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GeekNights Monday - Instant Messaging in 2016

MrPeriodMrPeriod
in GeekNights

Tonight on GeekNights, we cover a topic that we covered first in 2006: Instant Messaging. The decade that has passed brought great change, and not all for the better. Smartphones entirely altered the landscape of messaging technology, federation died before it ever truly lived, and the world of IM is a fractured mess. Join us for a look at IM 10 years later: we're curious to see how our concerns compare to those of a decade ago.

In the news, Pebble is dead, the smartwatch industry is largely moribund, and malware is fiendishly clever.

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  • demoweaseldemoweasel
    Telegram is the best and also all you need.
  • StarfoxStarfox
    What? No, Telegram is awful. Encryption is off be default, and the crypto itself is suspect. Moxie explains why.
  • demoweaseldemoweasel
    For the things I use Telegram for, I don't really care.
  • StarfoxStarfox
    You're right. You probably don't have anything to hide. Or care about journalists with anything to hide. Or gay people in countries with repressive regimes. Or mass surveillance by the NSA et al.

    You get the idea?
  • demoweaseldemoweasel
    Starfox said:

    You're right. You probably don't have anything to hide. Or care about journalists with anything to hide. Or gay people in countries with repressive regimes. Or mass surveillance by the NSA et al.

    You get the idea?

    I'm not sure why my not caring if Telegram has encryption or not becomes an endorsement of "All Encryption Is Useless and Bad," but okay.
  • StarfoxStarfox
    I'm saying you should care! Because it's important. Even if you're none of those things I listed, other people are. And by everyone encrypting, it provides cover for the people who truly need it. Dude what wrote PGP had this to say about it, 25 years ago.
  • AmpAmp
    demoweasel said:

    Telegram is the best and also all you need.

    I thought you meant old time telegram and was happy for a moment.
  • demoweaseldemoweasel
    That can be arranged, but only if both parties agree to record themselves reading out their messages in a thick mid-Atlantic accent.
  • ColdguyColdguy
    I had many strings pulled to get Anime Openers for MAGFest but it's part of the plan of making sure awesome content gets in no matter what the subject matter is.
  • IkatonoIkatono
    Starfox said:

    You're right. You probably don't have anything to hide. Or care about journalists with anything to hide. Or gay people in countries with repressive regimes. Or mass surveillance by the NSA et al.

    You get the idea?

    Calm down. You're flipping out over literally nothing.
  • RymRym
    demoweasel said:

    That can be arranged, but only if both parties agree to record themselves reading out their messages in a thick mid-Atlantic accent.

  • StarfoxStarfox
    Ikatono said:

    Starfox said:

    You're right. You probably don't have anything to hide. Or care about journalists with anything to hide. Or gay people in countries with repressive regimes. Or mass surveillance by the NSA et al.

    You get the idea?

    Calm down. You're flipping out over literally nothing.
    Those have all happened.

    So kind of the opposite of literally nothing.
  • IkatonoIkatono
    Starfox said:

    Ikatono said:

    Starfox said:

    You're right. You probably don't have anything to hide. Or care about journalists with anything to hide. Or gay people in countries with repressive regimes. Or mass surveillance by the NSA et al.

    You get the idea?

    Calm down. You're flipping out over literally nothing.
    Those have all happened.

    So kind of the opposite of literally nothing.
    Those are all reasons why it's important that encryption exists, not reasons why every message ever needs to be encrypted no matter what. None of those are actually a response to
    demoweasel said:

    For the things I use Telegram for, I don't really care.

  • StarfoxStarfox
    Starfox said:

    Dude what wrote PGP had this to say about it, 25 years ago.

    Phil Zimmerman said:

    What if everyone believed that law-abiding citizens should use postcards for their mail? If a nonconformist tried to assert his privacy by using an envelope for his mail, it would draw suspicion. Perhaps the authorities would open his mail to see what he's hiding. Fortunately, we don't live in that kind of world, because everyone protects most of their mail with envelopes. So no one draws suspicion by asserting their privacy with an envelope. There's safety in numbers. Analogously, it would be nice if everyone routinely used encryption for all their email, innocent or not, so that no one drew suspicion by asserting their email privacy with encryption. Think of it as a form of solidarity.

