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.

  • BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    21·
    6 days ago

    This was probably one of the first times I can remember when our chat programs were under one primary program. Before Discord there was market segmentation abound and I think it made the system better for there were alternate means of contact. Discord becoming monolithic like it it did was a real issue and let’s be honest, we need to have alternatives. I foresee Discord still being used for a bit by most of my groups, but they are certainly considering alternatives.

  • chunes@lemmy.world
    25·
    7 days ago

    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.

    • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
      9·
      6 days ago

      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.

    • GaumBeist@lemmy.ml
      1·
      4 days ago

      Stoat and it’s been mostly fine, but they’re already implementing age verification.

      Can you elaborate on this? I can’t find anything about it online

    • sakuraba@lemmy.ml
      3·
      6 days ago

      Any source on this Fluxer monetization? I get that they need to sustain the flagship server, but AFAIK the dev said none of these monetization features will limit what you can do in your self-hosted Fluxer (when it comes)

      Don’t get me wrong, I’m wary of Fluxer but it seems like the dev does have a plan unlike Stoat that’s has been very slow (already tried it when it was called Revolt and has not changed at all)

        • sakuraba@lemmy.ml
          1·
          5 days ago

          thanks. it’s really weird that they don’t make clear if this monetization feature will be limited to their main instance or will be available to selfhosters too

          would this add a limitation of some kind, would every selfhoster be required to add this feature do be federated?

          i’m gonna keep looking at XMPP at the moment

  • Avatar of Vengeance@lemmy.mlEnglish
    17·
    6 days ago

    I wasn’t really sure if the US chatroom app infamous for harboring pedophiles and saving hyperlinks of users’ deleted photos in rooms’ modlog was evil but now that the logo is red and has scary eyes I’m seriously considering it

  • mononoke@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    14·
    7 days ago

    I have offered to do a lot of education and technical effort surrounding this, e.g. helping groups migrate in some of the circles I’m involved with and all it’s really gotten me is abuse and condescension, bafflingly. No one cares and if they do it’s mostly superficial and they want the easiest way out—someone/something do everything for me, and I mean everything. I don’t want to click more than two buttons and even that is pushing it, buster. Sometimes there aren’t easy solutions, though, and I think this is one of those times. Big Tech is massive and in the world we live in now we cannot have all of the things it promises without immense tradeoff, and for the most part it just isn’t worth it. The modern web being almost completely centralized around Discord is really harmful, like what happened with Facebook years ago. What used to be simple, publicly accessible websites for all these groups, locations and interests with email, forums and chat rooms for asynchronous as well as real-time communication is now entirely on Discord or Facebook. It’s disastrous. Neither of those things are easily accessible or friendly to archival…why do I need to be in a Discord chat room or Facebook group for community events around my public library? It’s absurd. I hate all of this so much, and basically no one around me agrees with me so we’ll just circle the drain forever while the “pet cameras” start calling DHS on our neighbors.

    I’m just going back to xmpp, maybe mumble for voice calls. They’re both friendly and simple and xmpp supports modern features just fine. I can host it for myself and my friends who care; I don’t have much hope for the masses anymore. I don’t really like how bloated Matrix/Synapse is, and everything else is riding coattails we don’t need to ride. I don’t care about video games or streaming to people in a chat room or anything like that, and if I did I’m sure something like Jitsi handles that well enough. Oh no, a second program!! We are all so dependent on tech in our lives but it seems like so many want nothing to do with being informed about it on any level…I just don’t get it.

    • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.netEnglish
      11·
      6 days ago

      I have offered to do a lot of education and technical effort surrounding this, e.g. helping groups migrate in some of the circles I’m involved with and all it’s really gotten me is abuse and condescension, bafflingly. No one cares and if they do it’s mostly superficial and they want the easiest way out—someone/something do everything for me, and I mean everything. I don’t want to click more than two buttons and even that is pushing it, buster.

      Oh no, a second program!! We are all so dependent on tech in our lives but it seems like so many want nothing to do with being informed about it on any level…I just don’t get it.

