Signal stories shows what I want social media to be
On July 11, 2025 by Sosthène Guédon
I initially didn't understand the point of stories in apps like WhatsApp or Snapchat. I never really used any app with such a feature. Three years ago, my messaging application of choice Signal added a stories feature and their implementation makes me think that an instant messaging app like Signal could actually fill the exact use-cases that social media like Facebook are trying (and failing) to fill.
Stories
The application I use mostly for instant messaging is Signal. It's Open Source, pushes the state of the art in matters of privacy and end-to-end encryption all while being amongst the simplest applications to use.
In 2022, Signal introduced a stories feature. This feature allows users to show in a separate tab a picture (or a link) for 24 hours to their contacts. The implementation is very similar to the stories features in Snapchat or WhatsApp.
Signal allows users to select precisely who will receive the story, and users can very easily change the list of recipients for every single story. This is unlike other implementations that expect users to have only one set of recipients that changes rarely, and that users would send their stories to all recipients. This means that with Signal stories, users have a lot of control about what they share and with whom. One can send pretty personal stuff to just their family and close friends, while also using the Stories feature for more silly things like dog pictures to everyone they talk to 1.
I initially didn't think I would use this feature, as the 24 hour expiry felt designed to keep people hooked and coming back to the application. I still liked being able to share unimportant stuff like dog pictures without notifying and interrupting anyone. If they see it nice, it can even spark a conversation. If they don't no worries, since I only ever share non-important stuff through stories.
I really like the idea of having a channel to share information with friends and family that is truly asynchronous, but the 24 hour window makes it useless for things that I don't necessarily want to be ephemeral. The image-only format also doesn't help. Let me write long text!
What use case I want Signal stories to fill
I would love to have something that is as private and granular as Signal stories, but suited for more "important" information, that I don't want to be ephemeral.
"Classical" social media like Facebook are supposed to be designed for that, but there is not a chance I ever use them. They are almost all built by very privacy invasive corporations and instead of being designed to keep track of your friends and family they are designed to suck you in to waste time looking at advertisement. There are open source social networks, but they are not privacy focused in the sense that they don't have End-to-end encryption and are geared towards public rather than private posts.
One promising project was Circles, but it sadly has stopped being developed2.
On the other hand, Signal almost has everything I want:
- (almost) everyone I care about is on Signal
- Signal already has a story feature with the granularity I want
- Signal has a very strong commitment to privacy
- Signal's major competitor WhatsApp is more and more becoming a social-media type of application. The addition of unidirectional channels in WhatsApp, which are only used by influencers and of a pointless AI chatbot is a good opportunity for Signal to stand out by offering features designed to improve connections with the people you care about, and not try to bring advertisements as close as possible to your intimate conversations.
How I think Signal stories could be adapted for that
I think Signal stories could be adapted to fill that use case. In my hopes, the 24 hour expiry would be opt-out, and it would be possible to write non-ephemeral stories (let's call them "story entries"). Story entries would be text-first, but could support images as attachments like normal messages do. They would use the same audience selection mechanism as ephemeral stories do.
Story entries would also show up in the "stories" tab, but when clicking on it, they would not open 30s-per image viewer that normal stories have. Instead, they would go to a special section of the sender's profile, where there is a form of "channel" that looks like a normal 1 to 1 conversation (kind of like telegram channel), where you can see all past story entries from that sender. You would not be able to reply in the channel, but you would be able to reply to individual stories in your 1-to-1 conversation with the sender, just like you can with ephemeral stories.
Once read, the story entry would be removed from the story tab (or maybe moved in a second section of the tab, below unread and ephemeral stories), but would still be available by going through the profile of the sender. You would see all the story entries that the sender has sent to you.
Such a feature would replace most needs for facebook-style social media. It seems to me perfect to be able to share stuff with my friends and family, and to get news from my friends and family.
Some edited screenshots to capture the idea better:
Unread story entries show up in the "stories" tab, and a new button allows creating story entries:
Story entries from a specific sender would always be available by going on the sender's profile:
Story entries would display a flow of normal messages, supporting text, audio, image and videos
It would be possible to reply to a given story entry in the 1-to-1 conversation with the sender, as it is possible to do with stories. Emoji reactions could also be supported
Addressing concerns
I see a couple of concerns coming with such a feature.
Signal is not social media
This is a response that often shows up in the Signal community forums to feature requests. It also was the response of many when Stories were first introduced. I disagree, Signal is a social application. Signal is used for social connections with other people. Tools that are used to connect to other people do have their place in Signal.
Such a story feature would not have the issues that come with "social media":
- There would be no need for any recommendation algorithm The app would still only shows you what people sent to you. No need for a smart system to bring up story entries in an algorithmic feed. Past story entries would only show up if you're looking for them
- There would be no need for moderation The story entry feature I suggest would not require any moderation that current stories and message request don't handle. Just as stories, story entries would not show up if you have not yet exchanged messages with the sender.
- There would be no clout-chasing, or "content discovery" Since the sender is responsible for selecting who will receive the story entry, amongst the people with whom they are already in contact there can be no chasing audience numbers. It would only be there to help you keep touch with people you know.
Why not just send messages
I don't necessarily want to send a notification to everyone any time I want to share with my family how I liked a book I just read. Also sending messages would mean having to manually send the same message to each person I want to talk to. That's not very practical. Signal also prevents you from transferring the same message to more than 5 people at a time to prevent spam.
The story entries feature on the other hand would simply allow you to use the story recipient lists to have this feature.
Why not create a group with all the recipients
One of the nice features of Signal stories is that you can easily change who the recipients are for each story. I want the same granularity for the story entries, and having many groups depending on the type of story entry would be annoying, and difficult to explain. Also having everyone I talk to seeing each others in a group would be weird.
I really hope Signal makes this possible. I'll soon be starting a bike trip for 2 weeks. I want my friends to be able to see my progress over the trip, picture and stuff, but I don't want to flood them with notifications. For me, today, there is no good solution for that. An extension to Signal stories would solve that.
Why not create and use a dedicated app ?
Since what I'm suggesting would not create notifications, people would just forget to check it, making it useless. However, if it's part of Signal's story feature, it would still show up as a simple red dot to users when they open Signal (which most people around me do regularly).
Signal needs a feature to distinguish it from its competitors
Right now, besides the privacy benefits and the Open Source nature of Signal, which are very intangible, Signal does not distinguish itself from any competitor on the feature front.
Its main competitor WhatsApp, which I'm trying to get the few remaining groups who use it to migrate, has a couple features that Signal doesn't (polls, communities and pinned messages). Having a privacy preserving, enhanced stories feature in Signal, without any dark pattern, could make it stand out!