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by joshwarwick1518 hours ago |
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upvoteby batuhanicoz18 hours ago|
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The way I would put it as someone who works at Beeper is: only use messaging automations for personal use, and don't use it to spam anyone or do anything you wouldn't do yourself within the app.

As long as you don't abuse and keep your usage within the parameters of any human, you'll be fine.

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upvoteby theoryaway9 hours ago|
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Someone who previously helped a project Barista/instagrabber, you should be wary of it.

https://web.archive.org/web/20240527132615/https://austinhua...

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upvoteby fg1379 hours ago|
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That's quite... something.

I (almost) don't use any Meta products, but this just convinces me that I should stay away from it as far as possible.

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upvoteby sigmoid1018 hours ago|
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...until Meta decides they want to offer this kind of thing themselves and ban everyone else. Building your SaaS on top of someone else's SaaS is always a gamble, especially if said product is directly sold to users already and not a pure b2b intermediate.
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upvoteby joshwarwick1518 hours ago|
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They're already outright banning many OpenClaw usecases via their official API: https://techcrunch.com/2025/10/18/whatssapp-changes-its-term...
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upvoteby trashb14 hours ago|
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Since recently Meta offers this as per European Union mandate (Digital Markets Act, DMA). For both Whatsapp and Facebook messaging. [0]

Now there are a lot of implementation requirements, basically forcing you to have some kind of messaging provider. Therefore difficult to apply for an open source solution. However there is such an interface.

[0] https://developers.facebook.com/m/messaging-interoperability...

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upvoteby NoahZuniga18 hours ago|
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Meta already has a whatsapp api product
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upvoteby TeMPOraL17 hours ago|
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For spammers.

They don't have one for regular people who want to do regular end-user computation.

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upvoteby kamma44347 hours ago|
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I personally find the almost absence of spam on WhatsApp a big success story for it. Think about how much Spam still hits your email inbox (and nobody knows how much is filtered away before it does).

I totally understand why they try and make it hard for integration to happen. When compared to classic SMS, the fact that you need to start a conversation with a preapproved template means that they have a way to control casual interactions.

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upvoteby pancsta16 hours ago|
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Companies in spain use it for legitimate reasons, so its more a lack of usage which makes spam the only usage?
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upvoteby TeMPOraL16 hours ago|
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I consider marketing use to be spam, and this is what the API is primarily meant for.

I understand that WhatsApp is kinda special in that it effectively replaced SMS in some parts of the world, but IMO this needs to be looked at through the lens of other Meta effort. The same is the case with Facebook/Messenger, and has been since before WhatsApp has been a (Meta) thing - they offer multiple different official ways to support spamming users and tricking them to buy stuff, but may the Lord have mercy on you should you want to create an auto-responder or "save to calendar" script and hook it up to your personal account.

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upvoteby filcuk16 hours ago|
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Who mentioned marketing? It's used for package tracking, order updates, bookings and so on where I live.
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upvoteby TeMPOraL13 hours ago|
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Not where I live, presumably not in the US, and it doesn't look like the main use case emphasized in the developer/integration documentation.
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upvoteby c0balt14 hours ago|
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That seems a but pessimistic. A few companies use it for customer service, like ime Adidas Germany [0] (they handled an exchange for me once on there). It is effectively just another customer support line like a chat portal on a website.

[0]: https://www.adidas.de/en/help/contact-us

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upvoteby nurettin11 hours ago|
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Personal use is all fun and games until your little beeper goes into a loop.
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upvoteby swyx10 hours ago|
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just so we know the consequences - is ban permanent? is there an appeals processes?
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upvoteby pedroslopez8 hours ago|
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When banned it'll give you means to reach out to support, you can claim ignorance and get unbanned. I've gone through this, having done some whatsapp automation myself, YMMV though.
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upvoteby swyx8 hours ago|
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very helpful, thanks. good on WA for providing actually working support. people will fuck up when testing legitimate stuff, it happens.
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