Comment on It's time to stop using SMS, here's why!

• Showroom7561@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I mean, Signal (the messenger that Privacy Guides recommends) only works with Signal, right? And if I recall, it was difficult or not even possible to back up your texts from one device to another.

  SMS, especially for anyone who isn’t tech-savvy in the least, “just works” without any setup.

  How do you convince people to move away from that?

  I’m not saying we shouldn’t, I’m saying it doesn’t appeal to the majority of people.

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  • Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Signal…only works with Signal, right?

    Yes, that is one of many potential alternatives. Many others can be run on a variety of servers, with a variety of apps.

    SMS…“just works” without any setup.

    Sure, but most people these days are expected to have email these days, and signing up isn’t any more complicated than that. It’s not that hard.

    How do you convince people to move away from that?

    You send them the video in OP. Or try to send them literally any video via SMS. Someone sent me a video of their kids singing happy birthday for me. It was a really beautiful moment lived through the lens of a potato.

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    • Showroom7561@lemmy.ca ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Many others can be run on a variety of servers, with a variety of apps.

      Yes,but smaller market share means less optimistic future, or not enough incentive to continue the project, or harder to convince someone to use it.

      Sure, but most people these days are expected to have email, and signing up isn’t any more complicated than that. It’s not that hard.

      Signing up isn’t the hurdle… Convincing someone they should install a second app for messaging when nobody they know uses it would be a bigger challenge.

      Google and Apple teaming up would effectively eliminate basic SMS, but that likely wouldn’t solve issues like privacy or data ownership.

      You send them the video in OP. Or try to send them literally any video via SMS.

      Dude, I went on a mission to convince the people I know to move away from corporately owned email and to use a private provider. It was excrutitingly difficult, and I don’t think a single person switched.

      Family would constantly “not get it” and continued to email my old email address, too, like they thought this was a phase. lol. It was insane.

      Personally, I find switching messenger providers to be more difficult than email, so I’m not hopeful that someone would convert without having some strong motivations first.

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      • Ulrich@feddit.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Yes,but smaller market share means less optimistic future

        Optimism in terms of user adoption? Sure. But these are your choices. I understand your apprehension. You can choose the “easy” button and let the corpos continue to silently abuse you, and be complicit in their abuse of others, or you can take a few minutes to learn something new and convince others to do the same, and try to be part of the solution.

        continued to email my old email address, too

        Yep, people did that to me too. I deleted the old email address. Their IG and FB messages also stay on unread. Some of them I even blocked. When their emails bounced and I didn’t give them a new one, they logged into Signal and started messaging me there.

        Personally, I find switching messenger providers to be more difficult than email

        Depends on which one, but I will respectfully disagree.

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