<p>SoDiscord's been on their bullshit again (as if they were ever off of it). This time it'sanoverhaultotheirusernamesystem,lasttimeitwasachangeintheirprivacypolicyallowingthemtocollectdatafromvoiceandvideocalls,andthenthere's the AI stuff. It'snotlikeDiscordactingshittyisanythingnew,butthispostisn't about the company'stransgressions.ThisarticleisaboutescapingyourdependencyonDiscord,andmorebroadlyescapingtheviciouscorporatecycleofwhichit'sthelatestiteration.</p>
<p>IwasoriginallygoingtocenterthisarticlearoundtheprosandconsofdifferentalternativestoDiscord,andIdostillwanttotouchonthat,butIthinkit's important to express my reasoning in detail here; it will be easier to avoid another situation like the one we have now with Discord if we know what'sactuallywrongwithitonamorefundamentallevelthanwhichadministrativedecisionsoftheirsarebad.Howdoweensurewhereverwegonextwon'tpulltheexactsamecrap?</p>
<h2>SowhyisDiscordbad?</h2>
<p>Let's be honest with ourselves up front: In many ways, Discord, as a service, fucking owns. It has a ton of fun features not found really anywhere else and the quality of its voice, video, and live streaming functions are tough to beat. However, these advantages come at the cost of Discord'smostsignificantfundamentalproblem:It'saproprietary,centralized,VC-fundedplatform.Itgetsthefundingitneedstobesoawesomefrominvestorswhoexpectareturnontheirinvestments,anditislegallyobligatedtoputcreatingthatreturnaboveallotherpriorities.</p>
<p>Discordwasneveractuallyprofitable-it's been able to keep the lights on for this long using money from investors, but it needs to become profitable at some point in order to keep going long-term. If you'reanavidDiscorduser,thinkofsomeoftheblatantcashgrabsthey've pulled in the past at the expense of user experience, all the pointless features they'veaddedbehindthepaywallofNitro.I'dbetyoucannameatleasthalfadozen.Andnoneofitworked.NowimaginewhatDiscordwouldneedtodo,orwouldtry,inordertobecomeprofitable.Personally,theimagineconjuredinmymindbytheideaof"Discord but profitable"isprettygrim.</p>
<p>Thisisn't a problem specific to Discord. A popular term for what'shappeningtoitis"enshittification"-CoryDoctorow,theterm'sinventor,<ahref="https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys">explainsitwell</a>:</p>
<p>Iwon't restate his essay or the examples he lists here (though you should give it a read), but one obvious one his article didn'tcoverbecauseitwaswrittenmorethanaweekagoiswhat'shappeningwithRedditrightnow.Reddithasbeenenshittifyingitselfforyears,butthecurrentcontroversyisparticularlybadandparticularlyrepresentativeoftheproblem.Asofwritinginmid-Juneof2023,ReddithasjustinstitutedanewpolicyrequiringpaymentforuseofitsAPI,tothetuneof$12,000per50millionAPIrequests,whichforcertainpopularthird-partyclientsandmoderationtoolscomesouttomillionsofdollarsperyear.</p>
<p>Redditdidnotneedtodothis.Redditwasdoingfine.Thiswaspurelyacash-grab,andit's blowing up in everyone'sfacerightnow,includingtheirs.Moderatorsofmanypopularsubredditsareessentiallygoingonstrikeoverthis,andifyouthinkthat's the only critical problem this decision is going to cause for users you know very little about Reddit. The developers of open-source clients and moderation tools used by massive portions of Reddit'suserbasecan'taffordcostslikethis,andmostofthemwillbeforcedtoshutdownifRedditstickstoitsguns.</p>
