There are bots that relay huge media files
It's probably (imo) the fastest & most complete cloud based chat app
Everything.. Literally everything you share can be retrived over the cloud
& and now calling
That must be super expensive infrastructure? No investors no monetization
I'm sure they will find ways monetize this. Data is the "new gold", as they say[1]...
Q: Will you have ads? Or sell my data? Or steal my beloved and enslave my children? No.
So I don't think they will make money by selling data.
[1] https://telegram.org/faq#q-will-you-have-ads-or-sell-my-data...
> An FAQ isn't binding.
Probably not, but please beware that this service is not subject to US law, but the laws of the Russian Federation.
> What does their TOS say?
TOS are subject to change, right? And even if it wasn't, do you really think the TOS will stop a company run by a russian nationalist[1] offering a free service with a million dollar bill will stick by their word (which, in this case is literally a single word)?
They are not registered in Russia, afaik.
> russian nationalist[1] … [1] https://www.instagram.com/p/-MrPWGr7aL/
That's just Pavel's usual populism. He says the same things about Russia or pretty much anything.
They are writing the software in Russia (right next to the VK's door to be precise), though. Source: local Saint-Petersburg newspapers.
"If you look at Telegram today, every month it burns over $1 million. It might seem that it’s just going nowhere, but if you want to come up with business model, you need to get to a decent size first. We have 62 million users at the moment, which is enough userbase to attract third-party developers to create products on top of your platform. You can’t do that from day one. It’s difficult."
http://kernelmag.dailydot.com/issue-sections/features-issue-...
I suspect the cost is even higher now.
Also, experience has taught that users are fickle and that products that are free that transition to paid products quickly lose their users.