You currently need a phone number to sign up for Telegram. Add an option to sign up using an email address or another method, like some messengers do (e.g., Wire, Matrix, Threema, Session).
Potential spam issues could be mitigated by:
Only allowing addresses from major email providers at first and slowly expanding reach if it's manageable.
Automatically limiting such accounts from contacting strangers until their perform some additional actions.
Allowing group admins to prevent such accounts from posting by default.
Use Cases
Avoiding an identifier tied to your identity, hiding identity from governments or people who know your number.
Workaround
Use a virtual phone number.
Warning: Do NOT use temporary numbers to connect to your account, as you may lose access to your account when you lose access to the number.
I have an idea: Telegram could also lift all restrictions on accounts created without a phone number if they purchase something for a certain amount of stars to prove that they are not bots.
Yeah, at that point Telegram will become kinda pay-to-use, but at least you'll be able to get rid of the need to link your phone number to your account
Well, you already can do that with anonymous numbers on Telegram's fragment.com, but for TONs
How good it was if such a cat was on Threema ID card 0518d61b08748bd8d2bda51eca26095b8f586141588e7c5dcda10532e70aeda00b That's exactly why I'm asking this, what can I do here in any Profession? I'll throw off your photo and create a new account and put a name on your Photo and a Turk if it's a Cat, so I can't just do that! If you understand me!
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Yeah, at that point Telegram will become kinda pay-to-use, but at least you'll be able to get rid of the need to link your phone number to your account
Well, you already can do that with anonymous numbers on Telegram's fragment.com, but for TONs
That's exactly why I'm asking this, what can I do here in any Profession? I'll throw off your photo and create a new account and put a name on your Photo and a Turk if it's a Cat, so I can't just do that! If you understand me!