@ernie I enjoyed using Beeper - but let’s be very clear - it was never more secure - it relies on each Apple user logging in to a remote Mac running in a DC somewhere in Europe (I know this as I received 2FA alerts when I tried to login) giving Beeper access your Apple account.
This means that your entire Apple #account - literally everything that is tied to it - is as secure as whatever practices Beeper implements.
@thecodingbeard@blakmarkit I successfully ran this code on my Linux machine with no problems a few days ago.
I have tested other methods for this in the past. The reason why this one got attention was because it directly communicated with the server largely on device. Beeper explained this process in a blog post:
@ernie it’s an issue for Americans and basically nobody else. As a British-American I can say with confidence that 0% of people I message regularly are using SMS. WhatsApp or Signal for the Linux-types (including you!)
@mattl@ernie All, and I do mean all, the concerns folk keep raising about "green bubbles" are already solved.
It's so weird.
Beeper also destroys the "It's unreasonable to expect people to install another app just for messaging" when clearly many did just that.. so why muck about with a hacky solution that was always going to get nixed when they could just use one of many established platform-agnostic apps?
@stevo887@mattl@ernie The majority of people aren't on iMessage though. Not globally at any rate.
I'd also suggest think small. Just start with asking the people you give a crap about chatting with to install whatsapp or whatever and make that experience better.
@stevo887@mattl@ernie and I'm willing to bet near 100% of those iPhone users using iMessage by default have multiple other apps installed for all kinds of things.
It's really quite reasonable to install another for being able to better communicate with folk. It's a 30 second task. if that's too much effort do they really value being in touch with you..? 😉
@wiredfire@mattl@ernie I did that with my wife, however I’m a freelancer in the film industry and I go out to a new set and they want to add me to a group chat. 5 people aren’t downloading a different app to include me for the one day that I’m day playing. It’s crazy here (United States) but iPhone has the market share and everyone is using iMessage.
@stevo887@wiredfire@mattl The best way I can explain it to people outside of the U.S.: It’s basically like Facebook in terms of its prevalence, in that it can be socially ostracizing to not have it in some cases.
There are some chats I’ve had going for years that I just manage on my Mac even though I use Android.
@ernie@stevo887@mattl looks like the image of prevalence is more than the reality, a tribute to Apple’s marketing no doubt.
Stats I saw put iOS usage around s 39% so that’s a lot of folk on something else. Which makes sense of the noise. If “everyone” was on iOS this would be a non-issue but over half US smartphones users are not but want in because of the image Apple managed to make stick over there.
@wiredfire@ernie@stevo887@mattl I really don’t think there’s much in the way of “look at how great iMessage is” marketing on Apple’s part. Yeah, they occasionally talk about new features, but aside from that?
It seems to be more of a word of mouth phenomenon where teens started using it, and now they’re in their 20s and still prefer it.
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