Seems morbid but my guess is that they died. Would be a shame, since their family should have it, but it makes the most sense to me.

At least that's how I'd like to think of it, otherwise some poor sod is having to think about this every single day.

Not really! After I realized I had lost my wallet, I just went out and bought more bitcoins. So I predict most of these people that lost that wallet in 2011 don't have a zero balance today.

Hm, but it's using the same phone number so I think that the Sim will register with the Sim in your phone. Setup will all have to be done from your phone.

I don't think that you will need a new plan, I think that it will use your current plan.

Or did I get the wrong end of the stick?

Yes, constantly adding new innovative features which WhatsApp will then copy. Today is video messages, which look great.

Have the option of secret chats, which I believe is proper E2EE. But to be honest, this isn't my biggest worry anyway.

Can join plenty of communities for lots of discussion.

Great searching features for old conversations.

Desktop client is great and available for Linux. Also supports voice calling now from desktop.

But most importantly, you can have more than one device per phone number! Crazy, right?!