top 97 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[+] 146 points 8 months ago (62 children)
  • [–] 47 points 8 months ago (9 children)

    Yeah honestly. Running the teamspeak server executable is hardly selfhosting, and they're just another closed source proprietary service. Cool they're still around after all these years I guess but they shouldn't even be considered as a migration option.

    Stoat and Fluxer are both open source, very straightforward and familiar, and I believe self-hostable. Much easier for casual users than Matrix too.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 9 child comments
  • [+] 34 points 8 months ago* (3 children)
  • [–] 21 points 8 months ago

    Yeah honestly. Like I work in IT, have my own home server, run linux on everything, etc etc etc, but even I found Matrix to be a convoluted mess, and most clients have their own issues. I can't imagine trying to get someone who's not tech-savvy to try it out.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    I tried to get friends into Matrix before and they were confused by it. So can confirm it's not that simple for everyone.

    Though to be fair, one of them wasn't able to post without including an emoji in their message, that shit confused me too.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago* (5 children)

    I'm unsure what is difficult about Matrix.

    I've had several "casual" friends register and join my space on their own.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 25 points 8 months ago
    • Signup can be tricky.
    • Managing your encryption keys is tricky for normal people (I know someone who signed up for it on incognito because they weren't sure about it yet then got a bunch of confusing popups when they signed on with their phone).
    • Room organization is missing a layer used on discord (server->room instead of list of rooms) leading to confusing moderation structures and nearly required manual organization of rooms if you're in more than 10.
    • notifications rules can be obtuse.
    • having different commands based on the clients used can lead to confusion.
    • most clients have security related popups that just confuse people (This person reset their identity!).
    • people can struggle with how to properly interact over federation, much like in the fediverse
    • screensharing tools just aren't there yet

    Things have been getting better fast for matrix, but its just not ready for the masses IMO. I still suggest it when I can when the use case makes sense.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    I think I locked myself out of my account. I'm only logged in on my old computer and I've deleted the app from my phone. I saved my security key (I have a session security key field and security-key.txt in my 1password) but Element didn't seem able to use it to reactivate. I would lose all my chats. Which wouldn't be the end of the world, but still, I'm just demonstrating that I'm tech savvy enough to save things I'm told to save but I either missed saving a recovery key, wasn't told to, or the process is just lacking. Regardless, like I said, I'm just demonstrating that it can be tricky.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (2 children)

    Hosting it is far from simple

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Sure, but I see no need to host when so many cool nerds will gladly host your space for you. Different strokes, I guess.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (-1 replies)
  • [–] 28 points 8 months ago (6 children)

    Using Stoat's main server raises a privacy concern because it’s UK-based and AFAIK lacks E2EE—UK authorities could seize server data without our knowledge. That effectively means private use requires self-hosting.

    Issue with self-hosting Stoat is, it's currently more complicated than Matrix. This user created a detailed GitHub guide that documents their research and pitfalls for getting Stoat working with voice/video: https://github.com/javif89/stoat-selfhost

    The official self-hosted guide (https://github.com/stoatchat/self-hosted) looks simple at first, but if you look at the compose file, it requires FOURTEEN containers to run and doesn’t yet include voice/video support which will increase complexity.

    By contrast, TeamSpeak’s self-hosting appeal is its simplicity: only two services (or one with SQLite) and it works out of the box today.

    But I agree — moving from one closed-source silo to another isn’t ideal. I just wish Stoat were easier to run behind the scenes.

    For me, a combination of matrix for text chat and mumble for voice is the simplest and most privacy respecting way to self-host a discord alternative.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 6 child comments
  • [+] 13 points 8 months ago* (4 children)
  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago* (2 children)

    There's also Movim, which doesn't even require an email, you can join instantly with just a username and password.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [+] 0 points 8 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

    Fluxer is doing the same thing, no email signups right now on its homepage.

    It's no different from how lemmy/piefed function. Some instances require email, others don't. My instance, as an example, doesn't require an email to sign up, but it does require you to write a short message as to why you're interested in joining the server, and what communities are appealing to you. This weeds out 99% of bots or spammy users, and the handful that get through that are quickly banned.

    Movim currently has so few users that the main server is trying to put as few barriers as possible to adoption, other servers can and do enable the Email requirement.

    If it becomes more popular and bots or spam accounts become an issue, they could easily activate the email requirement, or even implement a system similar to what I described above. Instances that don't take appropriate measures to those threats as they become a problem can just be defederated as they are here. It's worked out pretty well so far.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago

    The official self-hosted guide is actually quite simple and straightforward. I had it set up and going in a half hour or so, and that's even with removing Caddy and using my existing nginx reverse proxy. It's intimidating at first-glance, yeah.

