Discord was already succumbing to enshitification. Now with their intention to be owned by Wall Street, that trajectory will certainly accelerate at warp speed once the change of hands happens.
Anyone already get ahead of this and find a solid alternative?
Right now I’m on the fence between Element for Matrix, and Revolt. Both seem to have their pros and cons and I can’t find a clear “winner”.
Ever looked up XMPP ?
And Snikket for super-easy setup and management
mumble is great for VOIP.
Matrix seems interesting, but i think it might be a little bit too heavy handed, im not personally a fan of web tech, though there are other things like xmpp as well.
revolt is meh, apparently their dev team is hostile to self hosting, so there’s that. There’s also spacebar, which is a reverse engineered implementation of the discord API, could be interesting.
Can you elaborate on what you mean by web tech? I don’t know much about how matrix works
a lot of modern technology and software is built on the foundation of work built by the web browser industry, it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not necessarily a good thing either. Provides a lot of nice features, native integration into a web browser, industry standard security and encryption procedures.
That’s about it though, Outside of that, running a dedicated version of that app is almost always some bullshit built in electron, which is a horrible buggy mess with horrible performance. Nothing stops devs from integrating these features into a standalone application… But, they likely won’t since they’ve already developed a web browser version.
I also have some problems with the way web tech is generally built, it’s built with the expectation that you will host and treat it as a web app, which is fine, it works. But i prefer not to host services i use via anything web related as generally i find it both intrusive, and problematic, in the instance that a DNS server goes down for example. (it’s not very likely, i know, but still)
I also think a lot of the networking protocols are fairly bloated, but that’s not as big of a deal, it’s just annoying.
anyway, enough of my ranting. Matrix is actually a specification for a set of communication protocols based on the foundation of web tech, it’s highly universal, and inter-compatible, which is great. But it sort of stops there. There are several server implementations, and numerous front end implementations, none of which seem to be particularly, interesting. There’s numerous electron front ends, a few that aren’t (though they won’t support most features) etc, stuff like that, it’s just. Not clean.
Way too few mentions of Jitsi.
I use it with friends, it has good server config, and I’m pushing it on businesses.
they are owned by a Nasdaq-listed company. does that not the defeat the purpose when OP is trying to avoid Wall Street-ownership?
Discord is a completely proprietary walled-garden that bans third-party clients to maintain full control AND (soon) has Wall-Street-ownership.
Jitsi is open-source built with multiple open protocols BUT has Wall-Street-ownership.
Neither is great, but these are two distinctly different situations.
Just self-host it? It’s open-source, that will last you a lifetime.
Explain more of this Jitsi, sounds interesting for my business
It’s voice and video calling with chat and screensharing. I intend to use it for a language school. It’s extendable, for instance you can also self-host a whiteboard, where everyone can draw. You can see the drawing in real time, which is good for asian languages, where direction of the stroke is important.
Free, open-source, packaged in Debian, runs without issues, used it with friends for multi-hour voice chats during gaming nights.
On the server you can configure things like FPS for screenshare. I have yet to adjust that and try streaming video/game through it.
This does sound extremely useful and good.
I’d say the only issues software like this have is there’s a lack of beginners guides to self hosting, so people either know too little and instantly have their server botted / hacked, or know enough to be too paranoid and afraid to set up their own server because they know of the risks.
As for me though, I’ll probably look into implementing this and play around with it for our DnD group first.
That sounds great, let me know how it works for you.
There is also BigBlueButton if you are looking for another similar project.
Time to dust off my old Mumble server!
I was reading this thread and started looking for that app again.
Mumla? Is it even still being updated?
Mumla the ever living!
I’ve also been comparing Element and Revolt. Both seem really solid, both are open source and both are self-hostable. Hard to find any downsides there.
There’s a discord server that me and a bunch of friends use as our main hangout. They’ve raised the prospect of bailing before things enshittify, and of course I’ve been tasked with pitching a replacement. For my money, Revolt is the way I’m going to go, specifically because it’s basically a one for one clone of Discord. The people I’m pitching this to are a mix of technical and non-technical, so I think something that looks and feels like what they’re used to will be the easiest transition.
