actually worse, as there is no web version and the desktop app is flaky. So there is no improvement here at all in this regard.

[yusmary]

Signal is also shitty in the sense that it announces your presence to anyone that is using the service prior to you and has your number.

If you only want some people to know you are there, you are screwed

[sneak]

This is hugely incorrect. Signal is private, WhatsApp is not.

Go read the app privacy labels if you don't believe me.

[Beltalowda]

This is about smartphone usage, not privacy. You're injecting a completely different issue here.

[Freak_NL]

That's what I do currently, but when some other kid's parents are organising a birthday party I can of course ask them not to use WhatsApp, but then my kid will be the kid with the parents who want to make things hard for everyone.

If this means that I have to get WhatsApp just for those things, than I can hardly refuse without making my son a social recluse.

[sneak]

No, you are the one parent who isn't making things hard for everyone. It's people demanding you and everyone else in society use Facebook spyware who are making things hard for everyone: not just your class, but all of the people of the world.

You don't make things better by making bad choices.