Signal allows you to speak confidentially, therefore it is private. It is not, by default, anonymous. Yes, this plus the centralized server mean that potentially dangerous metadata, like relationship maps, can be collected. All indications are this isn't the case, but that's not something you can count on.

If you need anonymity, which you probably do at least a bit, use simplex. And yes, having more people using anonymous services like simplex is a good thing for the community as a whole. That said, I'm not going to try to convince all of my friends to use simplex. It's just too far from the mainstream, missing too many features. Signal is a sufficient compromise for most people, and it's sufficient for me for most purposes.

Here, go argue with this guy for a few weeks, and give us a break for a while.

Privacy and anonymity is different things

You can use whatever app you like, but I think this adds confusion.

Signal is private because no one can see your messages except the people you are messaging. The government can't, Signal themselves can't.

Signal is not anonymous only in the sense that the government can check if you use Signal. That's it. They can tell if you use Signal. They can't link messages to your number in any way through data requests, etc.

Not forcing anyone to use Signal, but if you choose to, you can know it is private.

(So this post is confusing privacy with anonimity basically)

This thread shows the success of Signal's PR campaigns, and how a shiny app can get people to overlook all the privacy concerns. They're just as successful as Apple at getting people to think that a US-based corporation hosted on Amazon's servers and subject to national security letters, whose privacy model is "just trust us with your phone number", is in any way secure.

Signal is private, what you should differentiate is being anonymous or not. Using your usual phone number is NOT Anonymous but is PRIVATE, as in the content of your messages being only available to you and the person you're talking to

The way you get a phone number depends on you too, so you can be very much be Anonymous even if signal requires a phone number.

Started to write a long paragraph to explain the difference between privacy and anonymity but I now believe this new user is (no idea why) collecting engagement via rage bait. I won't participate in their posts anymore.

It might even come from a good place, namely trying to always do "better" and be "more private" but in practice it's just lead to confusion.