Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
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Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
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Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#2Previous discussions:
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#3Funny to see this reposted today, as just today I encountered an open source project which primarily uses Discord for chat - a terrible idea for all the same reasons. I had planned on writing a similar follow-up article reminding people that Discord is a bad communication medium for open source projects, too. I think that this is something the community ought to be occasionally reminded of, lest we lapse.
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#4There have been months where the spam on freenode was unbearable, and fundamentally IRC is, like SMTP, a protocol where spammers have the advantage, and only heuristics stop spam.
A big part of the value of IRC-replacements are accounts that are tied enough to a person's identity (For example, by requiring sms confirmation) to deter most spam. IRC hasn't been able to do that.
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#5Previous discussions: 2015: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10486541 2016: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11013136
Let's do another one!
Note that it's often been an excuse that Slack has an IRC and XMPP gateways, but, per the article, they've been shutdown in 2018.
I really hate Slack for how much memory it requires, and how many bugs it has. The Android app, for example, logs me out of every community if I'm removed from one of them; really "nice" when someone cleans up the resources of an old hackathon to be logged out of all the dozens of various teams you're part of. (Noone even knows how to call each of these individual teams or communities, either; requiring a separate login for all of them is pretty annoying, given that it's all maintained by Slack anyways.)
Or when they remove you from an existing hackathon team to make up space for new members, and now you lost all your contacts, and/or have to be re-invited again if you're still participating in the next-year-edition. It's basically a mess.
Even for employee communication — from a contractor's perspective — it makes you a non-owner of your own communication, unlike IRC, so, if you so happily accept it, you're basically working against yourself again.
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#6There have been months where the spam on freenode was unbearable, and fundamentally IRC is, like SMTP, a protocol where spammers have the advantage, and only heuristics stop spam. A big part of the value of IRC-replacements are accounts that are tied enough to a person's identity (For example, by requiring sms confirmation) to deter most spam. IRC hasn't been able to do that.
Doesn't IRC support the registration of usernames?
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#7Funny to see this reposted today, as just today I encountered an open source project which primarily uses Discord for chat - a terrible idea for all the same reasons. I had planned on writing a similar follow-up article reminding people that Discord is a bad communication medium for open source projects, too. I think that this is something the community ought to be occasionally reminded of, lest we lapse.
What's wrong with Discord?
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#8There have been months where the spam on freenode was unbearable, and fundamentally IRC is, like SMTP, a protocol where spammers have the advantage, and only heuristics stop spam. A big part of the value of IRC-replacements are accounts that are tied enough to a person's identity (For example, by requiring sms confirmation) to deter most spam. IRC hasn't been able to do that.
Doesn't IRC support the registration of usernames?
Most servers do, and a simple channel mode solves the spam problem (which isn't nowhere near as much of a problem as email spam).
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#9Funny to see this reposted today, as just today I encountered an open source project which primarily uses Discord for chat - a terrible idea for all the same reasons. I had planned on writing a similar follow-up article reminding people that Discord is a bad communication medium for open source projects, too. I think that this is something the community ought to be occasionally reminded of, lest we lapse.
What's wrong with Discord?
All of the same things that are wrong with Slack, discussed in the OP. Don't use nonfree platforms to collaborate on free-as-in-freedom software. They also appropriate "server" terminology to dilute stuff which actually puts the users in control - unlike typical "servers", a Discord server is anything but - they run on Discord infrastructure and the user has little to no influence over their adminsitration.
Re: Please don't use Slack for FOSS projects (2015)
#10Funny to see this reposted today, as just today I encountered an open source project which primarily uses Discord for chat - a terrible idea for all the same reasons. I had planned on writing a similar follow-up article reminding people that Discord is a bad communication medium for open source projects, too. I think that this is something the community ought to be occasionally reminded of, lest we lapse.
What's wrong with Discord?
Everything that's wrong with slack, and more.
No IRC gateway.
Developers are extremely hostile to 3rd party clients.
Centralized control.
Ownership of your data.