<p>I'm not saying they will, but Discord could absolutely do the same thing, and it wouldn'tsurprisemeifitcametothat.ImagineifDiscordbotdevelopersneededtopayAPIfeeslikethat.There'd certainly be a lot fewer Discord bots, and probably a lot more paywalled ones among the remainder. Discord absolutely needs to become profitable in order to be sustainable, and it will do whatever it needs to to that end or die. Even then, it can'tjustbreakeven;capitalismdemandsendlessgrowth.Discordwillkeepgettingworseaslongasthere's money in it. It'sinevitable.It'srequired.</p>
<p>ThecentralizednatureofDiscord,theplatform,meansthatit,initsentirety,isinherentlyvulnerabletoanythingthathappenswithDiscord,thecompany.Anychangethecompanydecidestomakeisuniversal.Ifthecompanyshutsdown,theplatformgoeswithit.IftheadminsatDiscorddon't like what you'redoing,theycanunilaterallypreventyoufromusingtheirplatformatall.</p>
<p>ThistiesprettycloselyintothewholeVC-fundedthing-Discord,theplatform,isfundamentallysubjecttothewhimsofDiscord,thecompany's investors. I guarantee you that'swhytheychangedtheusernamesystem:thecorporatebigwigsprovidingthefundinggotconfusedbyDiscord'sunique(andverygood)usernamesystemanddecideditwouldbebetterifitwasmorelikeTwitter,soDiscordmadeitmorelikeTwitter.</p>
<p>That's really the core of the issue here: being centralized means that Discord can easily suffer the same fate as Twitter. Some incompetent nutcase with more money than the entire planet'scollectivepoolofsensecouldbuyitoutanddestroyit,orthecurrentownerscouldjustmakesomeboneheadeddecisionanddothesame.Adecentralizedplatform,runningonacommonopenprotocol,ismuchlessvulnerabletotheanticsoftheElonMusksandu/spez'softheworld.</p>
<h3>ThePrivacyProblem</h3>
<p>Thisissueisn't really inherently connected to the others - a lack of good privacy doesn'tfundamentallydoomaplatformliketheothertwopoints-butI'm treating it as a third major issue because I feel it'sextremelyimportantandwarrantsconsideration.</p>
<p>Ifyouvalueyourprivacy,Discordisanatrociouschoice.Takeitfrom<ahref="https://tosdr.org/en/service/536">theirowntermsofservice</a>.AnythingyousendonDiscord,whetherinaDMorapublicguild(I'm not calling them "servers"), is <strong>not encrypted</strong>, meaning it can be accessed and read by Discord staff, as well as any hackers that manage to access their systems or any law enforcement entities that might demand it. Discord is not even trying to pretend to be private. I'mnotconvincedit'ssomethingtheyeverthoughtabout.</p>
<p>Andlet's be clear here: You should value your privacy. You should value it a lot. The idea that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear is a complete scam. Even if you don'thaveanythingtohide,yesyoudo.Take,forexample,<ahref="https://archive.ph/TYPd1">thetime</a>Googleflaggedsomeoneasacriminalandpermanentlyclosedtheiraccountforthecrimeofsendingmedicalphotosoftheirsontoadoctor.Ormaybeyourgovernmentwantstoarrestyouforbeinggay,orhavinganabortion,orsomeotherinnocuousbutpotentiallyillegalthing.Ormaybetheywillinthefuture.Ormaybesomestuffyou'vesaidisjustkindofembarrassing.</p>
<p>Ifyoustilldon't believe me, read through a couple months of your Discord message history and then contemplate printing it out and mailing it to the NSA. If the government asks, Discord will save you the trouble, and they won'taskyourpermissionfirst.Andwitharecentchangetotheirprivacypolicy,thistheoreticallyappliestoyourvoicechatstoo,thoughtobefairIexpectthatwouldbeprohibitivelycostlyinserverspace.</p>
