alt Hacker NewsWhile that would perhaps be the best solution in the long run, wouldn't you agree that gains in userbase necessary for growth (or at least sustainability) are predicated upon how good the UX is _currently_ ?
While that would perhaps be the best solution in the long run, wouldn't you agree that gains in userbase necessary for growth (or at least sustainability) are predicated upon how good the UX is _currently_ ?
My minimum requirements for personal online communication outside of public web-accessible forums like this one, are open protocol, open source implementations, optional E2EE, independent hosting, client choice, and access to channels on other independently hosted servers. These are non negotiable for building my social graph of communication with family, friends, colleagues, etc.
Communication is a sacred part of the human experience and I will not allow centralized entities to control my primary means of connection to my friends and family.
My options for digital comms are then are limited to email, IRC, XMPP, or Matrix.
Matrix has leaps and bounds the best UX and functionality by this criteria and is what I use for the overwhelming majority of my communications.
Anyone that is exclusively willing to communicate over corpotech disrespects my values for freedom and privacy, and is by extension opting out of being friends with me unless we see each other in person regularly.
9/10 times the people that respect me and want to be friends with me also respect my ethical conviction and create matrix accounts to talk to me if they do not already have one.
Taking back control of the internet will require conviction and I try to lead by example in my social circles. I personally could not give less of a shit if Matrix has feature parity with xyz corpotech as they are not solving the same problem. I also use IRC heavily to talk to many of the best engineers in the world and that is a low UX bar to beat.
That said, as corpotech walled gardens keep screwing their users, more and more hold-outs will come over and new features and improvements will reduce that friction over time.
For now though very few individuals understand the vital importance of digital sovereignty for a citizen controlled society, but governments absolutely get it and do not want people like Zuck controlling their comms, so it is not surprising governments are first in line willing to pay for help switching to Matrix. The people will follow in time.