Here in South Europe people mostly use Viber. Edit: I was very unaware about situation in Southern Europe as I’ve learned from this post… Most people in Croatia use Viber!
Viber. Brings back memories.
Germany: Only aware of WhatsApp but I don’t chat much…
Personally online: Discord
Signal does end-to-end encrypted messaging, voice, and video chat.
iMessage/SMS and Messenger are what most of my friends use. Although I know people who use Snapchat at work. I don’t anyone who uses Telegram or Signal.
Signal
Most people I know use SMS/RCS/iMessage or Discord. My family uses Signal, but I don’t know anyone else IRL that has even heard of it. I personally don’t like Signal because they don’t have some basic features, such as if you get a new phone, you need to export/import all of your old messages manually. If your old phone broke or your traded it in already, tough shit. If you log in on your laptop, afaik, there’s no way to get your old messages from your phone. I know these were intentional design decisions to make it as secure as possible, but I would be fine with something being slightly less secure to have these QOL features.
Always interesting when I hear people’s families use something other than the default in the US. What started that? Were your parents always concerned about privacy? Did you somehow convince them to use that app? What about when they text someone who isn’t on signal, which is probably 90% of the US? I could get my family to download the app but I feel like it’s pointless because no one else uses it so they would just quit.
My parents were going out of the country where they wouldn’t have cell access, and they just googled what to use. Signal is what came up first in a list they read online. They knew that they didn’t like Facebook and wanted to avoid Whatsapp for that reason. After we made a family chat group, it just kind of stuck. If we want to send something to the whole family, we use that group. If we send something directly to each other, we still usually use SMS/RCS/iMessage.
I’ve been in the Cyber Security space for a few decades now and have all of my close family on Signal. It’s another step in helping them understand what privacy options are out there and how to best protect themselves.
We’ve also managed to not have any of the more egregious social media platforms (Meta, X, TikTok, etc…) as well as VPN’s on everything and PiHoles at the perimeter.
It sounds paranoid to most of the other families we know but, to each there own I suppose. And knowing the people in my household stand a chance against the ever persistent push of advertising / privacy invasion is worth sounding like a madman once in a while.
Signal definitely has some room to improve with regard to backup/sync. It should probably never store your messages on its servers, which is what it would take for you to get your history back if you lose access to all your devices containing it, but it could allow you to keep the full history in sync across multiple devices without compromising its security guarantees.
Who convinced your family? I tried to do the same with my family and friends to no avail.
A vast majority of people I’ve met through work and other social activities simply use the default messaging app on their device.
Canada’s pretty close to America, so I’ll answer. My family uses WhatsApp. Better than unencrypted, at least.
You’re not going to get a very representative sample here. Signal is great but a lot of North Americans haven’t even heard of it.
We love our 51st state in the north ;)
Thank you, and fuck you too.
Like, you’re not wrong, but in case it wasn’t intended telling someone their country isn’t real is generally considered an insult.
No, it was a lighthearted joke. I genuinely have had almost nothing but good experiences with Canadians. Like, 8/10 encounters with unknown fellow Americans is anything from indifferent to bad. Canadians, it’s been more like 1/10 is bad. Mind you, one of those was trying to bang my mom and grabbed my ass, so he can continue fucking right off lol.
Have you never run across that before though? Where you make fun of a bad stereotype? Like, Americans treating canada like an extension is a common enough thing that I see it online all the time as a serious thing, so it becomes a joke in itself.
As a former Vermonter we used to delight in considering ourselves part of Quebec. Hell, most of our power came from Hydro Quebec.
Hey, and you’ve already succeeded in separating from Canada!
No, it was a lighthearted joke.
Ah good. Keep shootin’!
No it’s really typical banter, it’s just with Americans you can’t be sure how aware they are. Same with Chinese if you can talk to them, apparently; it must be a byproduct of being a giant self-contained hyperpower.
Sorry you got downvoted.
No worries :)
Damn. Here in Quebec pretty much everyone seems to default to FB Messenger.
I’m pretty curious to know what got a bunch of prairie farmers on WhatsApp, but I suspect it leads back to India fairly quickly. Unfortunately, French-speaking Indians are a rare breed.
Signal for everything.
There are a couple people who are too lazy to get Signal, and they got iPhones, so I set up an iMessage server to forward messages to my GrapheneOS phone.
But the communication there is extremely sparse and surface level. It’s basically just a touch point. The real conversations all go through Signal.
Share a bit (or a link) about your iMessage server?
Maybe a good idea for a blog post, but the general gist is this:
- Buy an old/cheap Mac mini
- Set up AirMessage or BlueBubbles (open source)
- Run a command or get an app so keep your Mac mini (or whatever other Apple device you’re using) awake 24/7
The messages will get delivered to your Mac, and then forwarded to your phone via AirMessage or BlueBubbles.
Thank you :)
I want to do something like this but airmessage does not have a desktop client that works without using their clouds. I use a Apple phone but I just want to be able to respond to texts on my Linux computers. I have an iMac server that I vnc into but it’s kind of annoying just to respond to a text.
SMS Facebook Messenger Google Chat Discord
There was an attempt for one friend group to go to Signal, but not enough people wanted to jump ship.
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This is probably funny since OP said southern Europe. If it was eastern that would be very old I’m sure.
SMS text messaging unless it’s a group chat/voice call for gaming, in which case it’s Discord.
Really? People pay for short, unencrypted messages that can barely handle accented characters, let alone media, when there are free alternatives that are much better in the vast majority of scenarios?
Or is free sms a common thing in people’s phone plans?
Pay? In the US we haven’t paid extra for SMS since about 2005. Which partly explains why it’s prevalent.
I’ve had unlimited sms since before I had a smart phone.
It outsmarted them.
My plan is $25/month for unlimited talk, text, and 5g data.
Almost all phone plans have unlimited texting. Or at least it seems that way.
Well most messages can be understood without accented characters and SMS is dependable to work on all devices.
Like others have commented, unlimited texting has been available in most phone plans for the better part of a decade now; I’d struggle to name a place that offers plans without it.
As for the accented characters, that’s something I personally don’t encounter much as a native English speaker. I obviously can’t speak for those who do need those keyboards, but for me it’s not a problem.
With regards to encryption/privacy, I can’t say that’s a concern I’ve personally had regarding my texts. Could the government read my messages? Probably, but all they’re getting is cute cat pics and random chatter about games and food and whatnot. Again, that’s another aspect that’s probably more of a concern for people in more sensitive situations, but I can’t speak for them.
USmobile still offers non-unlimited plans. I thought ting did as well, but I guess that changed at some point. But I think I’ve only heard of one person using USMobile.
Pay per text plans only seemed to exist up until like 2010 at the latest.
The problem in the US is that the iPhone has a huge amount of the market and iMessage mostly does that already. For Android to counter that you have to use a 3rd party app, which further fractures an already smaller market. Or everyone could just use sms which is free with basically every plan nowadays, which gets you by.
For Filipinos, Messenger is life, it seems.
Me and my friends prefer Instagram, Discord or WhatsApp though
Mostly SMS, but I have one friend who uses Whatsapp. I have Signal installed but wasn’t able to convince anyone else to switch.
Discord for friends, SMS for everyone else. Rather use something private but I can’t convince people to care.
