Re:WhatsApp co-founder accuses Facebook of trading privacy f...
by derefr on Saturday March 16, 2019 @10:40AM
(#19408008)
Not inherently decentralized, no. But it’s “inherently” E2E-encrypted, in the sense that that’s why people (or, a large segment of people) use the app. If it doesn’t do that, people will stop using it.
Maybe “inherently” is the wrong word. Is “Diet Coke” inherently a diet drink? That’s the idea I’m trying to get at here: that people wouldn’t buy a “Diet Coke” that isn’t made with a sugar substitute, because then it wouldn’t be “Diet” any more, and that’s why people were drinking it in the first place.
Re:WhatsApp co-founder accuses Facebook of trading privacy f...
by eitland on Sunday March 17, 2019 @03:08PM
(#19415779)
> Not inherently decentralized, no. But it’s “inherently” E2E-encrypted, in the sense that that’s why people (or, a large segment of people) use the app. If it doesn’t do that, people will stop using it.
People used and loved WhatsApp long before it was e2e encrypted. I know, I was one of them.
In fact, IIRC was pretty bad before they implememted the new e2e encryption.
I used to think people chose them because they promised no ads and no tracking.
I now think most people used it because it was a user friendly messaging solution.
Correct.
> since Facebook now owns the service of WhatsApp, they have the adopted duty of popularizing it—a service that inherently resists the kind of centralized analytical approaches Facebook uses to make money
There's nothing inherently decentralized about WhatsApp.
> that nobody would accept if it was turned into not-that, because that’s its whole thing.
Sadly, that's what happened with WhatsApp. It was sold as a privacy-friendly alternative.
After it became part of Facebooks metadata harvesting engine it turned out the majority cared less about privacy and more about the fact that it was a really good messenger (it was/is).