  • IkatonoIkatono
    That doesn't require every message be encrypted, just that enough are that encrypted messages aren't suspicious. There are enough encrypted apps that you can use one of those without arousing suspicion.
  • RymRym
    Guys, the protocol for basically all transactions in capital markets is unencrypted clear-text ASCII strings. There are reasons to use such protocols: not every message needs encryption.

    If you're going to advocate an extreme position on the use of encryption in day-to-day communications, you'd better be willing to go all out. Unless you handle email the way Wil Wheaton does, you can STFU ;)

    http://wilwheaton.net/contact.php

    If you use something other than PGP/GPG, show me how your certificates' chains of custody are secured, and prove to me that there is no avenue whereby they would compromise end-to-end crypto. Otherwise, your crypto is garbage.
  • MattMatt
    edited December 2016
    Can we talk about Jibe? https://jibe.google.com
    Post edited by Matt on
  • AprecheApreche
    Matt said:

    Can we talk about Jibe? https://jibe.google.com

    That web site does not help me understand what it is or how it works.
  • MattMatt
    I... was kinda hoping someone else could explain it to me.


    I just listened to this episode. Two points:
    1) WhatsApp and the like took off because people wanted to chat via SMS but people were getting charged 10 cents per text message circa 2009/2010. Fuuuuck that. Of course I had unlimited texts at the time but not everyone is so fortunate. Huge population of people on budget phone plans. That is where the user base came from.

    2) Allo is insane. It is an SMS-only client, but you cannot select it as the default SMS app in Android. Hooooooly fuck what is happening.
  • RymRym
    edited December 2016
    What'sApp didn't seem to get really big until relatively recently outside of that budget SMS-using crowd. I suddenly had a ton of people trying to get me to use it around early 2014, where before then I'd never encountered it in my life.
    Post edited by Rym on
  • IkatonoIkatono
    I forgot to mention, congrats for talking about snapchat without sounding super old. Apparently that's very difficult if you're over 25.
  • GreatTeacherMacRossGreatTeacherMacRoss
    I have fond memories of ICQ before AOL bought and killed it.
  • Luke BurrageLuke Burrage
    WhatsApp has been massive for years and years.

    I kid you not, for the last three years I've been on many trips to South America, and not only have EVERY person I've ever seen using a smart phone has been using WhatsApp, but I've never seen any other app in use, measaging or otherwise, which wasn't for something specific like the camera.

    No Facebook, no browsing, no snapchat or messenger or twitter or anything. Just WhatsApp. It's so ubiquitous nothing else is seen.


  • Dazzle369Dazzle369
    Whatsapp is the upgrade to SMS. Some people still pay for SMS, whereas they can message unlimited for free if they have wifi.

    This is the strange circumstance people are in with access to free communication.
  • RymRym
    Almost everywhere I encounter WhatsApp has been outside of the US. Mostly in LATAM and Europe.
  • La Petit MortLa Petit Mort
    I pretty much use discord for all of my messaging needs nowadays, surprised you guys didn't even mention it.
  • ColdguyColdguy
    Trillian has been a life saver for me, got the lifetime subscription and still rock that. The problem is that Skype and Yahoo decided to be dumb asses and no longer work with it, so slowly Trillian has been an AIM/Facebook chat only.
  • RymRym
    All of these "why didn't you mention specific platform x" questions prove our point about fracturing of the landscape.
  • IkatonoIkatono
    Semi-relevant XKCD?
  • Luke BurrageLuke Burrage
    Rym said:

    All of these "why didn't you mention specific platform x" questions prove our point about fracturing of the landscape.

    Yeah, this episode was just nonsense to me! You were saying all kind of things like "Well of course anyone clever would just set up a Google Hangout."

    I have never once used a Google Hangout, nor been invited to one, nor know enough about it to know what situation to use it. Beluga? Never heard of it, and it seemed the obvious choice for you for convention chatting. I've heard a lot about Slack, but haven't ever thought to try it, nor have been invited.

    Also because I use a an iPhone and a MacBook, I can chat to anyone from either device. Even my iPad. All SMS messages make it through to all my devices, as well as (at least) notifications from other chat services. So don't live in a world where I have to worry about the split of mobile and desktop.
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