As a community, we often ask ourselves how to attract more users to #XMPP.

As a community, we often ask ourselves how to attract more users to #XMPP. Yet the real tragedy is that people would rather build something entirely new (loosely based on email or #ActivityPub) than consider XMPP. Need end-to-end encryption by default? If compatibility with existing XMPP clients is a secondary concern, you can implement it in your own solution while still benefiting from our two decades of experience in instant messaging.

@daniel
I'm guessing there are complex problems in IM space that they don't realize they'll have to solve from scratch, which XMPP already solved for them.

What are these problems?

@daniel I think people have never truly forgiven XMPP for being an XML based protocol.

I consider this a failure on our part but I don’t really know what to do about it. Most arguments against #XMPP don’t hold if you’re building from scratch anyway:

• #Conversations_im looks very outdated: OK, but you are developing your own clients anyway.

• XMPP doesn’t have an SDK: Neither does your #ActivityPub or email stack

• OMEMO is insecure and I would prefer #MLS: Yes, let’s work on that together and you’ll still benefit from XMPP’s 100+ solved IM problems.

@mariusor @daniel what would've been a better alternative?

Stop Telling Us XMPP Should Use JSON

XML vs. JSON: Stop Worrying About the Wrong Layer

ProcessOne (www.process-one.net)

@wolf480pl yes I think that is a huge part of the problem. It is very easy to completely underestimate the complexity of Instant Messaging. Sending a message from A to B seems like something every software developer can write before lunch and people don’t see how it can and will rapidly escalate from there.

But I don’t know how do communicate that to other people.

@joshix based on what's popular today: JSON.

(I'm joking, my assumption is that they chose what was the best alternative at the time. As far as I know JSON hadn't been described by Crockford at Jabber's inception)

@daniel

@mariusor @daniel JSON is worse and has less features

@joshix I am making jokes not technical decisions. Hold off on the snark please.

@daniel

@daniel The big plus of #DeltaChat is that the infrastructure is already there. Infrastructure is a big part of the problem. And obviously using mail for that is only for people born before 2000.

Second is branding: When people hear #XMPP they hear 20 years of failure of implementing robust solutions both server-side and client-side. People just don't know that after 20 years there now are server and client solutions really working.

@lazarus @daniel #XMPP is still a thriving ecosystem with lots of good FOSS developers doing interesting things.

XMPP is also used under the hood in tons of products needing instant messaging even if they are not advertised as XMPP clients, or do not federate. But look at #Matrix, only 25% of matrix servers federate.

Anyway, all three share a strong focus on protocols, but there is a big difference: https://chatmail.at does not expose protocols to client developers, just a Rust SDK.

@daniel@gultsch.social The Lemmy developers have added a user profile field where you can enter a Matrix account. It would certainly be better to also add a link to XMPP, and I believe this would be the most viable way to immediately achieve secure communication in the Fediverse.

However, it's always helpful for someone to try to "reinvent the wheel": diversity is a very prolific mother of solutions to problems that don't yet exist.

@delta @lazarus @daniel where is this "only 25% of matrix servers federate" stat from? it's pretty hard to tell what servers exist that don't federate(!)

@matrix @delta @lazarus @daniel Every protocol/standard/client has their own pros and cons. The real enemies are centralized and proprietary systems. What people really need is XMPP/Matrix/Delta interoperability.

@dragospirvu75 @matrix @delta @lazarus The way to achieve interoperability is to stop reinventing the wheel and agree on one standard. Implementing three protocols is completely unfeasible and unnecessary. This worked 20 years ago with MSN, ICQ and AIM when IM protocols had a lot less features and no E2EE. Doesn’t work today.