privacy Telegram will soon launch a premium subscription service

[captain_to_fire]

Telegram's founder and CEO Pavel Durov said on his channel that in order to keep up with request for more features and to keep the platform ad-free.

 

Quote

And yet, many have been asking us to raise the current limits even further, so we looked into ways to let you go beyond what is already crazy. The problem here is that if we were to remove all limits for everyone, our server and traffic costs would have become unmanageable, so the party would be unfortunately over for everyone.

After giving it some thought, we realized that the only way to let our most demanding fans get more while keeping our existing features free is to make those raised limits a paid option. That's why this month we will introduce Telegram Premium, a subscription plan that allows anyone to acquire additional features, speed and resources. It will also allow users to support Telegram and join the club that receives new features first.

I think this is a nice option if you are a kind of person who sends files larger than 2GB and faster download/upload speeds and get new features first. No word on the pricing just yet but I doubt that it'll be that expensive. I'm sure that there are people in the comments below ranting about another subscription but it should be kept in mind that all the current features will still be available and that they're not putting ads on channels. It's not like they're forcing you to pay up. Maintenance of servers and bandwidth are not cheap as Luke Lafreniere of Floatplane once said in a tweet. Personally I wouldn't pay for it but I'm sure that there are a handful who can benefit with larger attachment sizes and faster upload/download speeds.

Here's another unpopular opinion of mine about subscriptions, YouTube should actually block access to the site if an ad-blocker is detected unless they pay for YT Premium. Many people will whine and rant about it but remember than Alphabet, Inc. is a for profit institution, not charity.

 

Sources

Pavel Durov's Telegram channel

[Beskamir]

Telegram's not private or secure. They happily give up whatever data they collect to governments and they collect quite a bit. PSA: Do not, under any circumstances, use Telegram if you value your privacy.

 

[GodBleak]

On 6/11/2022 at 8:52 PM, Beskamir said:

Telegram's not private or secure. They happily give up whatever data they collect to governments and they collect quite a bit. PSA: Do not, under any circumstances, use Telegram if you value your privacy.

 

Oh cool, more Telegram fear mongering.

 

Using the same and only claim that Telegram has released user data, whose source is basically "Trust us".

 

They also claimed Germany has been hounding Telegram to cooperate for years, how tf is that "happily" giving up? And Telegram collects far less data than the alternatives that thinly veil their blatant disregard for your privacy.

 

And of course he uses the old "it's not E2EE by default" shtick. And to give it merit, sets up the typical flimsy assumption that the average person values total privacy at any cost and over features, but are incapable research and thus at risk of being "tricked" by a feature Telegram has an inservice on.

 

Telegram has always been open about cloud chats being the default. And if their transparency about it wasn't enough, you need only search "Telegram" to be bombarded with other articles blowing Telegram's flaws out of proportion, using the same flimsy assumptions as their basis for concern as well.

 

And despite all the over-exaggerated warnings, Telegram maintains a userbase that rivals WhatsApp, with many communities for development, IT, and even infosec. Many of which have thousands of users. Surely, of all people, they should know better. But they continue using it. It's almost as if they know how to read, and thus know how to use Telegram, and see value in it beyond privacy and security