Hopefully remains as interim. I'm still suspicious based on previous experience with him selling Whatsapp to Facebook and all that. Actually, very surprising move, are they planning to sell Signal?
The only reason Whatsapp was bidded up to an insane 19 Billion sale value was because Acton did not want to sell. Note that it's not insane in terms of value (in hindsight this was clearly a good buy for FB), but insane when considering that value for your small 30 person company.
That's a crazy sale price, I'd like to see you turn it down.
It can be true that he didn't want to sell and regrets it and just couldn't reject that offer, the opportunity costs available to you at the level are nuts. This is a risk with centralized services, it's why we need systems that don't require benevolence: https://zalberico.com/essay/2020/07/14/the-serfs-of-facebook...
Most people don't have principles valued at 19B.
I think Urbit is a potential way to get there, but a lot of the web3 ownership model points in this direction.
That said, I think Matrix is cool and appreciate what they're trying to do. I just think without solving the upstream problems you won't be able to succeed beyond a niche audience.
For all its flaws in Facebook integration, WhatApp is the single most impactful system ever in getting people to use secure communication. 1B+ people started using end-to-end encrypted communications overnight when WhatsApp enabled e2ee. This move pushed the entire industry towards adoption of e2ee.
Yes, they sold to Facebook. Yes, Facebook is doing everything it can to get the contents of WhatsApp communications so they can monetize. But it is impossible to not see the change they made on the landscape of communication privacy.
From my perspective, it's also remarkable that WhatsApp managed to enable e2e while already being owned by facebook. It probably won't last, but to me that demonstrates a commitment to security and privacy on the part of the WhatsApp team.
That's an important part of getting step 3 to happen.
You need proof of regret, and $800 million seems to have been enough. Cheap money if you can make step 4 happen such that it nets more than 0.8 billion.
They incorporated Signal as a nonprofit, so it is illegal for anybody to personally profit from the sale of Signal. Of course, that hasn't always stopped people from trying (eg, the recent debacle with the .org tld).
Given that Brian Acton apparently "left over a dispute with Facebook regarding monetization of WhatsApp, and voluntarily left $850 million in unvested options on the table by leaving a few months before vesting was completed"[0] and that he went on to found the Signal Foundation one year later with Moxie Marlinspike in 2018, I feel it's not a super clear signal that Acton or Marlinspike are trying to "sell" Signal.
Okay, but still. It seems like a stretch that the guy is secretly evil but voluntarily gave up almost $1 billion to deceptively prove he's not actually a bad guy. You can claim to be a good guy and wait a few months to cash out - leaving money on the table IS a real signal, even if he's already rich.
Depends on if he actually left money on the table or if he speculated that there would be more money coming to him if he publicly left FB when he did.
Social/public good will is a kind of money itself that can't easily be measured in dollars. That's a big part of the reason extremely wealthy people engage in philanthropy.
Good will is a currency that opens some doors that no amount of raw dollars can open.
I can't imagine they intend to sell Signal but then when I say "they" it's always been a stand in for Marlinspike. We can only hope he's correct in terms of the team he's built continuing the mission that had formerly been guided by his judgment.
