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WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

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Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#31

Post by MattJ100 »

kenniskrag wrote: post #9
ezst wrote: post #5

I wanted to like this piece for calling Signal for what it is: WhatsApp with better marketing (with a lot of security and privacy backed by obscurity), but if everyone is jumping ship from WhatsApp out of data syphoning concerns, I'm not sure that Matrix's insistance on replicating and distributing as much metadata as possible across its nodes is much better. The end game is probably P2P with "dumb" servers doing lit…

Can you recommend a self hosted setup? I want chat + forward to email if I'm offline.

I'm the developer, but simple self-hosted XMPP is the goal of https://snikket.org/

There's no forward-to-mail, but happy to consider a feature request.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#32

Post by capableweb »

madeofpalk wrote: post #28
capableweb wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with statements like "I happily use Matrix but my grandma will not, ever, not in this world" is that Matrix is more of a protocol than anything. So of course, your gradma would never use HTTP, but since browsers are now user friendly enough, everyone is using HTTP indirectly. Same can (will? Might?) happen with Matrix, where a popular applications get written on top of Matrix, and users don't even need to…

> Same can (will? Might?) happen with Matrix When will this happen, if ever?

Well, no one knows when a new popular app appears, gain traction and how it looks like, otherwise we'd all be rich by now!

What is sure is that people said the same thing about Matrix, Bitcoin (and more) that people were saying about HTTP/the web back in the day.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#33

Post by cheph »

CJefferson wrote: post #11

I really sympathise with this point of view, but when it comes to messaging with family and friends, I just don't really care. Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app. That's fine, but often not what I want. Teaching my mother in law to use Signal: Install. Accept permissions. Choose a PIN. I can send you messages. You can see your friends who already use Signal.…

I am heavily against switching from WhatsApp to Signal, but you have very good points, and I think Matrix should take note of these points. Technically Matrix can yield a very similar user experience to Signal, but there has to be more focus on actually doing it if it wants to be considered as a serious player in the same space as WhatsApp and Signal.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#34

Post by mvanbaak »

capableweb wrote: post #12
cassepipe wrote: post #10

The reason why Signal is not an open protocol like email has been argumented by Signal creator Moxie before (can't find the article please help). It has pros (evolution is faster and thus it's easier to compete with proprietary solutions) and cons (single point of failure) and Signal devs are well aware of that. We should stop acting like Matrix and Signal are competing with each other. I happily use Matrix but my gr…

The problem with statements like "I happily use Matrix but my grandma will not, ever, not in this world" is that Matrix is more of a protocol than anything. So of course, your gradma would never use HTTP, but since browsers are now user friendly enough, everyone is using HTTP indirectly. Same can (will? Might?) happen with Matrix, where a popular applications get written on top of Matrix, and users don't even need to…

And when a popular application get written, it will become the next walled garden.

whatsapp uses xmpp. whatsapp became a closed system.

PerfectClientXInTheFuture uses matrix. PerfectClientXInTheFuture becomes a closed system.

Why? Because that way they can make more money.

It's sad, but true.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#35

Post by dpatterbee »

CJefferson wrote: post #11

I really sympathise with this point of view, but when it comes to messaging with family and friends, I just don't really care. Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app. That's fine, but often not what I want. Teaching my mother in law to use Signal: Install. Accept permissions. Choose a PIN. I can send you messages. You can see your friends who already use Signal.…

I get what you're saying, but you seem to just be criticising element, not matrix. All of these are temporary problems which can be overcome with more time to hone the user experience.

I would love to see another company come along and make another matrix-based chat app to compete with element, hopefully that would result in them both getting better much quicker.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#36

Post by rwmj »

CJefferson wrote: post #11

I really sympathise with this point of view, but when it comes to messaging with family and friends, I just don't really care. Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app. That's fine, but often not what I want. Teaching my mother in law to use Signal: Install. Accept permissions. Choose a PIN. I can send you messages. You can see your friends who already use Signal.…

Moments of recognition reading this. A couple of weeks ago at virtual FOSDEM I was trying to work out how to join the FOSDEM chatrooms using the Android app formerly known as Riot.im (now Element.io). And I couldn't work it out - I gave up completely. I'm an actual programmer and heavy IRC user!

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#37

Post by mouldysammich »

argvargc wrote: post #27
airza wrote: post #4

I wish that the author had spent more time really thinking about _why_ communication has moved away from email, or why XMPP/IRC never really caught on despite being vastly older than these app competitors (hint: it is because they are federated, and so making sweeping changes to the protocol/client in the name of UX becomes intractable.) It is _very_ frustrating that the internet has had messenger fragmentation since…

Isn't the fact neither XMPP nor IRC are e2e-encrypted a factor in them catching on? Nobody wants to use a messenger that's public, or that with a single centralised compromise/hack could make all their messages become so. To me that disqualifies them as even being potential solutions to the problem. Matrix has significant usability issues in its currently-available form(s) - but it at least meets the most basic of re…

XMPP has omemo for encryption which is support by default by both major severs and every client i've tried -- especially the ones that aim for user-freindlyness likes conversations

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#38

Post by newswasboring »

the_duke wrote: post #26
CJefferson wrote: post #11

I really sympathise with this point of view, but when it comes to messaging with family and friends, I just don't really care. Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app. That's fine, but often not what I want. Teaching my mother in law to use Signal: Install. Accept permissions. Choose a PIN. I can send you messages. You can see your friends who already use Signal.…

> Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app I don't know where you get that impression. Matrix / Element works great for 1-1 and small group chats, the general UX issues aside.

> the general UX issues aside.

I think those are the issues, at least according to the op. I mean, anyone can write a chat app. That tech has existed for ever. Putting the right UX on it is the hard problem good chat apps need to solve.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#39

Post by OldTimeCoffee »

mprovost wrote: post #25
mojuba wrote: post #8

Yes but email also used to be fragmented and walled garden'ed back in the early days of networking. Chat is still in its infancy as a technology. We are still trying to figure things out: what's the minimal necessary feature set? What should a server API provide to clients? And a myriad of behavior/feature/privacy questions that different messaging systems handle differently, for example: what happens when I leave a…

ICQ came out in 1996, AIM in 1997, and MSN in 1999. I don't think it's fair to give the people working on this a pass by saying this is a new problem - working products have been shipping for over 20 years. Some of the devs working on Signal and Matrix were probably born after ICQ was released. The reality is that all of these systems, including email, tend towards becoming walled gardens. Otherwise you end up with t…

Part of the problem is that previously they were a value add as part of a service provider. There was no intent to generate revenue from it because the revenue came from the provider's operations. If I'm building a chat client now, though, I've got to find a revenue path. You need the walled garden so that you get lock-in and can find a revenue model from it.

Re: WhatsApp and most alternatives share the same problem

#40

Post by junon »

maxwellito wrote: post #16
CJefferson wrote: post #11

I really sympathise with this point of view, but when it comes to messaging with family and friends, I just don't really care. Matrix seems to want to be an IRC replacement rather than a one-to-one / small-group chat app. That's fine, but often not what I want. Teaching my mother in law to use Signal: Install. Accept permissions. Choose a PIN. I can send you messages. You can see your friends who already use Signal.…

+1 Also about Matrix, the confusion when the client app doesn't have the same name as the protocol is so unfriendly for the non tech-savy users.

I was designing something similar to Matrix at one point several years back. The different names confused even myself when I was dabbling into Matrix.

Matrix is cool, there's no doubt. The packaging is terrible, IMO. They really need a product manager.

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