Ali Hasan
When Elon Musk says something, the world listens and responds. Same was the case when he tweeted “Use Signal”. As soon as he tweeted this, everyone started downloading and installing Signal app. His influence is so damn strong that the app crashed due to millions of people downloading the app at the same time.
After his tweet, the number of the application has skyrocketed and more than 100,000 users have downloaded it from the Apple and Google application stores, in the last 2 days, according to Sensor Tower data.
In fact, a large number of requests caused the platform to crash momentarily and the verification codes for its download were delayed, however, it was solved quickly and users “should no longer have problems joining”.
Signal responded following the overwhelming response and said in a tweet “Verification codes are currently delayed across several providers because so many new people are trying to join Signal right now (we can barely register our excitement). We are working with carriers to resolve this as quickly as possible. Hang in there.”
Signal is a well-known privacy-focused messaging app that is widely used by security experts, privacy researchers, academics, and journalists around the world. The Signal protocol also underpins WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption, although one key difference is that Signal is open source, while WhatsApp is not.
The original tweet that created hype was regarding WhatsApp’s policy change move that caused quite a stir, with reports claiming that it makes sharing data with Facebook mandatory. However, WhatsApp has issued an official statement clarifying that its data-sharing practices with Facebook have not changed. The changes were to go into effect in February 2021 but now it will be implemented later in 2021.
On the other hand, Elon Musk’s tweet proved helpful for another company that too has name Signal. Signal Advance which is a small component manufacturer was influenced by Musk’s tweet and saw their stock prices on cloud 9.
On January 11, the stock rose 438% and reached a high of $70.85, up from a closing price of 60 cents on Jan. 6, a day before Musk’s tweet. Signal Advance, which reported receiving no revenue in 2015 and 2016, is now worth more than $3 billion.
The buying fever that began soon after Musk’s remark illustrates an occasional issue in public markets of people investing in the wrong companies by mistake.
A similar case played out in 2019 as some people bought shares of Zoom Technologies, whose ticker symbol was ZOOM but was not the trendy video-calling service Zoom Video Communications, which trades under the symbol ZM. Last year the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission stopped trading of Zoom Technologies, partly because of confusion over its connection with Zoom Video.
Have you downloaded Signal or Telegram yet? Do tell us in the comments as your comments are valuable for us. These are the 2 potential apps that could replace WhatsApp as the primary messaging platform for millions of people.
