&gt;  If I don&#x27;t trust Signal to host my communication reliably, I want to pick my own provider... whilst still being able to talk to other Signal users.<p>I couldn&#x27;t agree more. And it&#x27;s not just a matter of trusting the host. It&#x27;s a matter of trusting and liking the clients. If e-mail were hotmail only, I&#x27;d hate it. But it&#x27;s not. E-mail is thousands of clients on dozens of operating systems, which can <i>all</i> talk to each other. Signal, hah, it doesn&#x27;t even work on my phone, and there aren&#x27;t even dozens of phone operating systems out there.