The comment implies Signal is peak chat when it’s flawed & other than maybe onboarding, isn’t superior to alternatives—with the phone number being a pro for onboarding is a con for privacy. It still requires you have an Android or iOS primary device (fueling that duopoly). They don’t want you installing it from a safer space like F-Droid. They still by default send notification metadata to Google & Apple (websocket support exists but drains a fair amount of battery & they refuse to support UnifiedPush). They still ship/use Apple emoji on Android & Linux. It’s still a centralized system you can’t self-host. They still have that missing part of the source code (where I would assume the feds planted something). It still isn’t a good space large chats. And the Electron desktop apps are far too bloated.

[–] SundryTornAsunder@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

And the Electron desktop apps are far too bloated.

No argument. Electron is categorically silly in its own right, lol.

They don’t want you installing it from a safer space like F-Droid.

F-Droid is by no means safe; use Droidify.

They still by default send notification metadata to Google & Apple (websocket support exists but drains a fair amount of battery & they refuse to support UnifiedPush).

Easy: use the FOSS version of Molly instead of the default Signal app.

[–] JohnDoe@lemmy.myserv.one 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Hi, could you touch on why F-Droid is less safe? Is it because they package (I think that's the term?) stuff themselves?

[–] SundryTornAsunder@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Certainly.

To answer your question: yeah, pretty much.

I got all of this information, originally, through this guy's channel (Side Of Burritos on YouTube):

It's also worth mentioning that part three of that series ended up directly inspiring another project called Obtanium, which he then did a video on here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiN37bn0OE8