this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2025
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Discord was already succumbing to enshitification. Now with their intention to be owned by Wall Street, that trajectory will certainly accelerate at warp speed once the change of hands happens.

Anyone already get ahead of this and find a solid alternative?

Right now I'm on the fence between Element for Matrix, and Revolt. Both seem to have their pros and cons and I can't find a clear "winner".

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[–] stopforgettingit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 26 points 2 days ago (7 children)

man I wish mumble had a better interface and a chat function, it could real FOSS competition with Discord, but the lack of a chat feature is holding it back

[–] thebardingreen@lemmy.starlightkel.xyz 11 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It's so much easier to set up and install than Matrix.

[–] splendoruranium@infosec.pub 17 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It’s so much easier to set up and install than Matrix.

Unbelievably so. Mumble is... basically one setup command. Don't even need a domain. And it needs absolutely no resources, can run on a Pi Zero.
Setting up my own Matrix server was honestly one of the most difficult things I've ever attempted in decades of non-professionally using computers and I'm still not sure I'd be able to properly take care of the installation if it breaks. Sooo many moving parts. All the federation-oriented projects that rely on adoption rates reaaaaally desperately need setup wizards before any other additional feature.

[–] thebardingreen@lemmy.starlightkel.xyz 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

I've set up Lemmy, Forgejo, Nextcloud and Mastodon. Forgejo is unbelievably easy, Mastodon and Lemmy both are complex but if you follow the instructions you get there pretty quickly.

Matrix is like "Follow a book of documentation, then when it doesn't work anyway, spend hours of your life troubleshooting a bunch of stuff that's NOT in the documentation. Why is this so hard?"

[–] db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 1 day ago

Sounds like this is part of their business plan. Make hosting it so onerous, you're better-off using their servers, or paying them to do it for you.

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[–] jagged_circle 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)
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[–] candyman337@sh.itjust.works 22 points 2 days ago

https://spacebar.chat/ looks like it will eventually be good, it looks like it's in its infancy right now though

[–] astro_ray@piefed.social 25 points 2 days ago (3 children)

What are your thoughts on xmpp? Recently I have come to like a lot and am pretty active with friends there.

[–] shortrounddev@lemmy.world 22 points 2 days ago (7 children)

There are people using xmpp? Last time I set up a server and tried using it with Pidgin, I couldn't find a soul that used it

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Avoid Revolt as there moderation is questionable

[–] pineapplelover@lemm.ee 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Wym moderation? Aren't you moderating your own server?

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

There is a single instance everyone is on

[–] pineapplelover@lemm.ee 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Ah ok, yeah in that case yes. Only solution to this would be federation. But matrix is nowhere there yet in terms of normie usability.

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[–] Rhaxapopouetl@ttrpg.network 5 points 1 day ago

Alternatives to discord, open source or not:

https://alternativeto.net/software/discord-app/

[–] Ulrich@feddit.org 9 points 1 day ago (10 children)

If you're self hosting, it's Revolt. But the default instance limits you to 20mb or something for files, which is a problem for me, personally.

[–] EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Revolt is also an annoyance to self host and the apps don’t support self hosted instances without you rebuilding them because the server is hardcoded.

[–] rickyrigatoni@lemm.ee 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Why even give the option then lmao

[–] EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

That’s just it, it isn’t an option

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[–] communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz 6 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Element/matrix all the way

if you want something that looks like discord there are themes for the clients, there's even commet.chat for a discord like experience (but they haven't added calls yet)

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[–] slomosapien@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 day ago

Its been a while since I used Revolt, I use element everyday. But I'd prefer something more "third party" too. Revolt was servicable back in 2020, maybe it has gotten better?

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