    That being said, the official self-host guide is also 5 months out of date. The alternative you linked requires jumping through a bunch of hoops because it's just a small community of enthusiasts hacking together the current version of Stoat for self-hosting.

    So I acknowledge that self-hosting current version of Stoat with voice is rather complicated and frustrating right now, but hopefully it becomes as simple as the official self-hosting guide eventually.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] -1 points 8 months ago

    Using Stoat's main server raises a privacy concern because it’s UK-based and AFAIK lacks E2EE—UK authorities could seize server data without our knowledge.

    When the alternative is Discord that's no different. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (-1 replies)
  • [–] 8 points 8 months ago (18 children)

    I'm not sure which horse to bet on Stoat or fluxer.app.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 18 child comments
  • [+] 6 points 8 months ago (7 children)
  • [–] 15 points 8 months ago (6 children)

    One thing that worries me a little about fluxer is this:

    Finally, we can offer commercial licences to companies that want to run Fluxer internally without being bound by the AGPLv3 copyleft terms. This is enabled via a contributor-friendly CLA, but it doesn't create a separate "enterprise edition". It's still the same Fluxer software everyone else uses.

    They have a CLA on contributions. So while today Fluxer is licensed as AGPLv3, tomorrow they can pull the rug and change the license, just like everyone else has been doing.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 6 child comments
  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago* (2 children)

    So while today Fluxer is licensed as AGPLv3, tomorrow they can pull the rug and change the license, just like everyone else has been doing.

    Isn't that just a problem for contributors to worry about though?

    Like, it's not like they can remove (or change the license of) the code that's already out there (their CLA says existing source code releases stay licensed as-is), nor does this affect forks. So I don't really see the harm to the consumer.

    any distributed version that includes your contribution remains properly licensed under the project license(s) that applied when you contributed.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

    They can’t retroactively close-source the older versions released under AGPL, but if it ever required a community fork to continue the last release of the GPL version, it would be a massive burden to maintain it, and could cause federation to break as the codebase diverges over time, which would create a rift in the community. You’d also have to hope that average users care enough about the license to jump ship to the GPL (probably now not as full-featured) version, otherwise the GPL version risks not being able to get enough funding to continue, or enough users to convince the larger communities to move over.

    As a somewhat similar real world example, the pixel-art program Aseprite once used a FLOSS license, but it switched to a proprietary license at some point. The last GPL version was forked by the community, but it never got much traction, and is now massively behind the closed source version in features and userbase.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (1 reply)
  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago (9 children)

    XMPP!

    Stoat is dead in the water due to dependency on the UK and not an easy solution to deploy yet.

    Fluxer is dead in the water due to license.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 9 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (8 children)

    I don't get why so many people are saying this. Afaik, it doesn't have channels within servers like Discord and Slack, which I feel is a defining feature in the text chat part of the apps.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 8 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (7 children)

    channels within servers

    Oh that is like the second most common thing on XMPP! It's rooms/chats/conversations on servers/conferences/salons, etc. Like, come on, even IRC has that and that was made before I was born.

    The one thing that's complex, or at least bad in the UI I've seen for most XMPP clients, is that searchability of rooms is not very good. Like, discoverability is, but to my knowledge there's no way to actually filter for rooms based on a keyword, you either get the whole roomlist for a server or nothing.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 7 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (6 children)

    Oh shoot, is it? I'm using Cheogram and Conversations on my phone and I can't figure it out. I guess it depends on the client?? I'm a bit confused.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 6 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago* (5 children)

    I think Iambalicious may be confusing terms. AFAIK no XMPP client has discord-like rooms within channels. The Movim client is actively working on implementing that feature (it can also do group video calls and screen sharing), but it's the only one doing that unless I'm mistaken.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (3 children)

    Oh you mean nested rooms? That's just normal rooms with a different organization. I think there is one XMPP proposal for them but I don't know of any server that implements it (they are unneeded since you can just create temporary chatrooms, same as in IRC) and then you need client support, of which apparently only Movim and Dino are working on it yeah.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago* (2 children)

    There's a bit more to it than just their visual organization. In Discord, a user only needs to join a single community to access all of that community's rooms (they don't have to manually join each one to have it in their feed).

    The admins of that community can then seamlessly create or delete rooms within that community (the users don't need to do anything for those changes to be seen and applied on their end), and can independently adjust what the base requirements are to view, enter, or interact with each room, and then give an individual granular permissions of what rooms are visible within that community.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Oh yeah that already exists in XMPP, it's called "Server spaces" and grouping can be done by admin or by room owners, but it's experimental so there's no direct way to know what servers or clients are using it or not.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (-1 replies)
  • [–] 12 points 8 months ago

    It’s all about friction. As long as the user has to pick an instance they will always hesitate to pick any federated service. The average user will always choose the path of least resistance.

