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[–] Awoo@hexbear.net [S] 25 points 6 months ago* (2 children)

Not an experience that is ever going to find mass appeal. It's good for security but it's not going to get wide adoption like this.

I am not looking for the most secure one, I'm looking for what's most likely to get adopted at scale. I have ruled matrix options out. What matters is community adoptions, subreddits that make a discord, twitch streamers that make a discord, patreons that make a discord, youtubers that make a discord. The next app that is mass adopted will be determined by these communities coalescing around an alternative and making the switch.

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[–] lapis@hexbear.net 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 child)

realistically, they’re mostly going to grumble about ID verification but ultimately stay on Discord, for the same reasons people are still using the likes of Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

I will say, every encryption issue I’ve encountered has been fixable either by giving it a moment to think or by restarting my chat client, which isn’t too different from when Discord has periodic blips.

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[–] Awoo@hexbear.net [S] 2 points 6 months ago*

I don't think so. Groups that want to chat go where community leadership determines they go. If people want to participate in the x twitch streamer's off-stream chat they are forced to go where that community decides to be. They do not have to follow an audience by going to discord, they make the audience go where they prefer. They don't get the audience from discord, discord gets the audience from them.

For this reason chat programs are uniquely vulnerable to people going elsewhere. They have no inherent audience of their own, they are not social networks, they are tools and they can be replaced by another tool at literally any moment. People will run discord and an alternative side by side until they can drop discord altogether. That's exactly how other chat tools died historically as well.

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[–] spectre@hexbear.net 13 points 6 months ago (6 children)

matrix uses a security protocol that sometimes has an absolute meltdown, leading to people not being able to see or send certain messages once the encryption breaks. Good for secure messaging (because messages stay encrypted), but it is frustrating to deal with, and will turn people away (including me).
element doss not support multiple accounts and has no plan to do so. I hear that other apps may support it, but I'm not sure what the current status of that is.

Messaging particularly benefits from a smooth UX and I think matrix has accepted certain trade offs for the aspects it's strong in.

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[+] Inui@hexbear.net 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

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[–] spectre@hexbear.net 5 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 child)

Right that's the vibe I have too. I've heard deltachat is a decent replacement for self-hosted messaging.

Edit: after reading more about deltachat, it seems like it is pretty well suited to being Hexbear's main messenger instead of matrix, no? It is almost a Signal replacement where I don't need a phone number to sign up.

I might give it a go, but it sounds like it isn't a replacement for a heavy duty messenger like Discord/Slack, unforuntately.

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[+] Inui@hexbear.net 5 points 6 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

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[–] lapis@hexbear.net 5 points 6 months ago (1 child)

Delta Chat looks fascinating, it’s literally email-based with some extra bits and bobs to make it behave like chat software.

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[+] Inui@hexbear.net 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

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[–] lapis@hexbear.net 3 points 6 months ago

Matrix’s UX has a bit of friction, but that’s the cost of an open, federated, encrypted platform where you own your own encryption keys. Every closed-source, centralized alternative is very much a “trust me bro” situation when it comes to message encryption and backdoors.

Element sucks as a client, I always recommend FluffyChat or SchildiChat to first-timers. On desktop/web, Cinny and Commet are fantastic options for people who want a Discord-like UI.

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[–] peeonyou@hexbear.net 3 points 6 months ago (1 child)

i hate matrix.. its an unintuitive mess. we need more of an IRC type experience rather than that jumbled mess of whatever its trying to do

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[–] lapis@hexbear.net 1 point 6 months ago*

I don’t understand this take, I have two matrix accounts in different servers and have played with a handful of clients, and the only issues I’ve run into have been either of my own making or due to impatience.