Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.
[Matrix/Element]Dead
much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)
Looks like Discord will do a Reddit in the near future.
I recommend switching to Matrix.
With how much they been cash grabbing, I'm not surprised.
If only I could convince 30 people I barely know to switch platforms.
I’m constantly looking for something that could replace discord for me, I need something like the discord screen/game streaming to consider changing apps.
Same. Matrix works like a charm.
Don't get me wrong, I love matrix, but works like a charm is not how I would describe that. Element Just seems to make everything harder because you have to keep track of your session keys. That way if you have a new device and can't use the previous device you don't get locked out And then to top it off you have the export and import of end to end encrypted room keys which even for somebody like myself who is technical enough to manage it has managed to screw it up almost every time. I find something like session or SimpleX easier because you're not having to manage keys like that. SimpleX has an actual database file export instead of key management and you need only remember the decryption key. Session of course uses session IDs with a neumonic seed phrase like crypto
Interesting concept! Element isnt my favorite client either but it has nothing to do with running or using matrix. Its like using an iphone and saying calling someone is very expensive.
The keys situation needs work though.
I will gladly leave this shithole called discord, as soon as matrix start to support screen sharing
I actually havent tried if screensharing works but jitsi seems to work very well in there. Even the german government uses it so I suppose it might be able to do that.
I know for a fact you can screen share in jitsi as I have seen it done.
Looking at all those companies that moved their support to Discord.
But I thought we cold have free support in realtime with security updates for free forever?
It would’ve been very smart of them to have this ad change only affect business ownedchannels, and then open up a fee option for businesses to no longer have ads on their channel
People aren't going to move on. Some of you really live in a bubble when it comes to this stuff. Users complained about ads on Facebook, reddit, Twitter, YouTube and everything else and no matter how many times you guys declare those services dead the reality is that they are still the default for most. Even in the unlikely scenario that a large amount of users do permanently leave, they won't migrate to the privacy respecting service you want them to.
Some are and some aren't. Like a lot of folks on here are here because reddit went to shit.
A minority are, yes. reddit is still massive and continuing to grow while Lemmy participation has fallen off noticeably and continues to decline.
(Last I checked) From this spreadsheet, Discord is the fourth worst messaging platform in terms of privacy. Now a new row for "Has ads" will have to be added...
According to my iPhones privacy viewer it’s almost worse than Facebook.
Ads are the least of your worries on Discord
Discord can do shit like this because they know many won't ever try to use an alternative. You need more than just "open source" "privacy" or "FOSS" to convince people.
To be fair, there was a time before Discord. People once used MSN, Skype, Teamspeak, IRC, etc.
They shouldn't get too comfortable with the idea that people won't just up and leave.
Discord has real advantages over many of those, and communities are slow to pick up and move. It'll take either a very bad decision from discord or a good competitor. I want that competitor to be Matrix, but it's far from perfect.
Steam supports direct voice chat. My friends use it for gaming.
Also, teamspeak.
And thus begins the enshittification of Discord
It has always sucked. From the beginning it was privacy-invasive, had no real business model, has had crappy Electron apps and has been proprietary.
More like half way down the road
Good. Maybe people will finally move on to something else.
Time to move to Matrix then, and I'm not even joking. Ads are Aids.
Why not Mumble and IRC or XMPP?
Resisting? It was a clear strategy: use VC money to give away something for free then charge/monetize to give back those investors all the money, with interests
I truly don't have a problem with ads being in a free service. My anger will be based on how annoying they are when they roll out.
The ads will become increasingly annoying snd intrusive over time based on every other website and app that has gone from free to supported by ads.
Even if they aren't too bad at first, they will get worse. Just like the nitro ads that are already in discord.
The problem is that no o.e will just serve a static PNG banner ad anymore. Ads these days inherently come with all the BS that makes blocking them mandatory
people do pay for discord though. that was the entire justification for Nitro and Server Boosts. they made $440 million in revenue in 2022. they aren't publicly traded so there's no way to compare that with expenses, but i'd be pretty surprised if they weren't turning a significant profit.
If you don't use Discord for voice much, Matrix has a pretty solid bridges you can use.
Hosting your own Matrix server is suprisingly way easier than I though - got a VM on hertzner for like 5$ a month, and there is an Ansible script that takes care of the setup for you. It's also one of those rare cases where someone made an Ansible script that actually works, instead of you getting stuck in dependency-hell (seriously, fuck npm. Not a single docker or ansible tool that has used it ever worked for me out of the box. Python can get simillarly annoying).
They have a pretty easy to follow guide, and the whole setup took me like 20 minutes. I only edited a few options in config.yml (mostly to add Messenger and Discord bridge), and ran the ansible, and it worked at first try.
So I could at least ditch both messenger and discord apps from my PC and phone, without having to convince anyone to quit their poison - with only issue being that you can't use Discord voice. And that the messenger bridge is still unreliable sometimes, but those are still minor inconviniences in comparison to my deep-seated hate for Meta.
Of course - Meta still gets my chat data and content, same as Discord. But at least they don't get anything else from my phone or PC.
Matrix bridges are nice until you realize that you have to be a mod in the server to add the bridge, you need to do it not only for every Discord server you want to use on matrix, but every channel as well. It's a huge chore. And ofc it doesn't work with Discord DMs.
Not blaming Matrix or the matrix bridge developers here because it's not their fault. But let's be honest: matrix bridges are a pain to set up for Discord and for a majority of people aren't worth the hassle. Moving to Matrix would be the better choice if at all possible
you need to do it not only for every Discord server you want to use on matrix, but every channel as well. It’s a huge chore. And ofc it doesn’t work with Discord DMs.
This wasn't my experience at all - all I had to do was message the Matrix bot with servers I want to join (I'm not a mod on any of them), and it bridged all channels in that server. Also, Discord DMs are working fine.
I'm using the mautrix bridge, which doesn't use a bot or anything like that, but uses your Discord session instead.
Goddamn I wish it wasn't so hard to convince friends that discord sucks. I'd rather just send SMS than use discord to communicate with my social circle.
SMS? You mean the paid, vendor lock-in, MITMable traffic? Possibly one of the only options that is actually worse than Discord
I don't always force my friends to use Discord alternatives, but when I do I force them to use Signal.
I only use it to play games with 4 other people regularly and another 2-3 people sporadically. When it becomes a pain to use, well move on just like we did with AOL Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Team Speak, and however many others we've used in the past. Something else will come along. It works great for now, but we aren't loyal to it. We're loyal to playing online with each other. I would honestly pay $5 a month for a decent program, should no free one be available, but I'm already cutting out multiple streaming services, satellite radio, and all sorts of other shit because commercials are too annoying.
Will using the browser version with the usual array of ad-blocks help?
I don't use discord but I don't think it's a bad idea. Those servers costs money
We need FOSSCORD!