It also feels like Element is geared pretty heavily towards being a replacement for Slack / Teams rather than a replacement for Discord. Their pitch seems a lot more focused on the enterprise market. Revolt seems more focused on gaming, casual hangout, that sort of thing.
I like Element a lot, but for me it doesn’t feel like the right solution to this specific problem. But if I was pitching something to my work as a Teams replacement, Element is definitely the way I’d go.
Man I wish my online friends were that easy to switch.
As soon as I mention Lemmy “what’s wrong with reddit”. As soon as I mention element “but everyone uses whatsapp/discord”.
It suck that 90% of the people are stuck in their old ways and refuse to try anything new.
Hell I almost got banned for even mentioning lemmy once.
Silly question perhaps, but I haven’t tripped across it on the site for Revolt – is there a relatively straight forward server version for self-hosting, or is it just that the source is on github and you can compile it in theory if you feel like goin through that process… ?
The most straight forward I see appears to be Docker hosting
https://github.com/revoltchat/self-hosted
https://developers.revolt.chat/faq.html#admonition-what-can-i-do-with-revolt-and-how-do-i-self-host
If you’re looking to self host but are uncomfortable with Docker I recommend checking out YunoHost as an option for something a bit simpler, they also support Revolt
Thanks, appreciated.
if discord is going public they don’t need my turbo sub anymore
Cancelled mine when they redesigned the mobile app anyway. I don’t want a different interface on mobile vs desktop. I want a unified experience, which was their original purpose.
Matrix is the way. It’s federated and you can have your own server.
I’ve started my self-hosting journey having Matrix in mind - especially the Matrix bridges to cut off the need to use social media clients like Discord.
Today, I’m slowly convicting my friends to join my instance. So far, that’s just one of the closest ones (still win for me).
I hope one day decentralization in social media would take off!
I JUST managed to get my closest ring outside my family to join Signal.
We have a total of 7 people now.
I’d light up a server and host matrix/frendica/lemmy/mastodon/headscale in an instant if I thought I could get those 7 to join.
Just remember your friend, https://discorch.org/
Thank you for sharing this link! Fucking wild times we are in.
Matrix is nice, and you can have jitsi for calls integrated. It seems to be pretty popular; Lemmy has a field for matrix @ in user profiles. Never heard of revolt before.
I use Jitsi for a non-profit, and I like the mute someone else function, but oh wow the noise cancellation needs improvement. So many voice comm apps have disappeared (there used to be one our group used all the time, then the devs dropped it (the client app) and just became on API or something).
XMPP?
Ah this is so exciting!
Discord ‘existing’ has held back development motivation on Foss Federated Communication alternatives.
When they go public only good things will happen for projects like matrix :)
I’m very excited!
Matrix is cool but it really suffers from complexity.
The spec is a mess because they keep expanding it.
Let’s not mention the abysmal performance for servers. Making it largely infeasible to scale.
It’s not the solution, not even remotely close, unfortunately.
What are you using instead? I only recently set up my synapse server and I’d be interested to head what the alternatives are
Synapse has seemingly improved since 2020. A word of warning though: if you join large rooms from your server, Synapse will eventually grow the DB to a huge size due to a “lookup” table state_groups_state, and will require manual cleanup. See https://www.sequentialread.com/matrix-synapse-out-of-disk-space-state_groups_state/
Woah nice heads up I appreciate it!
I’ll keep the janitor tool in my pocket for now as my instance takes up negligible space at the moment but someday that might not be the case.
Here’s the referenced tool for anybody else interested:
https://git.cyberia.club/cyberia/matrix-synapse-diskspace-janitor
This tool looks fantastic, thank you!
I’ve found SimpleX a much better solution than matrix for a discord alternative.
