Fluxer is AGPv3, recently promised to remove their CLA so the software stays free forever, has an ambitious roadmap with federation, and is currently being worked on by one 22 yr old dude.

It's very different than Discord.

This chad needs help. I'm more than happy to support him. This is an investment in Open Source™ and the future. If he can't work on this full-time or near full-time, he's gonna need to work for Google or some shit. Then it's never going to be able to compete with Discord.

They're also not going to be able to run Fluxer on powerful enough hardware. Take a look at Stoat. Similar idea. No funding. Their main server is HELLA slow, which I don't think it's their fault. The app is written in Rust, but it feels like it's running on a potato.

paywalling features that other platforms don’t

I might be wrong here, but I thought you could self-host Fluxer to get around the paywalls. So you could do that. What a gift! And federation is on the way, so maybe one day you can self-host AND talk to other instances! Amazing!