Telegram starts to look like a super app, echoing WeChat

The worst part is, they're partnering with Tencent.
Telegram is dead.
- Am also gonna stick with signal, eyeing up matrix. But what issues? The only reason i haven't tested it out yet is none of my friends seem too keen on trying it.
- This week, TON Foundation announced that it’s forged a partnership with Tencent Cloud, which has “already successfully supported TON validators and plans to expand its services further to help meet TON’s high compute intensity and network bandwidth needs.” Validators, in web3 lingo, are participants that help authenticate transactions in a blockchain network.
  It looks like the partnership with Tencent only extends to their Web3 blockchain thing, and there doesn't seem to be any partnership in the main app so it's not the end of the world - at least, for now.
  Also, what even is this TON blockchain? I never knew Telegram had anything to do with crypto :/
  
  Yeah, nah. Anything the CCP can slip it’s slimy festering little dick into, it will.
  There’s no way in hell that Telegram is secure.
- Telegram is partnering with tencent??
  
  They are renting server space off a big company, not much different than AWS or Azure.
- The entire point of E2EE is that it doesn't matter who the host is.
- @photonicsorcerer What do you suggest as an alternative?
  
  We have chat standard called XMPP created by literially the same org that makes standards for Internet and Email.
  And there are other public protocols to choose from.
  
  Signal
  
  Signal for private conversations and for larger groups Matrix. Matrix can also be bridged to telegram effortlessly.

Telegram is a suprisingly good app.
Open source clients
Decent Linux client on the laptop (whatsapp desktop is just terrible)
It can be downloaded without Google's appstore.
I wish other apps were half as good as Telegram.
- More importantly, non-electron app.
  
  It bothers me that the major complaint is not the privacy issues or the people who own it behind the scenes...
  but the technology used to build the desktop application. Electron is just a tool.
  
  Fucking hell 🤦‍♂️
- Owned by the Russians
  Partnered with the ~~CCP~~ Tencent
  
  Hasn't the founder been a vocal critic of Russia for years, including the Ukraine war? I don't really see why that would be a concern, especially since Telegram is supposedly owned by a US LLC
  
  a yes, the ceo that isn't on russia and is viewd as a criminal for being against the war?
  
  Better than being owned by Americans.
  
  "the russians" is the new "the jews" but for liberals, right?
- Telegram has the best clients ever. But those clients need to connect to something and this is where we encounter a big problem.
  
  But isn't that the whole point of a messaging service? Connect to something else that's not local and have your messages exchanged?
- yeah it is too good for just to be called a messaging app, hope it will be more privacy focused
- Well, thats also easy since telegram clients dont do much more than displaying messages stored on a server. Its more a viewer than a full client.
  And that compromises hard on privacy and security, which Signal and Whatsapp dont do, they have proper Clients that have to really handle and store incoming messages. And the E2EE makes it harder, developing an independent desktop client, like Signal always had and Whatsapp recently got. But both are mediocre at best, sure.
  
  I prefer Telegram to something owned by an American corporation.
- lol what are you smoking?!
- Being foss and available on Linux is the prerequisite, it doesn't make the app "good"
  
  Yet WhatsApp is neither.

The shitty forced "stories" did me question seriously this once wonderful app. If I'd want to look at crappy TikTok-like shorts from other people, I'd be on TikTok.
- I had the same worry when it happened to signal
  
  Signal has stories as well?
- Once I saw the stories I was like ok wtf. How do I turn this off?
  Maybe revanced manager can do it.
  
  I'm using Nekogram, that at least allows to automatically hide (archive) them.
- I use https://github.com/nikitasius/Telegraher/releases
  
  Looks nice but https://github.com/nikitasius/Telegraher/issues/27
  I fear that Telegram may ban user accounts...

Telegram has open source their client code. Not their server code. It's even on f Droid.
- But it's starting to get worse. Now they won't send you an SMS code for registration unless you are using official build of the app. Even chat app under libre licence must connect with something...
  
  This actually is not a bad thing. If an unofficial client MITM the whole registration process, it's much harder for the true account owner to prove that he/she is the legit one.
  Also, it doesn't really require a client to register; Telegram can be accessed from a browser.
  
  One of the most egregious thing they've done imo is this:
  If their app allows its users to access content from Telegram channels, third-party developers using the Telegram API are required to support and properly display official sponsored messages in their apps by January 1, 2022
  As well as not allowing registration from desktop.
  
  I might be misunderstanding you, but I believe telegram requires SMS verification for all accounts, regardless of client.
  
  it costs them too much to send code as sms, also some client abuse that in some way, it also may help them to increase the download count of their official app which is not bad imo.
- Thank you. Installed fork client and now that stupid story crap is gone and there's new stuff I can do to fine tune things.
  
  How do I do this?

Everyone complaining about both telegram and signal here should, idk, just start dead dropping handwritten notes to people inside of dead rats, like the true privacy experts.
Privacy is important, yes. But if all of my friends use telegram, I'm going to use it too. Not only that, I'm going to be happy about it, because the telegram app is 1000x better than pretty much any other messaging app.
braces for angry downvotes
- You don't understand, when it's only you in that platform, it's the ultimate privacy.
- Receive my angry upvote.

I was under impression that Google Play and Apple App Store don't allow apps that can do practically everything (super apps). Is it really allowed? If a completely new company submit a chat app that somehow includes taxy hailing, food delivery, nfc/qr wallet and micro-loan features all at once instead of adding those features gradually in future updates, would Apple and Google accept the app?
- WeChat and other composite apps are already on the stores, so I don’t see why others also wouldn’t be allowed.
  
  And Grab.
  
  But outside China, WeChat is only a messaging app, right? The super app aspect is only available for China domestic users with a WeChat version distributed outside Play Store? Other notable super apps (Tata Neu, Grab, Gojek, etc) are also seemingly only operates in Asia. Or is there any US/EU-based super apps out there? Is the lack of western super apps caused by regulation, app store rules, or something else entirely?

It does have a ton of functions tbh. I use it to access bots and keep notes. Even repositories for apps - Revanced Extended uses it for e.g. !

Uninstalled and moved to signal. But no one I know is on signal 🤡

This is the best summary I could come up with:
Telegram, the popular messenger with 800 million monthly active users worldwide, is inching closer to adopting an ecosystem strategy that is reminiscent of WeChat’s super app approach.
To build out this super app platform, Telegram relies on a network of infrastructure partners both from the established tech world and the crypto space.
WeChat has pioneered the mini app model in China and now powers millions of them serving functions from payments, food delivery, e-commerce, ride-hailing, to driver’s license renewal, just to name a few.
The developers would also need to learn the programming languages of blockchain apps, which might actually be an easier barrier to overcome than the process of understanding the economic incentives that facilitate decentralized applications.
Importantly, payment functionality played a critical role in WeChat’s early rise as it instilled a habit among users to make daily transactions through the chat app.
It will be fascinating to witness what lessons Telegram and TON take from WeChat and how a mini app platform with a decentralized twist unfolds.
The original article contains 678 words, the summary contains 169 words. Saved 75%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Telegram is rarely used in my country anyway.

Please use decentralized chat apps and not Telegram
- Why there is always the guy that tell others what to do? People should use what's best for them, be it IM apps, browser, OS, whatever.
  
  These people also don't live in the real world. "Hey buddy, I know all your friends are using this chat service, but just stop using it and move to this barebones, extensively complex to setup service and everyone will follow suit, trust me"
  
  Because you're on Lemmy and people here care about privacy, so my comment was a reminder and an advice, not a rule. You do you
- Guessing Signal doesn't count?
  
  Depends on how dogmatic you want to get. Signal gets a passing grade from nearly all privacy focused groups, including the EFF.
  Of course it has centralized control, and if they really wanted to, they could push out a change that creates huge privacy and security problems, but as a not for profit, they really have no incentive to do anything nefarious.
  https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/09/eff-award-winner-signal-foundation
  If you truly want to have 100% security, you need to go to school for a decade, learn how the latest encryption and security works, create your own ecosystem, and have zero bugs or problems.
  
  It's centralized. And like all US based companies they have to conply to Patriot Act and Cloud Act, meaning US government agencies have everything not encrypted (dynamic map of all messages and social links).
  Plus Signal has been founded by the CIA organisms (indirectly), it's really shady
  
  Session is the only one that comes to mind but they did such an overkill when it comes to privacy and security application is downright unusable.