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In Signal, push notifications simply act as a ping that tells the app to wake up. They don't reveal who sent the message or who is calling (not to Apple, Google, or anyone). Notifications are processed entirely on your device. This is different from many other apps. 2/

What's the background here? Currently, in order to enable push notifications on the dominant mobile operating systems (iOS and Android) those building and maintaining apps like Signal need to use services offered by Apple and Google. 3/

Apple simply doesn’t let you do it another way. And Google, well you could (and we've tried), but the cost to battery life is devastating for performance, rendering this a false option if you want to build a usable, practical, dependable app for people all over the world.* 4/

So, while we do not love Big Tech choke points and the control that a handful of companies wield over the tech ecosystem, we do everything we can to ensure that in spite of this dynamic, if you use Signal your privacy is preserved. 5/

*(Note, if you are among the small number of people that run alt Android-based operating systems that don't include Google libraries, we implement the battery-destroying push option, and hope you have ways to navigate.) 6/

@Mer__edith How does it end up being battery-destroying? Shouldn't it just be waiting on a socket that has no data until there's a notification to be processed, with the TCP keepalive set on the socket options so kernel rather than userspace deals with stupid NATs that would otherwise drop it?

@dalias
The vexing part is that @signalapp (seemingly categorically ) refuses to cooperate with the rest of the FOSS world to integrate with open solutions, which already exist. Instead, their spokespeople like
@Mer__edith prefer to talk down to people who, for whichever reason can't or don't want to run proprietary Google services on their Android phone.

@ck @dalias @signalapp this is a very rude comment that misunderstands our choices and commitments. I, also, do not *want* to run corp software. But in a world where a few companies own and/or otherwise control most of the infra we all rely on, INCLUDING choosing which FOSS options receive support (via hiring their maintainers, funding via Linux Found etc), it's an unhelpful fantasy to paint operating in this ecosystem, shaped by these forces/actors, as a "choice" made out of obstinacy/stupidity

@ck @dalias @signalapp There's also a reckoning to be had within the FOSS community IMO, which in the 1990s took its eye off market actors even as it remained vigilant about government surveillance/overreach. The acceptance of corporate tech (and implicitly its surveillance business model), led by folks like ESR via the break from Free software to "open source," did a lot to get us here.

@Mer__edith @ck @dalias @signalapp

On the other hand, one could argue that it was the absolute ideological dogmatism of RMS and his followers that led to corporates to go their own way.

@julf @ck @dalias @signalapp Sure. Yes. I would argue that assholes abound, and that this--and how RMS was allowed to keep his crown for so long in spite of his rigid, ungenerous dogmatism and shitty behavior--needs to part of said reckoning.

@Mer__edith @julf @ck @dalias @signalapp Who is RMS?

@Mer__edith @julf @ck @dalias @signalapp That helps, thanks.

@AngelaScholder
The ESR mentioned above is Eric S Raymond author of the Cathedral And The Bazaar and right wing ideologue.