    Proprietary services spend a lot of time trying to reduce friction, and it works.

    The only solution I can think of would be a three part one:

    1. The main app of a federated service automatically rotates between a pool or reliable, reputable, non-extremist instances where the user can log in with an email and password.
    2. The federated service makes it trivial to migrate accounts amongst instances.
    3. the user can log into their instance threw any other instance perhaps threw oauth.

    This would of course require some federated account login system. Hard but not impossible. It could be some sort of Casandra style ring based account service where nodes are part of the ring.

    This eliminates the new user friction.

    1. Download app
    2. Sign up
    3. Login

    It works anywhere any time with corpo style low friction. You don’t need to think about instances at all till you are ready to.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago (7 children)

    Stoat, both its app and website refuse to open on my mobile data. I doubt it's only happening to me. Teamspeak at least lets people host and have control of their own servers.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 7 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Im seeing a huge increase in people using stoat. And its been fun.

    If anyone is interested in Retro Games: https://stt.gg/GJh5JHy2

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (8 children)

    Yeah... I hate watching people make the same mistake over and over. I guess we just have to take the lead and build the communities that we need over on Stoat and Matrix.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 8 child comments
  • [+] 3 points 8 months ago (3 children)
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (3 children)

    Americans People will do anything but just setup XMPP, this is literally what it was invented for.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    having a tool intended for a purpose doesn't necessarily mean it fits that description without issues. the xmpp world is filled with a heterogenous plethora of clients of various quality and encryption duct-taped on top of about a third (made up/guesstimated number based on nothing but my gut feeling having gone down that rabbit hole partly). even if i convinced all of my friends to switch, there wpuld be no client for all platforms and learning miltiple programs to use a single protocol is bad UX imho

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • load more comments (1 reply)
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    I just spent a week trying to set up my own server and good lord it was such a battle I gave up. Matrix? Up in like half an hour. Shame because my friends are so much more interested in Revolt lmao. Just gonna give them some time to sort out their business before trying again.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    It seems like the most realistic option to me since I doubt the masses wanna get into self hosting.

    You only need these services as part of a gaming community.

    I think you'd have a hard time finding a gaming community that didn't contain at least a few people who could handle installing a docker container on a VPS.

    The trade off, to save minimal administrative overhead (compared to moderation and such), you give up complete control over how your system is run, how your data is divulged and any control over future cost increases.

    Everyone should be self-hosting (and also running Linux, but we'll beat that horse later) if they're running a gaming community.

  • source
  • parent
  • load more comments (1 reply)
    [–] 42 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (4 children)

    why go from one corporate property to another when enshitification is the problem and libre options are available??

    tomorrow's headline: "Teamspeak CEO excited to be working with Discord"

  • source
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 10 points 8 months ago* (3 children)

    Matrix has the best architecture by far. The only feature it lacks is high fps screenshare with audio. Right now its only acceptable for like a powerpoint presentation.

    When the update fixing that comes it will finally be ready to fully replace discord.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    I ended up running the element-call stack for our matrix server. Has worked great for group vid calls and screen sharing so far. I don't think it had audio for screen shares, the only item missing from your list

  • source
  • parent
  • [+] 21 points 8 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)
  • [–] 16 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    True. However TS has been around for a very very long time and have a proven record of not shitting on users. The free server and client have remained free all this time.

    That doesn't mean things will always be good though.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 42 points 8 months ago (26 children)

    TeamSpeak only supports 32 simultaneous users, you must purchase a license to support more than that.

  • source
  • hideshow 26 child comments
  • [–] 34 points 8 months ago (18 children)

    Yeah, this bit was all I needei to know:

    Besides all of that, if you'd rather not chat to randoms who also happen to have an unhealthy obsession with Arc Raiders, you'll likely need to pay an admittedly small subscription fee to rent your own ten-person community voice server. By that point, you're handing over card details and essentially fulfilling an age assurance check anyway. If you'd rather limit how much info your chat platform of choice has about you, there are arguably better options out there.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 18 child comments
  • [–] 13 points 8 months ago (9 children)

    How does CC details qualify as age verification? It's WAY better than gov ID or face scan.

    I just mean this type of business model is ripe for enshittification.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 9 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago (8 children)

    Face scan is actually much easier to defeat than CC details.

    Nowadays with VISA '3D Secure' and the equivalent on Mastercard you have to validate your legal name attached to the credit card, this is done via third-party which can request details your bank has on file (often your home address or mobile number), and even while those details are not supposed to be shared with the merchant (we know how careful banks are about keeping control of PII), the core detail - your legal name, is confirmed. It is not hard to tie a user to other data via data brokers once you have their legal name, and credit card number, and any other details they may share with the service (email, phone, etc).

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 8 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago (7 children)

    Face scan is actually much easier to defeat than CC details.

    I don't understand. You don't need to "defeat" CC details.

    They do not contain your age or your govt documents. Even if they did, a child is likely just going to use their parents' CC. So it's not a form of age verification at all.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 7 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

    In context, defeating the privacy exposure of requiring to use CC details would be by getting an anonymous credit card, which in most countries are now either very difficult to obtain or simply no longer offered (outlawed).

    Hope that helps.

    (Edit: spelllering)

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago (5 children)

    It is the same effectiveness of scanning an ID since that could also be their parent's.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (4 children)

    The point of scanning the ID is (supposedly) to verify the age of the user, not their parents.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (3 children)

    Using a credit card or an ID are both just using a physical item to 'verify' an age of someone who may or may not be that person. Getting a credit card has a minimum age, so the end goal of age 'verification' is met either way although the ID has way more personally identifiable information like skin color, actual birth date, gender, etc.

    It isn't like scanning an ID verifies that the person scanning the ID is the person on the computer.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Getting a credit card has a minimum age

    Not true, anyone can become a "verified user" on another's account. That's what my parents did when I was a kid.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago* (1 child)

    You are a verified user for their account. That is literally using their card with extra steps.

    Also, there is frequently an age 13 requirement to be an authorized user which would count for everything except porn.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    You are a verified user for their account.

    Right, which is different from the user's account, and thus does not verify their age.

    there is frequently an age 13 requirement to be an authorized user which would count for everything except porn.

    Discord doesn't have a 13 age group. It's just adults and children.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (6 children)

    Tangentially related: Fuck Arc raiders.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 6 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (5 children)
  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago (4 children)

    For me, it wasn't about the AI. It's that early development of the game was all PvE play. PVP was something that was added at launch, and the game is tagged as PvE, along with PvP on steam. Stupid me thought there would be PvE only lobbies and I was clearly mistaken. I tried playing it, I put 100 hours in. The entire game was me grinding the easy map, to level up and craft/buy better guns, only to be shot on sight by someone and have everything I worked for taken. I would solo down bastions, leapers, and bombdiers to have someone run up and shoot me on site, without asking if I would share loot. (I would rather share than lose everything.) Events in the game also reward PvP play by awarding cred. People are making smurf accounts so they can end up in friendly matches to dominate people that don't want to pvp. Enemy spawns are fucked up too. I've downed arc only for the corpses to despawn as I attempt to loot it. I've walked into clear areas, only to have bombadiers spawn on top of me out of nowhere. The worst part of the game is being dropped into a map/match after 10 minutes has elapsed, which means anything decent has already been looted and you're more likely to run into people camping extraction points. They have a temp event running that rewards PvE cooperative play, and I've still gotten killed on site, although less frequently. After the event is over, I'll probably uninstall the game again.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    I absolutely loath PvP in gaming. Always have. However, I recently discovered that I enjoy extraction shooters (I think that's what these types of games are called). Been playing HOLE and wished for something like it with co-op for me and a friend to play.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    Not trying to change your mind because if you don’t like it you don’t like it, but the fame was developed and play tested as a PvE game. It was slated for release before The Finals. The playtesting revealed that the game was just not fun. The developers, the play testers, everyone involved felt it was boring. They delayed the game and created what was released.

    I understand not personally enjoying what was released, but Embark made a decision to change the gameplay during development on their own, they weren’t forced to by a publisher or anything, and they didn’t renege on any promise or anything.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    The stuff I read about the play testing indicated it was PVE. I didn't do enough research before purchasing, no argument there. I happen to actually enjoy fighting the arc, and I really enjoy when I can play co-operatively, and do things like save someone that's pinned down by ARC, or help others down bastions, bombadiers, and matriarchs. Getting shot in the back after I'm soloing arc and my shield is down isn't fun. Getting shot even after I say I'm friendly, and I can't defend myself, or else trigger the algorithm to put me in more pvp matchups isn't fun. If it was already tested as a PvE game, I don't see why they can't give us PVE and PVP lobbies. Letting players decide if they want to risk PVP or not.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 8 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    That's 32 connected users to voice, not total server users isn't it?

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    For a room to chat or to talk with mic or webcam? I never used Teamspeak before.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    For anything, is my understanding. If they try to open it, they're just represented with a "server full" notification.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • load more comments
    view more: next ›