<p>Discordfundamentallycouldn't give a shit about your privacy, and doesn'tevenreallycaretopretendlikeitdoes.Ithasnoincentiveto.Theinvestorsprobablywouldn't be comfortable with the risks associated with pulling a stunt like responding to a subpoena with "yeah here'stheirphonenumber.that's all we got" like certain other chat apps anyway, and then there'sthepotentialtosellthatalldataonyoutoadvertisers.I'm not aware that they currently do that, but it'scertainlynotoffthetableshouldtheydecidetogothatrouteinordertoturnaprofit.Atleast,notunderUSlaw,anyway.</p>
<p>Beforewemoveon,I'll just drop this tasty little <a href="https://spyware.neocities.org/articles/discord">link</a> to further reading. It'sarealpage-turner.</p>
<h2>Cool,sohowdowefixit?</h2>
<p>Wedon't. Discord was doomed from the outset in any attempts to be sustainable or trustworthy. We are going to need to find an alternative to Discord eventually. So what should that alternative look like? I'lldiscussspecificslater-I'd like to start by establishing the general principles I feel a messaging system should conform to in order to avoid Discord'smajorproblems.TheTL;DRisitneedstonotbeanyofthethingsI've described thus far about Discord, but I'llgointomoredetailaboutwhatthatactuallylookslike.</p>
<h3>Followthemoney</h3>
<p>Asustainablechatsystem<em>absolutelycannot</em>befor-profit.Ifitisinanywaydrivenbyprofit,thedecayandeventualdeathoftheserviceisinevitable.Thatdoesn't mean it has to be entirely staffed by unpaid volunteers or anything, but it would need to be a non-profit foundation of some kind, just trying to break even with no incentive for infinite growth or any other corrupting financial influence. You'llnoticethisasathemeacrossmostonlineservicesthatdon'talreadyshowsignsofadvancedcorporatenecrosis.</p>
<p>I'm not even saying it can'thavesomekindofNitro-esquepaidtier.Idon't hold it against, say, Protonmail - in fact, I pay for that one - but the money can'tbetheendgoal.Asustainablenon-profitmodelmightbelargelydonation-basedlikeWikipedia,ormaybeitcouldhaveatotallyfreeproductforindividualusersandbreakevensellingsupporttoenterprisecustomerslikesomeLinuxdistributions.It's not currently breaking even yet according to its Wikipedia article, but I'llbeinterestedtoseeifandhowSignalreachesasustainablestate.Maybefutureplayerscouldtakenotesfromthem.</p>
<h3>Cutoutthemiddleman</h3>
<p>Betteryet,structureyoursystemsuchthatitdoesn't even need a corporation at the center - in other words, a decentralized system. I'mnottalkingabouttheblockchain;wecandothistheold-fashionedway,withtechthatisn't ponzi-scheme-by-design. In fact, we'realreadydoingthis,anditalreadyhasmoremonthlyactiveusersthananymessengerappevercreated:email.</p>
<p>Emailistheoriginaldecentralized,federatedcommunicationsnetwork.There's no Email LLC at the center of it all assigning everyone their email addresses and processing every message. Email isn'tanapp.Itisn't a proprietary service. It'sanopenprotocolthatanyonecansetupaservertoprovideaccessto.That's what Gmail is, that'swhatOutlookis,that's what your weird nerdy friend'sweirdnerdyfriendwhohasacustomdomainnameontheiremailaddressandcomplainsaboutGmailmarkingtheirmessagesasspamisdoing.They'reallpartofthebiggernetwork.</p>
<p>I'll try to keep this little tangent short, but I feel it'simportanttoestablishabasicunderstandingofhowthesesystemswork.Emailisafederatedprotocol,meaningitisn't tied to one backend running on one company'sdatacenter-instead,it'sanetworkcomposedofanynumberofentirelyindependentserversrunningcompatiblesoftwarethatcommunicateamongstthemselvesusingthelanguageoftheemailprotocol.Theseserversareoftencalled"nodes"or"instances",orsometimes"providers"inthecaseofemail.Auserofemailhasanaccountwithoneoftheseinstancesandcanuseittosendmessagestopeoplebothonthesameinstanceandonanyotherinstanceonthenetwork.</p>
