Why Telegram became impossible to use. Durov, return the messenger

In two days it will be exactly 10 years since I registered in the “cart”. Considering that the first mass version of this messenger appeared in August 2013, we can say that I have seen the entire development path of these children of Pavel Durov to the present day. Over the years, Telegram gradually replaced ICQ in my smartphone, then WhatsApp, then there was an attempt to evaluate Viber, how many messengers there were – I don’t even remember.

Compared to all of them, Telegram offered a laconic interface, installation of the client on any device with any operating system, file transfer, etc. Well, audio calls are also a good feature. This set was enough to defeat all other, less convenient analogues, and even encourage others to correspond only in the “cart”.

Now it’s 2023, and I’m spending time trying to figure out how the newly efficient Telegram will show me a previously hidden story. At the same time, I read notifications that a live broadcast has started in one channel, a drawing for premium subscriptions in others, and in a third…

Okay, stop. “cart” from a convenient messenger, whose main function was to EXCHANGE TEXT COMMUNICATIONS, has turned into an estate of social networks, YouTube, TikTok and Insta (banned in Russia)?

Don’t change everything in one application

Viber interface. Blood from the eyes.

Several years ago, when Viber appeared on my iPhone, I remember my feelings from using this messenger: irritation.

After the laconic interface of the “cart” and even “Whatsapp”, Viber looked like a madhouse: advertising, some kind of connections, animated stickers, emojis and gifs, inconvenient navigation through chats, the main thing is a constant avalanche of spam in all possible forms, from messages. to calls within the application.

I remember that it was enough for me for a day. Then I turned off all notifications from Viber and did not access it for about a month. Then I went in and was horrified by the amount of unread spam that had accumulated, among which it was completely impossible to find important messages.

And then I got angry because of the impossibility of the requirements, why didn’t I look at it, that the application icon on the iPhone desktop stubbornly shows something unread).

Even if you don’t have any unread messages, notifications on the icon will still appear. I just released a new sticker pack and you should know about it.

With a light heart, I deleted and forgot forever about this monster, which Frankenstein himself envied.

Yes, the owner of Viber, the Japanese company Rakuten, has relied on the “all-in-one” principle, when the user’s attention is not limited only to text correspondence with real people. But for me personally, this was inconvenient, because for watching videos there is YouTube and TikTok, for photos and constant videos – my own social network.

It has always been believed that a messenger needs to write or talk to the recipient of a message and receive a response from him in the same format as soon as possible. All.

The main problem with Viber was that its capabilities slowed me down from why I opened it in the first place. This is why we never managed to become friends.

And now exactly the same thing is happening in Telegram. I log in for the purpose of messaging, but I spend a lot more time there, studying unread messages from various channels and viewing history circles.

Yes, sometimes it happens through the use of activities and I learn something new. But mostly it’s just information noise that I could easily do without.

You can unsubscribe from all channels, prohibit sending yourself audio messages and video circles. But there’s still no escape from the flow of content – friends from your contact list will continue to repost memes, pictures and other garbage, because they are not original from anyone.

Why Telegram stopped being a messenger and turned into a monster

From the point of view of developing the project and maintaining it, the creators and developers of the “cart” are doing everything just fine. Because the user simply cannot just log in, read a message from a person and immediately leave. Something will definitely distract his attention.

You watch an endless feed of news and stories, everything is in a fogyou come to your senses in half an hour. You let people who run telegram channels earn money, raised the rating of the application itself among popular messengers, but lost your time. What did you want to write? And to whom? Oh, never mind, I already forgot.

Don’t distract attention, so stories.

It’s a shame that, together with Telegram, this is still the most convenient client for exchanging messages and files, so I don’t want to give it up and switch to WhatsApp. And study some less popular analogue that is used three cripplesit makes no sense.

Anyway, no one will download and register in an incomprehensible messenger just to send a few messages. There is a cart for this.

Judging by the popularity, Telegram engineers managed to implement the all-in-one format in a way that we like. But here I am, part of this very essence, and I want to say openly that no, dear Pasha Durov, I personally don’t like it at all. I would have preferred the old cart functionality from 2016, when the limit of innovation was the ability to send messages.

At that time, no one asked to add tons of functions, which today you just need to understand, but they need to be studied for a long time and carefully, reading guides and technical materials.

Sorry, it came out

I have been sitting in the “cart” for 10 years. I can say dissatisfaction.

It is impossible to turn back time, as well as the impossibility of developing Telegram. The authorities can appreciate themselves as much as possible from the flow of information messages, but stopping using the “cart” is simply unrealistic.

Sometimes I remember the best messenger, whose name was QiP (old one here?). Next to it was a text input field and an emoticon selection icon. And that’s all, this was enough to be a cool messaging app.

Yes, I myself record voices and circles in the “cart”, and often send files. I consider this a normal extension of functionality. But everything else, quotes, stories, gifs, advertising for non-premium users, the very idea of ​​premium subscriptions and other bells and whistles – personally, I would do just fine in Telegram without all this.

Did you ask for the wall back in 2010? The place for all those memes, in the form of turning the “cart” into one big wall with a bunch of information, pictures and inscriptions, turned out to be really scary.

Do you agree? Let’s check: