Comment by darklajid | Hacker News Reader

Comment by darklajid | Hacker News Reader

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If we ever meet I'll buy you a beer for the year of the Linux desktop line.

But honestly: I understand mobile support for iOS/Android only. I don't understand Chrome as a platform (FF isn't dead. And the biggest reason for that is that I fail to understand why that client needs to be 'web based' and then again not. A web app in a silo)

Mobile numbers.. Why? I mean, if 90% of the population WANT mum to see that they use a service and when they're online (or whatever metadata you want to exchange for contacts), just because they happen to know the phone number: Fine. But why isn't it possible to sign up, hit a box that says 'no phone number associated' and .. add contacts manually? I don't want the 99.999% to change, to make it harder for them. I just wish that Christmas brings an option that lets me opt-out of that. Chat contacts don't need my phone number. People that know my phone number are not chat contacts.

I'll get back pretending that Linux has won and will try to surf the web in FxOS for 30min just .. to prove you wrong. :)

This is my question exactly. What features does Chrome have that are worth making the app completely incompatible with other browsers? Why is it not just a "Web app" and it's a "Chrome app" instead?

Similar to Firefox extensions, Chrome has "apps" and "extensions". Both are locally-saved packages of locally-run JS/HTML/CSS, differing in what capabilities they have w.r.t. chrome api access.

So... I think the question still stands.

Perhaps Signal just isn't for you. No one who I've introduced signal to has ever had a problem with it. Now if you add a randomly generated 128 bit account identifier, then people WILL have problems with it. Not with you, but with your mum/grandma.

I really think Signal might not be for you. Signal is not about building the most secure or private system, it's about building the first mass-market encrypted that that's Good Enough. Signal is a infinite percent improvement over plaintext/https. It's not supposed to be as good as OTR.

Non-technical people I've introduced to Signal on iOS stop at the "upload your contacts" stage and go "I don't want this random little company to have access to my contacts". These are non-technical people who understand the importance of keeping their contact list private, and there are a lot of them.

Making it a de facto requirement that users on your network be personally identified via a phone number ("get a burner number"? really?) and that you have a copy of their contact list and phone calls, all within US jurisdiction, means mass metadata surveillance a single judicial order away (as it is now with the telecoms).

Unlike POTS, Signal prevents phone taps, yes, but it does not hide your social network, and so does little to provide you with the ability to associate with someone anonymously.

> These are non-technical people who understand the importance of keeping their contact list private

Do you take this opportunity to point out to them that they do away with this privacy every time they install whatsapp / fb messenger / hangouts / skype / practically anything that asks for contacts permissions?

The last person I'm recalling this conversation with actually blocks Whatsapp / Facebook from getting her contact list, but trusts Microsoft and Google. I'm not sure how representative that is, but I wouldn't be surprised if people trust big companies with big brands over relatively no-name startups in this regard.

See, that identifier might be an option. Or .. it might not be necessary. If that identifier would be the core 'me' on Signal, why wouldn't you be able to add me by phone number - if I gave Signal one to share/associate with? Mum and Grandma would see no change. People like me could run around without a phone number.

It's not as if that hasn't been done. twitter.com/darklajid is me (not worth checking it out). See? A name, tied to an identity. Same here. I used to have a FB account and even _there_ you can have a profile name that is unique and shareable. I really think you conflate things here: I DO NOT want to make life harder for mum/granny/the average WhatsApp fan. If you love that random people show up in your roster because you store their number (or vice versa: You show up on your Ex's roster because she didn't delete you yet) that's fine. And could continue to work like that.

I really have a hard time understanding why it isn't impossible to opt out. If I have a key, registered with Signal - why would I need a number on top? _Especially_ given that there's no federation to speak of, so I assume they don't need to 'shard' base on the identifier. foo@example.com -> talk to example.com? That's not happening here. And I don't see why/how they'd shard on numbers? +49 -> route to a German server?

Why is a phone number (and all the things that come with it: Discoverability for example) a requirement? You didn't answer that.

Yes, Signal might not be for me. I'm reasonably sure that I mentioned that before in this thread ;-)

If that identifier was linked to my Keybase.io account, that would be really cool. Or linked to Namecoin. Using methods like that to find my contacts would be great.

> Not with you, but with your mum/grandma.

Hey, please consider finding a better way to say "the average person" than calling out women and old people as being groups you think of as non-technical. Thanks!

It's a bit of a slippery slope argument. Things are hard. Let's compromise to make them usable.

That said there's a lot of potential as the crypto libraries are known to be top notch and reviewed. I hope they progressively address these issues.

If Signal's not good enough for us, what is?! I want to know...

> FF isn't dead

From http://www.computerworld.com/article/2893514/an-incredibly-s...:

> In the last 12 months, Firefox's user share -- an estimate of the portion of all those who reach the Internet via a desktop browser -- has plummeted by 34%. Since Firefox crested at 25.1% in April 2010, Firefox has lost 13.5 percentage points, or 54% of its peak share.

I love Firefox, but having used FxOS and mobile versions of Mobile Firefox, the Mozilla Foundations new products feel like the Netscape 6 / Mozilla Browser Firefox was created to replace, rather than the lightweight, user focused alternative.

Chrome is not any better at all. Speedwise they're about the same, but Chrome has better separation between tabs. However it allocates ram like there is an infinite supply of it, and it absolutely kills the battery on my computer. This is with the same extensions installed in both browsers, uBlock Origin, Privacy Badger, No Script, Last Pass, and Wunderlist.

They are not at all the same. I love Firefox too, but had to change to Chrome because of JS engine speed alone.

> I understand mobile support for iOS/Android only. I don't understand Chrome as a platform

> Mobile numbers.. Why?

Pidgin + OTR works on Linux, and doesn't relate to mobile numbers or Chrome at all. This might be a better fit for you.

I'm aware of that. I used to run an xmpp server and recently switched to Telegram for inter-family conversations (wife, brother, intimate friends) because the xmpp UX story is unfortunately not perfect (you need message carbons, you need stream management and you probably want MAM to have a usable system that can be used on mobiles as well).

This is great news! Such a big fan of the work you guys are doing at Whisper Systems. We are in the middle of an update to Umbrella App (which contains lessons on digital and physical), so will add the latest Signal changes to it in the next few days.

If anyone is interested in taking a look (free, open source, code reviewed, Android) please feel free: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.secfirst.u...

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