We’re rather large fans of Telegram; we use it to communicate amongst ourselves, to plan story ideas, and just to shoot the breeze. So much so, in fact, that a good many of us have convinced family, friends and significant others to use it as well, to keep things under one easy-to-use interface. Telegram continues to develop, and each new release makes it more powerful, and more cool.
Telegram has already instituted things like an easy bot interface (which we use quite a lot with our own Ausdroid bot!), stickers, secure chats and more, and the new Channels feature is kind of cool. Telegram has always had a broadcast messages function, but it was kind of restrictive; there were limits on user numbers, they weren’t public, and … well, they simply weren’t very useful.
Telegram Channels are a bit more useful. For starters, there’s no user limit; you could have 9,000 people watching a channel. They’re public, so anyone can join one, and with a permanent URL they’re easy for others to discover, too. The nomenclature might be a bit confusing though; most people would probably associate Channel with a two way communications path, however that’s not the case. These are purely broadcast-only channels, where information can be pushed to large numbers of users easily. Think of it more like a Pushbullet-type channel, and less an IRC channel (for those who are old enough to know what that is).
Other features included in this update are enhanced notifications for our iOS using friends, and an improved photo editor for them as well (which we’ve been enjoying on Android for a while now). Telegram is free and open-source, so give it a try if you haven’t yet.
Are you a Telegram user? What’s the best feature for you?
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Why should I leave Whatsapp for this? What value-add does Telegram bring to the table?
What a good idea for a story.
IT’s proper cross platform multi sign-on, pc, chrome plugins. p2p encryption. has a nicer and easier interface than wattsapp – only real downside i can see is no phone calls.
I seamlessly transition from Work PC, Phone, tablet, Home PC – it’s great – even the inline Photos suit my work flow. Notifications at the right grain.
Ultimately you will be where you social group is. Mine have all moved to telegram and it’s ACE.
Would choose this over Wattsapp any day (also use watsapp for some stragglers like family).