Later when I heard that Zoom installs and leaves a web server open on your machine, even if you uninstall it, I felt duped, since I did my due dilligence by Googling if it's malware. If it leaves a webserver running after uninstall, it's obviously malware, same as if it launched a Windows search for "passwords.txt". There's no real room for interpretation here.
But I didn't find that at the time.
Whereas if I did that Google search today I would find that it:
monitors activity on your computer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22657384
is not encrypting end to end despite claims - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22735746
allows any web site to access your camera at any time without requesting any kind of permission or making the user aware - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20387298
reinstalls itself silently after uninstall (if you click a zoom link, after uninstall) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20390755
If I were considering installing it today, I would install it only in a virtual machine after Googling what kind of protections to use when trying malware in a VM. (Since it can be expected to play shenanigans with your network and with the host's USB devices etc.) Just basic stuff, as Zoom isn't very sophisticated.
After I read all this I was angry. Not because all of this makes it obviously malware but because it's sloppy malware, and I specifically Googled whether it was sloppy, obvious malware and didn't get a clear "yes, Zoom is malware."
By the way sending data to Facebook doesn't make my list of links, as that is par for the course and anyone might do that. I have a pretty high tolerance for crap and to be honest Zoom is the only mainstream software that failed it so far.
Though I guess technically I still use Zoom every day (until I buy a new computer), you know, since I did install it that one time, before I uninstalled it...