Decentralize Messaging

#1

Post by wiggler00m » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 3:07 PM UTC

Decentralize Messaging
rodarmor.com

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#2

Post by kitd » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 9:23 PM UTC

Mentioned in a separate thread, but DeltaChat [1] offers a WhatsApp-style messaging interface over standard email.

[1] - https://delta.chat/en/

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#3

Post by timw4mail » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 9:25 PM UTC

Unfortunately, it's probably too late. Email caught on because it was the first option, and it's become ingrained in spite of itself.

At this point the closest thing to a standard for person to person messaging is SMS... which like the old guard of ICQ, uses a number rather than a screen name.

That said, I would love to see a good standard for person to person chat, especially one that doesn't rely on magic numbers.

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#4

Post by rapnie » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 9:39 PM UTC

kitd wrote: post #2

Mentioned in a separate thread, but DeltaChat [1] offers a WhatsApp-style messaging interface over standard email. [1] - https://delta.chat/en/

Like the idea. It was discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19216827

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#5

Post by jacob019 » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 9:55 PM UTC

I don't know why everyone hates XMPP. There are multiple solid open source server and client applications for just about every platform. It is decentralized and works well but without google, apple, and facebook making it practical for grandma to use, it doesn't catch on. Well the big players have no incentive to cede control to decentralization.

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#6

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 9:55 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#7

Post by parvenu74 » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 10:05 PM UTC

Isn't this, at least in part, the goal of OStatus/Mastodon? It's a great idea but I find it humorous and ironic that many mastodon admins circulate block lists specifically meant to cut off nodes. I would prefer that users just use the block features available (and adding the ability for a user to block nodes or apply blocklists if they want to, but not for admins to make that decision for them).

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#8

Post by dijit » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 10:20 PM UTC

jacob019 wrote: post #5

I don't know why everyone hates XMPP. There are multiple solid open source server and client applications for just about every platform. It is decentralized and works well but without google, apple, and facebook making it practical for grandma to use, it doesn't catch on. Well the big players have no incentive to cede control to decentralization.

The issues mostly stem from:

1) not knowing what is supported on the server, or the other users server.

2) not handling mobile clients well (heavy battery use, weird deliverability issues.)

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#9

Post by ralls_ebfe » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 10:21 PM UTC

jacob019 wrote: post #5

I don't know why everyone hates XMPP. There are multiple solid open source server and client applications for just about every platform. It is decentralized and works well but without google, apple, and facebook making it practical for grandma to use, it doesn't catch on. Well the big players have no incentive to cede control to decentralization.

I moved to xmpp only for instant messaging over a year ago. At first it was met with great resistance by my contacts, but by now my family and almost every relevant friend installed conversations on their smartphone. I helped with the setup and provide them with access to my personal server. The growing public knowledge about privacy violations of the big services has made it very easy for others to grasp the reasoning behind my preference for decentralized services.

I actually thought about using matrix, but it apparently "modern" means "resource hungry". My xmpp instance server runs on a small server with 2GiB Ram, with more than 1.5GiB being unused.

Re: Decentralize Messaging

#10

Post by pmlnr » Fri, Jan 31, 2020, 10:22 PM UTC

jacob019 wrote: post #5

I don't know why everyone hates XMPP. There are multiple solid open source server and client applications for just about every platform. It is decentralized and works well but without google, apple, and facebook making it practical for grandma to use, it doesn't catch on. Well the big players have no incentive to cede control to decentralization.

Because then devs would need to follow rigorous standars with xml instead of "just building it".

Yes, I'm full of anger. We had xmpp, pidgin, miranda, trillian. Now we have gazillion mobile only (no, a web gw through a server to your phone is NOT a desktop client) messaging, so let's throw matrix in to solve it, instead of building an xmpp client with up to date xep support. Xkcd 927 on steriods.