I feel like matrix isn’t a one-to-one replacement. It’s a good slack replacement.
I haven’t used matrix enough to know for sure but does it have the discord equivalent of servers?
those are called spaces there. but there’s no flexible roles system. also no hop-on voice channels yet, but that’s a client feature so maybe that’s a bit different
Mumble?
it’s Element/Matrix if we’re lucky. Revolt is just another Discord - surely this single company will last! With Element/Matrix being an open protocol, it won’t be a “platform” you have to leave when it goes corporate.
Sadly I found out yesterday:
Matrix is not a community-based software, it was born [00] in Amdocs [01], a multinational corporation founded in Israel.
https://hackea.org/notas/matrix.html
Many were claiming its impossible to get contributions merged as well.
I would be happy to find out this information is wrong or outdated.
Revolt is F/OSS
https://github.com/revoltchat/
It’s not just a company with a clone of Discord, all the server back end, etc is open.
Yes, which is good, but the lack of federation is a deal-breaker. It means that you either:
- Use their servers - This requires entrusting them with your communities, just like Discord.
- Host your own private instance - You can control it, but the lack of federation means it’ll be isolated from communicating with other communities. This makes it really difficult to convince people to use your self-hosted servers.
Until Revolt adds a way for different instances to federate, Matrix is really the only other option.
I have yet to try revolt, but I thought you could just add stand-alone servers to your client (like idk, mumble). Is a revolt instance a whole separate ecosystem/infrastructure and not just a server entry?
My experience with Matrix is that the federation itself is a deal breaker. I have a pretty beefy server and good connection which was getting ddosed by running Matrix and timing out on so many requests for avatars/profiles etc. Maybe I did something wrong, but the whole experience rendered me quite skeptical to the viability of it as a federated chat.
That said I’ve had nothing but good experiences using it with big servers set up by pros.
I get why Federation can cause issues (most of the time it’s moderation related), but why would an extra option be a deal-breaker? Federation can always be disabled on a per-domain basis if you prefer. In fact, I’d argue it’s best practice to only allow domains on a case-by-case basis to prevent spam and abuse.
On the converse, you can’t enable Federation on a platform that doesn’t have it.
They were talking about matrix itself, not a specific option. And I’m not going to lie, having to hand hold your servers federation choices seems like a hassle. At that point why not just use a self hosted, non federated option?
I think the point they’re making is you can effectively have a self hosted non federated option with Matrix. Just disable federation as a whole (which I’m pretty sure is completely possible. Given companies use matrix for comms, and might not want federation, for similar reasons to what is being discussed here)
Why would an optional feature be a deal breaker?
It also seems like an issue that could be easily solved by whitelisting.
Yes, which is good, but the lack of federation is a deal-breaker.
The federation itself is a deal breaker
Why would an optional feature be a deal breaker?
Because the person they’re responding to said the lack of the optional feature was a deal breaker for them on a different piece of software.
I’m might be being dense but… Still: why would an optional feature be a dealbreaker? You just restated, you didn’t address the confusing logic.
Go ask the actual person who said it was a deal breaker for them, I can’t explain it more simply than I have.
but also with request ratelimiting
That doesn’t really change that it’s one company hosting it. Unless you’re willing to make 10 different accounts because your super-FOSS friends aren’t willing to join each others instances?
I guess the easy solution here to to make it use oauth2 authentication. Then you can just authenticate using one account elsewhere. If fediverse services also at some point become oauth2 providers, then even better.
That’s still not a solution. That entails non unified communication, access, and search. Making it easy to log in to others still doesn’t solve easy sharing between others. Also oauth2 is a pain to set up, and many people hosting their own instance aren’t going to bother.
Sorry but what exactly do you communicate and access between discord servers? Are you talking about PMs which are by default independent of servers?
Unified search could easily be achieved through third party tools at the least, like for IRC. I don’t think even discord has unified search between servers.
