Some interesting thoughts on this from the Signal creator: https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/
He is dodgy af. Doesn’t want any Signal forks (Molly being the only one tolerated) and won’t let them connect to the server. That’s why the open source version LibreSignal was shut down. He also doesn’t want Signal to be on F-Droid, a store which only allows 100% free/open source software.
Take everything coming out of his mouth with a grain of salt.
Totally agreed the project’s actions against the community are shit. From a LibreSignal issue:
I understand that federation and defined protocols that third parties can develop clients for are great and important ideas, but unfortunately they no longer have a place in the modern world.
This sounds like a jaded, cynical individual. It’s hilarious, sad, probably even delusional. How do they think the Internet and their operating systems work in this “modern world”? Magic fairy dust? It’s difficult, thankless work put in by loads of people around the world despite enormous commercial pressure to do otherwise. Over decades. I respect Signal’s work, but it’s boneheaded attitudes like moxie’s which impede progress, especially for the younger generations.
And an objection by the author of a popular XMPP client: https://gultsch.de/objection.html
That’s a good response I hadn’t read before - thanks. Still so relevant 7 years on.
And since that time, XMPP has improved significantly (more integrated with other protocols, more efficient client and server implementations, bridges from and to activitypub, more approachable, easier to self-host…), but Signal.looks to have … stagnated? Well… the crypto payments/web3 shady stuff aside :)
of a popular XMPP client
10k downloads for a hideous outdated app is popular now?
FYI that’s an app that’s used by the German police and in several other “sensitive” contexts where users won’t just pull it from the play store :) ISIS even had their own fork at a point.
“It’s what Slack did with IRC, what Facebook did with email, and what WhatsApp has done with XMPP”. Doesn’t he also notice a certain thing in common? Y’know, that they turned hostile?
For sure he notices; the author runs their own email server and founded a direct competitor to WhatsApp. The author is making the point that what each of those have done - build proprietary software around federated protocols - is a financially lucrative business model. I’m sad to agree.
FWIW my opinion is that Signal’s actions against these clients is petty and just shit. Thankfully, elsewhere we can see things happening differently: the interaction between Tailscale, Headscale and Wireguard gives me hope. Sourcehut is a cool project too.
