My group of (nerd) friends just migrated to matrix after Telegram started with their premium/crypto shenanigans and synthetic free-tier restrictions.
This new chat app is currently bait, but I'm not really lured by "threads", and the switch is a ticking timebomb.
Other red flags:
* Signup with phone number, other apps have proven that it's not universally necessary.
* Not mentioning that the author got equity of the app's company until halfway through the article.
* e2ee handwaving but there will never be proof unless they open-source it.
* Some integrated AI bot thing that nobody wants, could have been a bot API, stands at odds with e2ee, and just sounds like a lame attempt to ride the current wave.
* Mentions signal, whatsapp, telegram, but suspiciously not matrix.org, which AFAIK does have the touted feature to re-encrypt older messages to new members.
> e2ee handwaving but there will never be proof unless they open-source it.
This is a good point, and the Wavelength team is well aware of this.
> but suspiciously not matrix.org
I will admit I’d not heard of Matrix until your mention of it here. So I spent a few minutes downloading it, signing up, etc. It’s obviously competitive with Wavelength to some extent, but the first-class threading concept isn’t there. It seems more like a modern IRC or Slack alternative. Glad to be made aware of it though — thanks.
As somebody who has followed your blog via rss for longer than I can remember I am very surprised that you were not aware of matrix even before your involvement with Wavelength and shocked that you did not become aware of it during your early involvement. Don't you guys have a list of competitors/alternatives that you keep track of?
That being said I like what I see of Wavelength so far. I don't have anybody in my network that popped up right away, but I have a few people who are always interested in trying new chat apps so we'll give it a whirl.
This new chat app is currently bait, but I'm not really lured by "threads", and the switch is a ticking timebomb.
Other red flags: