Months-long Twitter Backlash Had Zero Impact on WhatsApp's User Base (techcrunch.com) 47
An anonymous reader shares a report: It's safe to say WhatsApp didn't have the ideal start to 2021. Less than a week into the new year, the Facebook-owned instant messaging app had already annoyed hundreds of thousands of users with its scary worded notification about a planned policy update. The backlash grew fast and millions of people, including several high-profile figures, started to explore rival apps Signal and Telegram.
Even governments, including India's -- WhatsApp's biggest market by users -- expressed concerns. (In the case of India, also an antitrust probe.) The backlash prompted WhatsApp to offer a series of clarifications and assurances to users, and it also postponed the deadline for enforcing the planned update by three months. Now with the May 15 deadline just a week away, we are able to quantify the real-world impact the aforementioned backlash had on WhatsApp's user base: Nada. The vast majority of users that WhatsApp has notified about the planned update in recent months have accepted the update, a WhatsApp spokesperson told TechCrunch. And the app continues to grow, added the spokesperson without sharing the exact figures.
Even governments, including India's -- WhatsApp's biggest market by users -- expressed concerns. (In the case of India, also an antitrust probe.) The backlash prompted WhatsApp to offer a series of clarifications and assurances to users, and it also postponed the deadline for enforcing the planned update by three months. Now with the May 15 deadline just a week away, we are able to quantify the real-world impact the aforementioned backlash had on WhatsApp's user base: Nada. The vast majority of users that WhatsApp has notified about the planned update in recent months have accepted the update, a WhatsApp spokesperson told TechCrunch. And the app continues to grow, added the spokesperson without sharing the exact figures.
Just goes to show (Score:5, Insightful)
You can make people accept any old thing as long as they have their free service to talk to their friends, view lolcats or post about their latest bowel movement. People just don't care about privacy anymore. Scott McNealy was right.
Re: (Score:2)
Only because they don't know. The story from 2 days ago [slashdot.org] about Facebook banning Signal for wanting to show ads that show what they know about you says it all really.
Re: Just goes to show (Score:5, Interesting)
No, it's more than that. When IE6 dominated, we saw nicely, what it takes for people to switch.
It does not suffice to have feature equality. As switching itself is a cost. And if you lack even the slightest thing, you're right out.
It does not suffice to have additional features. Even if they are unique. As "It's my current thing that I use." is its own unique selling point, and like with 4K and 2K and 5G, the status quo is simply "good enough".
You need feature equality *plus* an advantage, *with* a unique selling point, *plus* a triggering event that actually causes a social and neural chain of events that gives you a reason to do this right now. Because thought and motivations don't just come out of nothing, and there arr so many that yours needs to stand out enough to actually trigger some emotions, even in the hobby gardener granny and full-time cashier. Which requires emotional relevance to their life experiences
And in Signal's case, while it is afaik feature-equal and has some nice unique privacy features , most people never got this "Oh, now this angered me, and I want to do somthing about it now." moment. As the news must be quite big. The *actual* impact on their life doesn't have to be that big, but the *perceived* one, aka the trigger, needs to overcome the preceived cost of switching.
For social groups, it's even worse, if they are exclusive. E.g. you can happily use Firefox on a site that says "Made for IE6". But you cannot talk to somebody who refuses to use anything but AIM or Facetime or paper letters. ;)
Which is exactly, why such non-federating networks, walled gardens, lock-in, and other varieties of the crime also called monopolism are so popular with for-profit organizations aswell as ideologies, and should always be prosecuted by law enforcement.
The GDPR changed a lot here in Germany. Now it has become fashionable to care for privacy. People add excuses if they tell you they use WhatsApp, let alone Facebook (even thoug they are literally the same thing). Where previously, you were expected to come up with the excuses for not using them.
And the regular-people media now has a steady stream of news reminding people that data krakens are bad. A slow stream, but a steady one.
What's left now, is that "good enough" effect. So WhatsApp/FB/Google/... already lost in people's minds. It's only a matter of time now. People might not *switch* that much after that initial outrage event. But anyone *new* will always opt to not use them. Including new businesses, student groups, etc.
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Facebook and WhatsApp are not literally the same thing.
Did you ever use any of them? WhatsApp is a fancy ersatz for SMS, and thats it. You can do voice calls and video calls with it, too. And thats it.
Facebook is first of all a Web site. Just like Spiegel-Online plus its Forum. Has absolutely nothing to do with Calling or sending SMS, besides the fact that Facebook also has an app called "messenger", which is so utter shit, that they bought WhatsApp.
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Facebook and WhatsApp are not literally the same thing.
Whooosh. That went right over you head.
Facebook and WhatsApp are literally the same thing with respect to privacy, since WhatsApp is owned by Facebook. Whatever you reveal to either one is available to the other.
Consider this in terms of web cookies, for example. Cookies were originally thought of as somewhat secure, because only the website that created a cookie was supposed to be able to read it. Now, with a handful of giants controlling so much of the web, you can be tracked all over from one website to
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Facebook and WhatsApp are literally the same thing with respect to privacy,
That was not the topic of the parent.
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The GDPR changed a lot here in Germany. Now it has become fashionable to care for privacy.
I think my favorite is the android emulator app (Nox) that has a load screen with "In accordance with GDPR laws, we care about your privacy"! :)
I always wonder if there is a hidden clause that says you have to care about privacy, too
Re: (Score:2)
You can make people accept any old thing as long as they have their free service to talk to their friends, view lolcats or post about their latest bowel movement.
... and it's bloody annoying. This morning I was stuck on a one way street behind a car that was just standing there in the middle of the road with the hazard lights blinking which is why I didn't honk at the driver. After a while I lost my patience though since there didn't seem to be any immediately obvious emergency going on so I passed the car by driving through a couple of empty parking spots with two wheels up on the pavement. The driver was just sitting there, in the middle of a one way street with h
Re: (Score:2)
You can make people accept any old thing as long as they have their free service to talk to their friends, view lolcats or post about their latest bowel movement. People just don't care about privacy anymore.
I hate it when people take a binary view of the world. It doesn't help.
Yes, I care about privacy (and haven't been on Facebook in several years). But I still like to talk to my friends sometimes. I installed WhatsApp long before Facebook would buy it.
So what do you suggest?
Only one of my friends moved to Signal. Tell all of my WhatsApp contacts "it's been real" and leave? Force everyone to move to Signal one-by-one until they are all there?
I'd like to hear a practical suggestion rather than a condemnati
Re: (Score:2)
You prove my point: you prioritize your ability to chat with your friends over boycotting the gross privacy invasions of Facebook and its subsidiaries, on the grounds that your friends - who also prioritize their ability to chat with their friends over boycotting the gross privacy invasions of Facebook and its subsidiaries - won't quit the privacy-invading service.
In the end, nobody changes service because nobody changes service, and everybody goes "oh well".
It's all a matter of priorities, is all. You've m
I installed Signal (Score:2)
Re: I installed Signal (Score:2)
Well duh. The trigger has faded. There are other things to worry about.
Watch for the next impactful news. Say FB announcing that WhatsApp will be merged with FB messenger. Or legislators openly declaring that it is illegal to use WhatsApp in many jobs or the government (which is the case here in Germany), and people *will* be prosecuted and fined. Say Merkel (or Biden in your case), in her last speech, Holding up a phone, saying she switched to Signal and you should too, to avoid a 1000EUR fine.
Re: (Score:2)
As long as there is no real alternative, WhatsApp might be "forbidden" but is still used.
For many schools it is the primary communication platform for late: "teacher is sick, first class canceled" messages etc.
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Really?
What about all the kids that don't have smartphones?
Re: (Score:2)
What about all the kids that don't have smartphones?
One of the parents has one. Or do you think a 10 year old is organizing his school life completely alone?
Worst case the kid arrives in school and has to wait 45 minutes in the waiting7relaxing area.
Re: (Score:3)
Given all the crap we've found out that Facebook has been doing, over the past many years - I figure that nothing they might do is likely to impact their user base in any significant way. Anyone who actually cared about their privacy left Facebook / Instagram / WhatsApp some time ago.
Sure, people will yell at any new "bend over further" announcements... but it'll be like Twitter rage, lots of noise and then everyone will move on to some other topic after a short while.
Growth of alternate platforms expose this Lie (Score:2)
Of course WhatsApp would love us to believe "Resistance is Futile", but given the giant number of friends that jumped onto Signal since the WhatsApp Terms of Service change announcement (maybe 35% of all my contacts in this period), I can tell you, it made a big impact. Maybe these friends still have WhatsApp on their phone, but they are active on other platforms suddenly as well.
The way I see it WhatsApp really shot themselves in the foot by providing a solution to the Collective Action Problem in a netwo
Re: (Score:2)
Got to agree - try as I might, I just cannot get my neighbours or the school parents to move off Whatsapp. I've moved a few other people though, so WA is getting less use now than it would have done 6 months ago.
Yes, Zuck will still be collecting plenty of data on me, but no, he won't be getting *all* the data as he once did.
Re: Growth of alternate platforms expose this Lie (Score:2)
Seconded. My GF already was on Signal. Her job used it for private conversations about patients, to comply with law. It is iterally illegal to use WhatsApp for that.
And to my surprise, I got more and more people at my job suddenly using Signal. Then I was told they are exploring it as the organization's official messenger. No need from me to do anything. GDPR and a fee news articles is all it took.
Re: (Score:2)
Signal isn't HIPAA compliant [mozilla.org] which would get you in trouble in the US. I'm less familiar with the country-specific healthcare data privacy regulations in the EU, but there are generally concerns around having patient data on an individual's device that cannot be remotely deleted.
Of course maybe your girlfriend is using an employer-supplied device, or has some sort of mobile device management software locking down her personal device, or maybe her employer is self-hosting a Signal server that gives them ext
Re: (Score:2)
Most likely it is complient.
However thy did not "apply for vertification", read what they write on their web site:
Does the platform say it is compliant with US medical privacy laws?
No
Signal is not HIPAA compliant.
I would say a platform that is not recording anything, is compliant by default.
But using a 3rd party messaging application (even if end-to-end encrypted) is not always straightforwardly compliant with privacy law.
And why would it not?
Re: (Score:2)
I would say a platform that is not recording anything, is compliant by default.
That's not how HIPAA works, for better or worse. It's like aircraft-grade parts. A given part might meet all the requirements for manufacturing tolerances and have gone through all the safety checks required of an aircraft-grade part, but unless you have the paperwork to prove that the tolerances are correct, and that the proper procedures were followed in manufacturing, then that bolt isn't allowed to be actually used in the construction of an aircraft.
And why would it not?
I can think of a few reasons off the top, but the big
Re: (Score:2)
That's not how HIPAA works, for better or worse.
Yes, I mentioned: it is probably not certificated.
Doesn't matter if the sensitive healthcare data is secure in transmission if the device receiving and then storing it is unencrypted, and doesn't have a passcode, just waiting for its owner to leave it on a bus, lose it at a bar, etc.
That sounds like an absolutely stupid requirement. What if I get the results as paper mail and one breaks into my home?
I need some way to ensure that they aren't walking around wi
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"We had these problems when medical records were on paper, so we have no obligation to handle electronic data securely either" isn't really how it works.
What if I get the results as paper mail and one breaks into my home?
"You" in this example are the patient? Snail mail is, for better or for worse, considered a HIPAA-compliant mechanism for sending patient data. So long as the healthcare provider wasn't negligent (eg, by using a windowed envelope that exposes an HIV test result [healthcare...cenews.com]), they aren't responsible, under HIPAA, for the patient losing that data.
That is also a completely silly requirement as the worker in question could have the papers at home, or on his computer at home etc.
HIPAA compliance requir
Re: (Score:2)
this is generalizable to the question of "why is end-to-end encryption not sufficient to guarantee data security?".