      I feel this in my soul, and it’s something I’ve noticed a lot on reddit when trying to tell people that lemmy/piefed exist. Some of them will just find any reason whatsoever to not do something, pointing out the most minor of differences or slightest inconveniences as insurmountable obstacles that no human could be expected to overcome, and usually end it with “if It’s not already perfect/better than what I’m currently using (despite the alternative not being actively user-hostile like the thing they’re using and complain about is) I’m not going to bother”.

      I’m just going back to xmpp, maybe mumble for voice calls.

      With the Movim client (or Dino client), XMPP can do group voice/video calls :D

      • sakuraba@lemmy.ml
        5·
        6 days ago

        I’m gonna try setting up an XMPP server for group calls, I read prosody is good and light

        Matrix is a mess to setup in baremetal behind a CGNAT and I only use playit.gg to proxy my homeserver (for minecraft at the moment)

        • mononoke@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          2·
          6 days ago

          Prosody is what I use on my current server, which is just a really ancient Dell sitting in my closet. It could not handle Synapse+federation whatsoever. Prosody (and really anything XMPP) has been an absolute breeze in comparison.

    • 64bithero@lemmy.worldOP
      2·
      6 days ago

      I get what your saying and it’s true people are insanely lazy. But the whole point of these applications is to chat with your friends. So if you can’t get them to move in the first place , what’s the point of the application then ? So while there is no perfect solution , trying to do to much at once won’t work either …

      • sakuraba@lemmy.ml
        5·
        6 days ago

        I mean, if they are your friends and you are offering an alternative (assuming they asked or want it) they should to put some effort to install an app or two just for that

        Now, if your ‘friends’ are a discord community with hundreds of users, that’s a different use-case.

  • LycanGalen@lemmy.world
    15·
    7 days ago

    Genuinely curious: Stoat’s Community Guidelines list the legal jurisdiction for their Service Operator as the United Kingdom (sorry for the awkward sentence structure) I know that any online platform that provides “risky” content to the UK has to perform age checks, but I’m curious if the privacy impact increases when the service is hosted in the UK? Eg, would they be required to conduct age checks for all users, rather than just UK users?

    • 64bithero@lemmy.worldOP
      8·
      7 days ago

      Very good catch. Honestly the platform is so small I doubt it will come under fire. Worse case if the platform takes off more can self host and completely avoid these requirements

      • Zanathos@lemmy.world
        3·
        6 days ago

        Isn’t Matrix open source? And wouldn’t hosting your own instance unfederated resolve that concern?

        • geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml
          6·
          6 days ago

          Yes Matrix is open source so technically if there’s a backdoor people should be able to find it. But the dev team behind Matrix sketches me out so I wouldn’t be surprised if they sneakily hid a backdoor.

          Personally I wouldn’t trust "privacy’ software developed by an Israeli company which has made spyware in the past. It’s not direct evidence that Matrix has backdoors, but sometimes stuff is just sketch.

          • Zanathos@lemmy.world
            2·
            5 days ago

            Good points. I have been trying to spin up my own instance because the alternatives are still not up to snuff but Matrix seemed a decent alternative if self hosted.

            I just saw another article today about XMPP which was going to be my last ditch effort, but that will be my next foray it seems!

  • TrippinMallard@lemmy.ml
    5·
    6 days ago

    Managed to get a matrix server up + a web client frontend hosted on same site for friend group .

    3 container docker compose: continuwuity, tunnel, premade Cinny image with nginx serving frontend.

    Great if you don’t care about voice, but if you do then you’ll need to host a TURN server on a VPS and connect home server to that.

  • 64bithero@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    4 days ago

    Found another “new” discord clone called Kloak. Slightly curious as they claim to use purely a username and key to identify you and nothing else.

    Some of the site seems AI generated and the project is entirely closed source. I am curious but I have my reservations even trying it.

    Right now it appears registration is closed which is also odd.

    https://kloak.app/

    Might be worth keeping an eye on. But it might be worth entirely avoiding

  • Kristell@herbicide.fallcounty.omg.lol
    5·
    7 days ago

    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

    • 64bithero@lemmy.worldOP
      1·
      5 days ago

      Not sure I follow what you mean by temperature? Socially I’d say it’s all over the place. You can make channels for whatever you like. To be transparent the only feature to me missing is streaming / screen share. And the mobile apps need a lot of work …