I installed Signal a while back and tried to convince as many people as possible to switch. But only 7 people in my contact list have Signal installed. Even when communicating with those 7 people i tend to use WhatsApp because i tend to process all my messages at once without switching apps.
My strategy is to use it for planning birthday parties. Gets lots of people in for planning big group "secrets", and then they stick with the app afterwards.
I'm doing the same, and I only have 10 people. They happen to be my favorite 10 people, but still only 10.
I think Signal or something of that nature will be the ultimate endgame for communication systems. They're way too easy to make, they're cheap to maintain, and they're hard to monetize without being scummy. This is the perfect formula for a non-profit to step in. I think the WhatsApp founders alone could maintain a worldwide textual communication network for the rest of their lives using a small fraction of their wealth.
It seems to be inevitable that the "scummy" ones finish first. Deskop Linux could have been more popular than Windows, GIMP more popular than Photoshop and Signal more popular than WhatsApp if only they where first. But the Open Source world always lags behind when it comes to developing new stuff for ordinary consumers.
