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HalloApp: a digital space for people who you know and want to connect with

29 points| robinhood | 3 years ago |halloapp.com | reply

55 comments

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[+] egberts1|3 years ago|reply
Just let me stop you right there as I reiterate what Apple App Store has to say about HalloApp and its privacy:

    Data Linked to You
The following data, which may be collected and linked to your identity, may be used for the following purposes:

* Contact Info

Phone number (your most prized privacy info). This is a FULL-STOP right there in these days and ages.

* Contacts

Contacts (your entire address book, who would want to pull down the proverbial pants and leave their derrière exposed and tangle with the wind?)

* Identifiers

User ID (probably your Apple ID, after sufficient reverse mapping).

* Diagnostic

Crash data, not hard to get even more relational mapping from this.

############# # Signal

Compare that to SignalApp:

* Contact Info

That is entire optional and can be left blank within the Settings->Contacts->My Card of which that should always be blank.

Nothing to see there, move along.

[+] lelandfe|3 years ago|reply
> We use your phone number to connect you with friends and family. Beyond that, we never collect, store or use any personal information and never show you ads. Never. For real.

From their homepage. Contact Info and Contacts sharing are inherent to this app, it seems. It's worth noting that "beyond that, we never collect [more personal information]" is pretty clearly incorrect, since they do at least also collect contacts.

Their Privacy Policy[0] also does not inspire confidence:

> We may share personal data we get with service providers who help us provide our Services

We're not selling your data, we're sharing it.

Which service providers? What are their policies around my data?

> We may transfer your personal data to service providers, advisors, potential transactional partners, or other third parties in connection with the consideration, negotiation, or completion of a corporate transaction or proceeding in which we are acquired by or merged with another company or we sell, liquidate, or transfer all or a portion of our business or assets

We're not selling your data, we're transferring it.

This clause esp. makes me loath to sign up, since all this good will around privacy protections goes away in a sale. Given that this was made by WhatsApp devs, perhaps they understand the value of data...

[0] https://www.halloapp.com/privacy/

[+] thayne|3 years ago|reply
My phone number is definitely not my "most prized privacy info." If it was I'd be in trouble because there are all sorts of transactions, both digital and analog that require giving a phone number. At least in the US, if you refuse to give anyone your phone number, you'll have a hard time living a normal life.

And you compare to Signal, which also requires your phone number, and uses it as the primary identifier.

[+] zaik|3 years ago|reply
Pretty sure Signal also collects your phone number.
[+] hn_throwaway_99|3 years ago|reply
Just took a look at the landing page, but I didn't see any information on how they expect to monetize the app. Are they going to charge for it?

I'm fine if they are charging it, but all the problems with social media are pretty much a direct result of their business model. So putting out something that is free, without an explanation of how they eventually expect to pay for it all, is not something I would trust.

[+] nobody9999|3 years ago|reply
While I like the idea, AFAICT there's no actual web interface, only access through iPhone/Android apps.

Which is a deal-breaker for me.

That said, is anyone here actually using HalloApp? If so, what are your impressions so far?

[+] nicce|3 years ago|reply
Yep, if you want to go with privacy first, then make web interface and let us believe that you at least try to make it privacy friendly by allowing more user control and strict sandboxing.

There are anti-patterns in many websites to make people to use native apps - simply because it is easier to collect more user data.

[+] vmception|3 years ago|reply
Thats because its mobile-first! Like 2016! The founders and their stakeholders all agreed, trendy! Like in 2016!

Like Yo! But Hello, but spelled the German way Hallo! and because there already is a social network (and mobile app) called Hello, and other communications apps called Hello, and its also cool to mispell startup names, a web 2.0 staple, like last decade!

[+] browningstreet|3 years ago|reply
I use it to share certain activity photos with a small group who aren't on Insta/F (like me). For that, it's great. No expectation that it'll be around forever -- it's just real time photos of us on vacation in a way that doesn't bombard Messages.
[+] rglullis|3 years ago|reply
What can be done with this that can not be done with a personal WhatsApp/Telegram/Matrix/XMPP group?
[+] outside1234|3 years ago|reply
Its private, free, and with no ads...

... well until we need to make money, when we will sell all of that to someone.

[+] gigatexal|3 years ago|reply
And for this to be a viable thing how is this paying for itself or how will it eventually?
[+] extheat|3 years ago|reply
Terrible name, but good idea. However, the ecosystem for social media apps is so polluted (just open any app store and see all the "social media app" spam) that gaining any sort of market share is likely not possible.
[+] nikolay|3 years ago|reply
No web, no thank you! I'm tired of these mobile-only apps like Snapchap and the likes! I want to be able to move from one device and another without having the phone always in my hand!
[+] saltedonion|3 years ago|reply
How are they going to address the problem of connection creep? (Over time the number of people you add to your friends network increase and cause context collapse)
[+] MexicanJoe|3 years ago|reply
They will hire you - there now it's your problem.
[+] andreyk|3 years ago|reply
So this is basically WhatsApp in terms of functionality?
[+] ladon86|3 years ago|reply
Tip: it's not an official grammar rule, but in colloquial terms, scare quotes [1] are often used to indicate that the speaker is being sarcastic or that the quoted thing isn't actually true. So a typical American reader might infer from your title that this app is not _really_ "private" or "free".

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scare_quotes

[+] cylon13|3 years ago|reply
I definitely read the title as sarcasm.
[+] wvenable|3 years ago|reply
Yeah, if it's private, free, and has no ads why is the title not simply:

Like Facebook, but smaller and private and free with no ads.

[+] dang|3 years ago|reply
I don't know if the submitted title ('Like Facebook, but smaller and “private” and “free” with no “ads”') was intended to be sarcastic, but since the OP itself does not include that language (with or without quotes), we've changed it above to something it does include.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[+] rzzzt|3 years ago|reply
BBC news articles are full of scare quotes then.