Telegram is introducing a new feature, allowing its growing userbase on iOS products to import chats from their WhatsApp accounts (and from other social media messaging apps as well).
To say that WhatsApp has had a horrible past month or so would be highly understanding the issues plaguing our previously favorite social media communication app. Ever since the announcement of a change to the Terms of Service policy that allowed the app to share user information with Facebook, people have been quick to make their displeasure heard. With a general air of mistrust surrounding Facebook, considering how the social network has been subjected to an FTC lawsuit as well as criticism regarding its unintentional role in the US Capitol riot, users expressed paranoia regarding any amount of personal information being willingly handed over.
And thus, a massive exodus was overseen where WhatsApp's userbase quickly jumped ship and looked for other prospects. Two social media apps that quickly caught the public’s e were Signal and Telegram, both of which are also platforms for communication via messages and whatnot. The former was actively suggested by tech billionaire Elon Musk in a short tweet. Both these companies subsequently received a sharp increase in users, with Telegram growing by 25 million users in 72 hours, bringing its community to a cumulative 500 million.
Adding insult to injury for WhatsApp is the fact that Telegram's developers are unabashedly taking advantage of the former’s weakness. In the app's 7.4 iOS build, which was quickly taken off the market and is expected to launch a bit later, users have the option to export chats from WhatsApp, Line, KakaoTalks, and a few others. This relies on WhatsApp's Export Chat feature, found under Settings, Chats, then Chat History. Once extracted, typically in the shape of a ZIP file, the iOS Sheet Share will allow Telegram to utilize the chat and then let users manually select the new chat in which the messages will be integrated.
Honestly, Telegram's active facilitation of users looking to easily and seamlessly migrate from one platform to another isn’t exactly a nefarious practice. WhatsApp itself enables the transferring of messages via the aforementioned ZIP files, thus making this new update fair game. Its timing, however, is definitely of note and can be referred to as a very calculating move by Telegram's developers, or a mildly amusing if not unfortunate stroke of luck for them (which coincidentally spells misfortune for WhatsApp).
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To say that WhatsApp has had a horrible past month or so would be highly understanding the issues plaguing our previously favorite social media communication app. Ever since the announcement of a change to the Terms of Service policy that allowed the app to share user information with Facebook, people have been quick to make their displeasure heard. With a general air of mistrust surrounding Facebook, considering how the social network has been subjected to an FTC lawsuit as well as criticism regarding its unintentional role in the US Capitol riot, users expressed paranoia regarding any amount of personal information being willingly handed over.
And thus, a massive exodus was overseen where WhatsApp's userbase quickly jumped ship and looked for other prospects. Two social media apps that quickly caught the public’s e were Signal and Telegram, both of which are also platforms for communication via messages and whatnot. The former was actively suggested by tech billionaire Elon Musk in a short tweet. Both these companies subsequently received a sharp increase in users, with Telegram growing by 25 million users in 72 hours, bringing its community to a cumulative 500 million.
Adding insult to injury for WhatsApp is the fact that Telegram's developers are unabashedly taking advantage of the former’s weakness. In the app's 7.4 iOS build, which was quickly taken off the market and is expected to launch a bit later, users have the option to export chats from WhatsApp, Line, KakaoTalks, and a few others. This relies on WhatsApp's Export Chat feature, found under Settings, Chats, then Chat History. Once extracted, typically in the shape of a ZIP file, the iOS Sheet Share will allow Telegram to utilize the chat and then let users manually select the new chat in which the messages will be integrated.
Honestly, Telegram's active facilitation of users looking to easily and seamlessly migrate from one platform to another isn’t exactly a nefarious practice. WhatsApp itself enables the transferring of messages via the aforementioned ZIP files, thus making this new update fair game. Its timing, however, is definitely of note and can be referred to as a very calculating move by Telegram's developers, or a mildly amusing if not unfortunate stroke of luck for them (which coincidentally spells misfortune for WhatsApp).
Move your message history from apps like WhatsApp, Line and KakaoTalk to Telegram. https://t.co/PediepRhyt pic.twitter.com/VPeuilGt2T
— Telegram Messenger (@telegram) January 28, 2021
Here's how you can move your chats to Telegram if you're on Android. pic.twitter.com/VMq3mAeteq
— Telegram Messenger (@telegram) January 28, 2021
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