GroupMe SMS is dead, now what? — Ctrl, Shift, Esc

General Ctrl, Shift, Esc
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<rant>

Look what happened when TAG and Purifone ignored people wanting Waze and other features.

We ended up with Fig, a kosher smartphone with a keypad taped on, taking over, and becoming completely accepted.

Pretty bedi’eved.

I think people look at group chat something necessary enough that if no one does it the right way, it will just end being done the wrong way, by a “kosher phone” company run by a well meaning baalabos, that doesn’t understand what a kosher basic phone is actually about.

</end-of-rant>

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Agreed.

If an official elegant solution isn’t maintained, users will naturally migrate to whatever duct-taped alternative keeps them connected.

Though imo WhatsApp is already way to far.

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6 posts were split to a new topic: Education about kosher tech is broken

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agree that it could very likely happen but why cant people just do mass text?

if it is done hopefully it will be like megalife version

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Group MMS?

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Yes

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Biggest reasons are because it’s max 20 people, can’t add or remove people.

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It won’t happen right away, but I think it will happen eventually.

My guess is ETA ≤ 5 years

Education about kosher tech is broken?
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Think everyones forgetting how texting was viewed 10 years ago. There used to be a major fight against texting. Why? Because the entire world used it. There was cha-cha (remember that?:slight_smile: ). Twitter to SMS. It used to be much more of a problem. As the world moved on from SMS the Frum world vs Texting fight simmered down. Texting is way more tolerated than it used to be. Us Jews are basically the only ones still making bots and chats for SMS. (Granted. Recently with AI bots there was somewhat of a revival) I personally witnessed this. Even recently with GroupMe it was viewed in the Yeshiva world as a problem. Not a solution. Im pretty sure now that it’s gone they’re all breathing a sigh of relief.

Bottom line is. From the Yeshiva-world viewpoint I don’t think they’re very eager to replace GroupMe chats

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I see you didn’t read my article.

Also, I disagree on

I can’t say what it was like 10 years ago, but I can say that the fight against texting never dissappeared.

Just what the fight is over got a lot more isolated into different parts of the yeshiva world, depending on where they’re holding.

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I actually did read it and liked it. Not sure what you mean though.

I’m also curious why any kosher phone would allow matrix? It’s kind of opening the floodgates for anyone to make whatever hookups to WhatsApp, telegram, ai chat bots and whatever.

Whitelist servers? Who decides who runs the kosher hosting servers? And then your sort of handing out monopolies

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Hopefully quicker (bite me)

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TAG actually had been offering Waze on the LG Classic before FIG existed. TAG is not a filter creator and they have no means of offering what they’re not given to offer. Until Koshertek came around they couldn’t offer for TCL either. Purifone is a company who does not offer apps such as Waze on basic phones due to their shittos about what a basic is supposed to be. Actually similar to some of the opinions you have.

Edit: they also offer Waze for some models through Kosherphone (another filter creator) and this I’m not 100% sure about but I’m pretty sure they were doing it before FIG on these models too.

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The sheer number of apps available today can be overwhelming and make you give up on thinking.So now I’m also afraid of my smartphone.Nokia is now starting to offer 4G feature phones with physical buttons and AI voice control.Nokia! Nokia!! Nokia!!! So Many live LIKE SAME…GroupMe SMS is dead.Many people will be sad…than LIKE SAME

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What’s the point, sms groups on a server? I really don’t get it. Unless you wanna create the next iMessage this isn’t going anywhere.

Nothing open source is getting adapted mainstream anywhere, no one will ever trust it and the experience will always depend on end distributers fighting over everything.

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The point is to give the most kosherable option for group chats, especially for kosher phones that don’t want third party or “smartphony” apps.

GroupMe is 5-10 smaller than Matrix, yet the frum world still uses it.

Why?

If kosher phones all decide together to adopt a specific platform or service, then the frum world will go along with it, because that will be the only good way to have group chats that include people with kosher phones.

I assume Mind sends its updates from Windows servers?

The world, especially outside the US, is increasingly turning to open source alternatives to American big tech, for privacy, control, as a way of escaping big tech using their monopolies to milk users for money.

Just Google for news of prominent open source projects and european governments and companies turning to NextCloud, Codeberg, and the new Euro Office.

Open source alternatives are looking more and more likely to go mainstream.

Matrix is currently growing around 15%-25% year over year.

Most non techies aren’t smart enough to trust a service based on whether its reputable.

If it looks professional, then people will trust.

And only smartphone users need to trust it, kosher phone users will use it either way because it’s the only option.

Explain what you mean?

The companies don’t have to agree on anything besides for using one platform.
That one platform will enforce a specific standard, and any company that doesn’t keep to it will be incompatible with everyone else.

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No one I know of uses matrix and I haven’t heard of it till this chat, GroupMe is not open source and has nothing to do with phone companies or anything it’s a SMS enhancer for the sake of this conversation, so anyone can go and build a replacement, open source is being adapted and has been for the past 50 years as infrastructure, not as end user products, look at the biggest example, Linux, every distro is fighting over what it means and what it does and no one can unify the product.

Smartphone users have enough options and we specifically support RCS which is Google’s answer to iMessage, there’s no point that I can see here that will bring any measurable benefit to anyone.

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Exactly.

It’s proprietary and owned by one of the biggest tech companies, and yet Matrix is still significantly bigger.

Android: 3.9 billion devices, including all Mind phones
VLC: 6 billion downloads
Chromium: 75% of web traffic
Blender: 50% - 70% of 3d creators use it
7-zip: 1-2 billion downloads
OBS Studio: The industry standard for streamers and YouTube content creators
Signal: The most trusted secure messaging platform
Discourse: 80% of modern forums, including this one

For the same price there’s also WhatsApp, Telegram, and iMessage.

Most kosher phone users don’t use any of them, and don’t either use Google Messages.

Look, I understand that you don’t have a big incentive to pay your devs to make a new app.

The fact that the frum world, Mind phone users included, no longer have a way to have group chats that include kosher phone users isn’t your problem, and your phones are selling either way.

Just say that, or feel free to follow the example of the other phone companies over here, and just ignore this conversation.

Don’t make up stupid reasons.

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I’m not trying to make up any excuses, I really don’t see a future that will need it, I suspect most kosher phones will have RCS in the next year or two anyways and again GroupMe is a good example of making something that is additive without requiring anything additional from the phone or service, I don’t think it’s on any phone provider to figure that out, rather it’s a service like the companies that offer sms broadcasting and anyone can go and do it.

Android is open source but all the modern benefits aren’t. And however popular signal or matrix is it’s not replacing sms or WhatsApp anytime soon.

Anyways I don’t think there’s any reason for it as my first post started off with.

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Look into https://www.textbee.dev