RE: Recent #Discord news - is #Matrix / #Element really the best that FOSS has to offer?

[rubenwardy@hachyderm.io]

RE: Recent #Discord news - is #Matrix / #Element really the best that FOSS has to offer? Matrix's e2e/key stuff adds so much confusion and friction, makes it a huge pain to use.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

[rubenwardy@hachyderm.io]

Trying out Cinny which seems to be a nicer Matrix client than Element, but it still suffers from Matrix's e2e UX problems

I've heard Zulip and Rocket Chat mentioned before

[jsalvador@mastodon.social]

@rubenwardy it depends on the use. For communities without VoIP features? Matrix is nice. Clients like FluffyChat and Cinny make it very usable.

For gaming/voip? Nope.

[lizzy@social.vlhl.dev]

@rubenwardy Depends on your use case. I recommend XMPP for the purpose of talking in DMs or small groups, it has similar features to matrix, and you can use it either encrypted using OMEMO or unencrypted. I've had less issues with encryption on XMPP than on matrix, but some of them remain. It's federated and one can host their own server or join an existing one. For clients I use gajim on desktop and conversations on mobile.

For voice chat I'd recommend mumble (or jitsi), for managing communities I recommend zulip.

[skysong@floss.social]

@rubenwardy It depends on your needs. If you just need person to person messaging, Signal works. If you need text chat for a community, you could try Rocket Chat or Stoat. If you need voice chat for a community, Mumble or Teamspeak.

[rubenwardy@hachyderm.io]

@lizzy

My use case would be for an open source community like Luanti. So community management (roles/perms) and lots of channels is essential. Voice chat is desirable

[lunadragofelis@void.lgbt]

@rubenwardy @lizzy As far as I know, XMPP does have permission levels (like member, admin, owner). I don't know though how fine grained the permission system works.

[zughy_boi@mastodon.social]

@rubenwardy a friend who's fiddled with Matrix told me that the biggest issue is that Matrix has got so many policies to follow that implementing anything (including things that make UX better) is quite of a challenge. I don't know if it's true but I still hope it can become more user friendly, as as far as I know it's the best option out there

[kitkat@climatejustice.social]

@rubenwardy
> is #Matrix / #Element really the best that FOSS has to offer?

no, but improving it needs time & work, see talk about this:

https://cfp.2025.matrix.org/matrix-conf-2025/talk/BT8WR9/

[haise@tech.lgbt]

@jsalvador @rubenwardy there is lots of work on native group calls in matrix with https://github.com/element-hq/element-call with cinny support being actively worked on as well https://github.com/cinnyapp/cinny/pull/2335

[crimsonfall@mas.to]

@rubenwardy I’ve said this before but
as far as finding an alternative with a 1:1 feature parity with discord, you’re simply not gonna find any (unless it’s stoat chat but that has its own glaring issues)

in truth you’re probably gonna use a conjunction between different tools depending on your needs.

to matrix’s credit it does at least have bridges for you to connect different services, including this one for mumble

https://matrix.org/ecosystem/bridges/mumble/

[jsalvador@mastodon.social]

@haise @rubenwardy i remember seeing something like this on Fractal few years ago, but according to the info, is still experimental or not big enough to compare with Discord. So, still need an addon (mumble mayble?)

[andycallisto@soc.ua-fediland.de]

@rubenwardy I heard things about Stoat (previously Revolt), but never used it.