There is no truer adage to me than nothings is perfect. And when it comes to anything related to Discord it’s no different.
Discord itself to me has been an issue for years. Its use of data collection, the obsession of companies trying to buy it all were concerning. For me the latest age verification just further reinforces my beliefs. That being said the majority of users who ignored all this and kept going, really nothing would change. Most people I know use Discord lightly and aren’t in large chats that use hentai gifs. I still would tell anyone who would listen to get out of dodge. But if you never cared about data usage then you’re probably not going to start now.
For all the alternatives out there truth is, none are really anywhere near perfect. Matrix and most of its clients while encrypted don’t offer true jump in /jump out game chat. More a kin to Skype really. Foss Discord implementations like Spacebar are to all over the place and for me are not really functional. Stoat while probably my favorite is still really small and not holding up to the stress of the user influx. And of course it’s missing “discord features” and the new kid Fluxer while appealing is still to new and it’s monetization model a little to concerning. 300 bucks as a backer for unproven project ? And of course with the exception of Matrix none of the other projects currently offer encryption.
Truth is no option really is ideal. Truth is all the options have some pretty serious flaws. And truth is getting your large swaths of friends to move might be close to impossible.
So if you are looking to move please do some digging. Ask people who use the apps their opinions. Try to as a group of friends chose to make a move.
And the final truth is it’s a really good thing we finally have some options. No matter the flaws having competition brings innovation.
I hope this posts helps clear up some things for people who might be confused or concerned.
We switching to Fluxer
isn’t matrix compromised and holding ties to israel?
Matrix was originally developed by Israeli company Amdocs, which has since rebranded and moved to the UK.
But they are sketchy as all hell, denying that their parent company was involved in proven spying incidents.
thank you for the information.
Fluxer wants to have a ‘monetization’ to give payouts to ‘creators.’ Hard pass.
My wife and I have been using Stoat and it’s been mostly fine, but they’re already implementing age verification.
Stoat being based in UK makes me nervous as their laws are ridiculous. Devs claim that they are going to try to only apply draconian things when necessary but I have my doubts.
I’m not sure I understand why Fluxer’s monetization gets so much hate. It seems to me like it is a built-in way for the people hosting servers to accept money from users.
For all the alternatives out there truth is, none are really anywhere near perfect. Matrix and most of its clients while encrypted don’t offer true jump in /jump out game chat.
After complaining about it heavily for a few days, I did find one client that has that same feel, commet.chat. I haven’t done a whole lot of testing yet, but from what I’ve seen/experienced, it’s close, if not there
Personally I still prefer XMPP+Cheogram. It’s more Signal than Discord, but it’s a lightweight chat server with voice call abilities, and that’s what I needed it for
Check out the Movim client for XMPP, it allows it perform group video/audio calls, and even has screen sharing! (though you need to use a chromium browser to share the audio of an application for now). And the dev is currently working on implementing Discord-style channels with collections of rooms.
Oh, hot shit! I know about Movim, it’s just not my main client (notifications are finnicky, and offline messages don’t seem to work right for me?), but them adding discord-style rooms is great!
From my quick testing I did the other day, the conclusion I came to was:
- Fluxer looks like the easiest drop-in replacement for my group. I agree I am also a little hesitant about its longevity & funding.
- Matrix UX leaves some to be desired, but it’s functional and I like the E2EE.
- We don’t have anyone good enough at selfhosting in my group to even attempt Spacebar.
- Stoat just doesn’t seem viable. Lack of screenshare is a big issue for my group.
Surprisingly, the new TeamSpeak 6 looks pretty okay to me, but the UX is pretty different so might have a little bit of a learning curve for some people in my group. It costs money for a server but honestly my group is fine with that. We used to pay for a Mumble server back in the day but it doesn’t have robust text channels so we don’t want to move back to that.
EDIT: The Fluxer dev has agreed to remove the CLA!
I was just informed today of a huge red flag for Fluxer; it has a contributor CLA that could allow it to change to a non-FLOSS license in the future. I was hopeful for it previously, but that kills it for me.
Also @[email protected]
I’ll be sticking with Movim, which is already federated, encrypted, can do group video calls, can even screenshare, and most critically does not have a CLA.
Movim looks insanely promising. I’ll have to check it out after I get off work. I’ll have to update my write up if it’s that impressive. Curious how it will handle from what I understand XMPP is protocol like matrix yes ?
Hey, quick update, the Fluxer dev has agreed to remove the CLA, so I’d say that puts it back in the running.
For me Fluxer is technically more feature complete with steaming options. But banners and custom emojis are behind paywalls. (Non local hosted)
Stoat offers free banners, emojis a nice UI even a community browser! Its voice chat works well enough but no streaming features. Stoat is purely donation based at the moment.
Sounds like Fluxer is gaining momentum mainstream wise. I’m happy with either option …
Im about to try to self host stoat. I’m really feeling like spinning up 3 or 4 of the new services and trying each to see which one or mixture works best. If anyone else is doing this we should start a megathread
Movim would be a good one to try. It’s actually more full featured than Stoat as well, as it offers Encryption, Federation (XMPP), group video/audio calls, and screensharing with application audio! (must use a chromium based browser to pass the audio for now). It is currently missing Discord-like channels with rooms, but the dev is actively working on that.
Stoat currently cannot do video calls or screensharing, and has no plans to implement encryption or federation, AFAIK.
Also @[email protected], @[email protected] and @[email protected]
offer true jump in /jump out game chat.
What does this mean?
Services like Discord allow you to keep an always on chat channel. People can join and leave as they like and no one is disrupted. Matrix is more like Skype/Zoom you create a call or session. But there is a person host. Once host leaves the call ends. In some cases you need to invite people to join the call.
an always on chat channel.
I guess you must mean an always on voice channel. Thanks for clarifying.
(For what it’s worth, my groups are using Mumble for that purpose, alongside Matrix, at least until MatrixRTC brings its voice features up to speed.)
I have deployed LiveKit for my homeserver yesterday. I’m not gonna lie, it does involve a bit of work, but once it’s running it is very seamless.
This is what I’ve ended up doing, too. Now the only issue is that we’re missing noise suppression. The boys are not passing this year’s emissions testing.
Read the privacy policies too. I can’t remember which one I was reading yesterday but it read like they were going to monitor every word I said… All the while saying they are privacy advocates and based in Europe
I seem to recall the one for Root was particularly bad, can’t remember for the others.