Oh hey, you’re totally right, that’s crazy. I use Beeper (hosted matrix setup) to aggregate my chats and I guess I’ve always been using that to search across all servers without realizing. Fully thought the DM search would also search across servers.
DMs are definitely also another case though - you can’t easily DM people on another server if that requires you to log into another server.
That’s true about DM, however DMs are not a core use-case for discord-like services. It’s the group/voice chats etc. I could see a workaround like lemmy does, where if you want to DM a user in another server, you might be able to do it through your fediverse instance (i.e. a DM simply has your fediverse instance DM their fediverse instance), but I’m sure there can be more elegant things like. However DMs by themselves are a weird thing by themselves, so much so, that even bluesky had to bolt DMs on-top and outside of their protocol.
…theoretically for now
It a centralized server controlled by the devs
Host your own then
Nheko provides an interface that is reminiscent of Discord. Fully featured and fast Matrix client.
Thank you for the recommendation. I tried element a while ago and found it lacking. Matrix must be the way forward. Disregarding IRC of course.
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Honestly, I am ready to go straight back to TeamSpeak.
I miss hosting my own server and having full access and control over it
I used to just host it on a piece of shit. 2003 Dell XP machine I put Ubuntu on
There is also Mumble. TS3 era voip and text chat features, but it’s FOSS.
It was so featureless back when I last used it. I don’t remember it having half the features ts3 had in 14
Oh, it’s basic af. But it did what it needed to do, and still does, for some.
I havent used it in ages, I have no clue what sort of stuff continued development has enabled. If anything.
My friend group went first from Skype to the massively better TS3, and finally to Mumble. I don’t remember really missing anything.
If they add federation I’m sold. Honestly it would be nice if it integrated with Activity Pub
It’s not that kind of application. Federation would be massive overkill for a project like Mumble.
It’s a voip server and client for video gaming, with a couple adjacent features sprinkled in.
It doesn’t even really have accounts, and adding servers is just matter of configuring their IPs. What would you even use federation for?
Hell yah, TS3 crew all the way. (Or TS5 for the zoomers…)
My nerds herd recently also set up a cluster of Matrix Synapse servers so we got our little “We have Telegram at home” set up. Getting non-tech people to accept that this is how to find me has been tricky without sounding like a digital prepper.
: ( i was too dumb to follow the playbook correctly
i wanna have a matrix sever!
but I’ll use snikket for now until i skill up
We believe in you, there are other write-ups and guides on how to get it working. Its was great learning expirence for VMs and Proxmox (thats what I did and it did make it harder, but I feel more confident when im cosplaying as a sys-admin)
This one is pretty close to whats needed, but go into it expecting each step to open a new tool/application that needs to be researched before you press enter. Also look up how to set it to a PSQL db before you start inviting users, it defaults to SQLite and that will cause problems eventually.
If you try to do calculus and don’t have the understanding of the underlying math then you won’t have a good time when ansible breaks. I’d advise it’s normally better to learn how to manually install and manage software from the command line.
Why would you down-grade from Snikket to Matrix?
If you want to skill up a bit add a Slidge.im gateway to your Snikket xmpp server to access Matrix (and Discord etc.) from there.
that is actually what I’ve been thinking. xmpp with encryption seems good enough for me! plus I’ve heard some stuff isn’t encrypted in matrix, (metadata? emojis? not exactly sure)
i am heavily leaning towards scaling up to snikkets big brother, prosody.
The currently common older implementation of e2ee in xmpp has the same issue with only the message body being encrypted. There are newer specs of OMEMO that have better metadata protection, but its adoption in xmpp clients has been very slow.
Prosody is more of a sandbox, with Snikket being a preconfigured version of it, but yes running Slidge will be a bit easier with a normal Prosody server.
TS 6 looks so good. I can’t seem to figure out it’s release window though. Along with the mobile app being updated. Once those are done I plan to move over.
I used to have a free lifetime server from someone that was giving them away, but he shut down after a few years.
Did he die?
Maybe it was based on the “lifetime” of their hamster 🤷