Actually that was not the question.
I understand that HIPAA-compliant basically means that you have to conform - hence the word - to a lot of rules. Most of them completely irrelevant for the patient.
If I want my results sent by Signal, then basically the same rules apply as to have them sent by paper mail.
As soon as they are on my device, it is my responsibility, just as with paper mail in my h
Deliberately misleading. (Score:2)
You can have more than one messenger installed.
People with Signal and FacebookApp still prefer Signal, if the other side has it too.
If you want to delude us into believing it did nothing, you need to try being less obvious.
Just like Amazon (Score:3)
Amazon treats its warehouse workers like slaves! Someone should do something.
Jeff Bezos is too rich. He doesn't need all that money.
Amazon has fake merchandise on their site and does nothing about it.
Amazon has scummy privacy policies.
Oh look! Shiny. Good thing I have Prime to get it tomorrow.
Says Who?! (Score:1)
"without sharing the exact figures."
So, lying.
Take note (Score:2)
Twitter is very loud and very obnoxious but at the end of the day it's just a small number of people who are addicted to being angry and making a fuss and they don't have any real world power.
I tried to get friends and family to move... (Score:1)
According to themselves (Score:2)
Accepted? (Score:2)
Fake Metrics (Score:1)
For fake ad markets and fake communities with fake stock valuations for fake productivity.
Anyhoo (Score:2)
Cancel culture may weaken once corporations realize blowback is not so great, and that a lot of its generative impulse comes from a tiny cabal of what may very well be organizational manipulative trolling.
We shall see.
"Without sharing the exact numbers"... (Score:3)
Without sharing the exact numbers, a spokesperson for Digg assured us that despite recent pushback over the latest updates and many prominent bloggers claiming to move to new rival platform Reddit, the Digg userbase has not declined.
Oh (Score:2)
The Free Software people have known this for years (Score:2)
We have known this for years. For decades now the free software advocates have been fighting a very similar fight. DRMs, Net Neutrality, Rights to Repair, open protocols, open drivers, then we had the AOL shit, MSN, ICQ, Skype, .... The GNU project and FSF have lead the way in fighting for the common good by selectively chosing software since before I was born (GNU started in 1983).
The idea that some campaign that going to kill a facebook product was ridiculous to begin with.
no duh (Score:2)
Wait another week before reaching conclusions (Score:2)
How many people accepted the change of terms? Nobody except WhatsApp knows, and they ain't saying "everybody accepted", they are just saying "user base unchanged".
The fact that WA felt the need to yell "everything's fine" just showed you how worried they were. If over 95% of their user base had accepted the new terms, they will definitely kept mum to avoid drawing any more attention and bad press to this change.
Of course the existing user base won't change significantly (YET), people who installed alterna
Nada sounds strange (Score:2)
The download numbers of Signal and Telegram skyrocked.
Obviously an WhatsApp user is not deleting the App, as he wants to stay in contact with the people who have not switched away.
WhatsApp sovereign (Score:2)
Long ago ~2016, Latin America realized this message application tourists from the 1st world brought with them to their country worked in their language too. Nothing is better than finding that your 3rd world nation can have perks like in the 1st world. WhatApp was a hit!
Latin America needed a hit to power itself beyond 1st world advantages of infrastructure, wealth and communications. WhatsApp lit the imagination of Latin Americans and enterprise welcomed its every innovation which it put to good use.
Today
"Zero" is a Tool for Making Lying Easier (Score:2)
Hidden impact (Score:2)
Never noticed (Score:2)
I never heard anything about a planned policy update. And if the update is forced on me without me having to agree on and even read the new update it doesn't make a chance in court, as far as I know. Besides, I live in the EU, which has strict rules concerning privacy.
Re: Never noticed (Score:1)
They pushed the new policy in India first which is their largest user base. I think the EU is safe, thanks to GDPR.
Deleted all FB apps years ago, never looked back (Score:1)
I did have WA longer than anything else but nuked that too just about when WA announced their new plans.
Businesses had already started spamming and linking up with FB would just make it worse.