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Meta discontinues Messenger Lite for Android, it will be unavailable after Sep 18. Users need to install regular Messenger app instead (beehaw.org)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/technology@beehaw.org
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I have not found any news article on this on a whim. Because my friends and family, I need to use Facebook Messenger, and Messenger Lite was a OK client - lightweight, no unnecessary features, etc., compared to the regular Messenger app.

Now I'm a little torn, having a Meta app on my phone is already bad, but having to downgrade to the bloated Messenger app? Not sure I will make a change. What are your thoughts?

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[–] 17 points 2 years ago (1 child)

I'm on the same page. I would prefer not having those apps installed or even an account, but my friends are more worth to me than my IT ideals.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    It's too bad that your friendship isn't more important than ten minutes of inconvenience for them to install a different app or to give you their actual phone number.

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  • [–] 18 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    I find that you're making a lot of assumptions on my friendships based on my 4 lines comment.

    I do chat with my friends via SMS or phone cause I indeed have their number. But you can't deny that SMS for group chats is pretty gruesome.

    Based on that, everybody is used to those popular chat apps and have their other group chats on them. Why would I make them change when they work for what's intended? Privacy is the best argument, but they may not all care enough to not find it bothering. So I don't bother ¯_(ツ)_/¯

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    They dont work for what's intended. Its an illusion to pull money from your content and your potential ad revenue.

    Thats not getting into any of the other sociological effects of a huge amount of people getting their daily news from Facebook message headlines.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    It's exactly what social media platforms, particularly Facebook, want. They want you to feel locked in because your friends are there

    I don't know why people don't just use more SMS. You don't need all the fancy bells and whistles, it shouldn't change the conversation you're having, especially with the gradual rollout of rich messages, and it has a wider audience than Facebook will ever have. More people have SMS than have Facebook

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  • [+] 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)
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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Everyone outside of the U.S. almost assuredly still has SMS capabilities, it's just not common utilized because everyone is already on WhatsApp or Telegram. It's where their friends are, locking them into the ecosystem, which is exactly what I just said. And I would be willing to wager the only reason WhatsApp really got huge was because SMS hasn't always been free to use and may still not be free in some countries and with some plans.

    Telegram, Signal and WhatsApp are fine, as for privacy how exactly are SMS better?

    I wasn't speaking to privacy specifically, but where all your friends are.

    If you want privacy, then you shouldn't be using Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp anyway, considering both are owned by Meta and their privacy track record is shaky at best.

    Signal is a great choice, but we get back to the main point where not everyone is on Signal, and once you are on Signal you're locked in to using Signal and must have their app to participate in the conversation.

    My point wasn't that SMS is better, but it's simpler and more widely available and doesn't require a standalone application to use.

    Ideally we would use an open standard like the Matrix standard to communicate, that way you can download whatever application you want and have all the privacy you could ever desire, but not have to download some random messaging application just to catch up from Gary from primary school

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