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Comment by patrickdavey | Hacker News Reader

Anyone on here is probably one of the tech influencers for their family group. I've just started the work of trying to get people to move onto using Signal. I really really like the ethos of the organisation. I don't see how there's any downside (other than the time of getting people to switch).

Wouldn't it be great if, as a start, everyone moved to a secure not-going-to-sell-your-data organisation for instant messaging.

Then, if Whisper Systems could just bring out some magic Facebook alternative, well, that would be just amazing.

We should care about this stuff, we should try to influence our friends and family.

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> I've just started the work of trying to get people to move onto using Signal.

The first question my friends would ask is "I tried signal but I couldn't see a way of posting photos and getting likes...or planning an event. It doesn't look like facebook at all, just a chat app!

Facebook the platform is so extremely large and so useful to so many. Most people (including me!) would struggle to set up a photo album from my vacation that my friends and family can see and comment on, but other people can not.

Any serios attempt at displacing facebook needs to solve ALL of the things facebook solves. And unfortunately while solving them separately (one chat app, one photo app, one calendar app...) is much better for integrity - it's almost useless from a usability standpoint to have to manage multiple social graphs.

I wrote my initial comment too quickly. I specifically think that moving people to use signal instead of WhatsApp is a relatively straightforward drop in. I totally agree that signal is not a replacement for Facebook.

There's also Secret Conversations[1] which can be used in the Messenger app, that implements the Signal Protocol.

Ideally people should move off Facebook, but I don't think most of people's friends (including mine) care about this event that much.

[1]: https://www.facebook.com/help/messenger-app/1084673321594605

> I don't see how there's any downside (other than the time of getting people to switch).

Network effects. It's hard to switch if not all of your contacts also switch.

Absolutely, that's why people like you and me (who care) should put in the effort to try and influence those around them. Once enough people do it, and once it's cool to do it, it'll happen.

Not trying to be an arse here but just because our group of people do it doesn't mean it'll ever be "cool" to do it. It may get cool in our "techy" circles, but i highly doubt our less tech savy peers will come around any time soon.

We should also make them all switch to Ubuntu and vim too, right?

Heh, no, fair point (and not what I was suggesting). I just think that Signal is a drop in replacement for WhatsApp and it can start a conversation about privacy and what happens with data.

I didn't say initially that I meant Signal more as a straight replacement for Whatsapp, not FB.

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