We use Telegram for daily communication in general and teaching online courses in particular. We use Telegram for family, friends, people, communities and classrooms. We address why do we use Telegram in this article.

Free software

Telegram is free software licensed under GNU General Public License. As a member of free software community, this reason is always our priority. This alone is basically enough.

Desktop application

We want software running inside our computer to be free. Telegram is available as a desktop application we can run on desktop and laptop computers and not just mobile version. This makes us could modernly chat in group in freedom back in 2014 when we had only a laptop and no phone. We said modern ways meaning not IRC-like but WhatsApp-like.

History

Telegram is the earliest free software alternative to WhatsApp. We did use Telegram for communication, teaching and profit since 2014. No other free software alternative predated Telegram at that time (XMPP was clearly not an option). By alternatives we mean Element, DeltaChat, XMPP, Jami, Tox etc.

People and community

Telegram has the one thing we need, that is, people and community — and especially in the country where we live, Indonesia. No other free software alternatives have it. This reason is superior to technological ones like choosing XMPP instead.

Multiplatform, multidevice

Telegram is a complete alternative to WhatsApp as it has all versions –Desktop, Android, iOS, Web– and surpasses it as Telegram supports multidevice as well as multiaccount. It means, one account can login on many laptops then receive and send messages simultaneously altogether — the same does if you have even more devices.

Features

No other free software alternative today offers complete features of Telegram as the following:

• Fast
• Group chat
• Private and public groups
• Channels
• Fine privacy controls in group
• Phone number identity
• Simple identity link
• Simple group link
• Identity link has nice web page
• Edit message
• Delete message
• File sharing
• Voice call
• Video call
• Video conference
• Screen sharing (works in all devices)
• Chat history
• Export chat
• Multidevice
• Multiaccount

We Migrated People

We already led people more than a thousand to switch from WhatsApp to Telegram. We are doing it and we will do more. Our computer course is running on Telegram. We witness that people are very easy to attend, communicate and participate this way. If someone wants people to switch away from Telegram, simply do the same like us and see if people will attend.

We Teach

If you are a teacher, you will need something like WhatsApp or Telegram to quickly communicate with fellow teachers and students. By a quick evaluation, of course we choose Telegram because it is free software. We are lucky that since its first release, people reception had been very good and now even more people use Telegram today. We are a teacher and we need Telegram.

Luck

Luck is a criterion many people seem to be missed when evaluating a technology. If the other alternatives already came back in 2014 starting in equal with Telegram, we believe they will not see the same success as Telegram. XMPP predates Telegram but unfortunately it lacks luck. We say that Telegram is lucky.

Why We Don’t Switch Away

We don’t leave Telegram for any other alternatives because we work on it already, we do not need another alternative at the moment to be frank, the worries do not happen (we wish they never do) and the real reason is there is no other one better than Telegram today. See also Justifying Shortcomings.

Justifying Shortcomings

Centralization. A few people see that using telegram is not right just because they say it is centralized, not decentralized, not federated as in networking architecture. We reply with we –together with many of other people– use what we need, we evaluate a solution based on our needs and Telegram as a free software does fulfill our needs.

Private server software. Another small group of people say that telegram server software is proprietary or nonfree. That’s incorrect. We reply that it is private software, we cannot force anyone to publish their private software, and it is unethical to do so, and using Telegram does not imply us being a nonfree software user.

Security. Some people criticize the security aspects of Telegram and we say their criticism were correct, we don’t reject their reasonings. However, another free software alternatives also have their own security issues, and the security worries of the critics did not happen, so we keep using Telegram. (Note: to be fair, proprietary software messengers do not have security at fundamental level so we do not choose them since the beginning).

Phone number and privacy. Some people criticize the privacy aspects of Telegram and we say they are also correct. For example, Telegram uses phone number as user identity is a privacy concern to them. We reply that all people and organizations in the world use phone numbers, had been for many decades, and still be for unforeseen years ahead and we cannot hope to stop that. Phone numbers are extremely useful for example to find your family, teachers and students. It is a feature, not a shortcoming. If other messengers can create modern messaging without one, we’d love first to see if it is succeeded or not. As a benchmark, we’d love to first see it surpasses the number of users of LINE in Japan or WeChat in China.

Answering Future Issues

Sustainability. Some persons worry for the future of each communication software like Telegram. Their reasonings vary from citing centralization, security, phone number and privacy issues, single company and some others. We do not need to reply seriously because all technologies have the same problem that is none can guarantee their future. With the solution we have now, Telegram, we do our job and we will do it well.

Alternatives. As for alternatives to Telegram, since long ago, we also had considered ones such as Element Messenger (which is based on Matrix) and more lately DeltaChat (which is based on email) and we will move on if only these worries became reality and force us to do so. Remember that this kind of move is very hard as many people should migrate altogether and not just us alone.

Conclusion

That’s all the reasons why do we use Telegram. We address 8 reasons above, which are, free software, desktop, history, people, multidevice, features, migration and luck. We wish the best for Telegram and for the worries to never reach it because it benefits many people and give them freedom they deserve. For people who criticize Telegram but never use it, we suggest you to try it out either by borrowing someone else’s or simply installing it on your own. We also wish you success. Last but not least, we are human and we may be right and may be wrong, and this article is purely our opinion that can change over time. See you later.