<p>Thisiswhyemailaddressesarelikethat-thepartbeforethe@isyourusername,andthedomainnameafterthe@pointstotheserveryouraccountisregisteredon.IfusernamesonotherplatformswereformattedlikethisyouwouldseestufflikeMrBeast@youtube.comforYoutubechannelsordril@twitter.comforTwitteraccounts,butthoseplatformsaren't federated so they don'tneedtodothat.</p>
<p>Hopefullythathelped.Backtothepoint,allfederatedservicesworkprettymuchexactlylikethis.Ifyou've ever had someone try to explain the Fediverse (sometimes incorrectly called Mastodon) to you by comparing it to email, this is what they meant. But this isn'tlimitedtoemailandmicroblogging;thistypeofsystemcantheoreticallyapplytoanything.Again,buildinganMMOthiswaywouldbechallenging,butfederatedmessagingprotocolssimilarinconcepttoDiscorddoexist.</p>
<p>Thebenefitofthiskindofsystemstemsfromthefactthatit's not under the control of any central authority: Gmail, Outlook, and that weird nerd your friend knows are entirely independent of each other, they don'tanswertoanyhigherEmailAuthority(otherthanthebodythatdefinesthecommonstandard)oreachother.Thismeansthatthere'snobodyatthetoptofucktheentirethingupforeveryoneorsellitofftosomeonewhowill;infact,evenifsomeonewantedtoitwouldbetremendouslydifficult.</p>
<p>Thenetworkisinherentlymuchmorestableandresilientingeneralthanacentralizedservice,asthere's nobody who would take the entire network down with them if the company went under or got sued or had a bomb dropped on their datacenter. Sure, a huge number of people would lose their email accounts if Gmail disappeared tomorrow, but critically, not the entire network. Email wouldn'tgoaway,andthosedisplaceduserscouldgotoOutlookorProtonmailorsetuptheirowninstanceandkeepcommunicatingoverthesamenetwork.Thesameappliestoanyotherfederatedprotocol.ImagineifyourDiscordaccountandguildsweren't controlled by Discord, but instead ran on a machine you controlled and was in no way answerable to Discord Inc, but you could still talk to your buddies on Discord proper. It'slikethat.</p>
<h3>Incognitomode</h3>
<p>Contrarytothetitleoftheprevioussection,afederatedapproachdoestechnicallyaddmoremiddlemen.We've gone from one unaccountable central authority able to read everyone'smessagestoseveralunaccountablepartieseachabletoreadthemessagesofeveryonetheyserve.Notmuchofanimprovement,privacy-wise,unlessyoutrustbothyourproviderandtheprovidersofeveryoneyou'retalkingtoimplicitly.Actualprivacyrequiresend-to-endencryption.</p>
<p>End-to-endencryptionmeansthemessageisencryptedbeforeleavingthesender's machine and can only be decrypted by the recipient once it arrives on theirs. This means that only the sender and recipient can read the message; even if it goes through some other party'sserver,theyhavenocluewhatthecontentsofthemessageare.Anymessagingsystemthatcaresaboutprivacyatallwillimplementthis-ideallythey'llbuildtheentireprotocolaroundit.</p>
<p>Here's the part where I discuss actual alternatives to Discord. I'llsaynowthatthiswillnotbeacomprehensiveoverviewofeverypossibleoption-recommendingchatappsthatdon't meet these standards would kinda defeat the point, and I'malsonotomniscient.TherearegoingtobeotheroptionsthatIhaven't covered here, and hopefully I'vegivenyouthetoolstodeterminewhichonesaregood.</p>
<p>XMPPisaboutascloseaswe've got to "email but for instant messaging". It'safederated,openprotocolwhich,havingbeenformallystandardizedin1999,istrulyancientininternetyears.Myunderstandingisthatitactuallyusedtobemorewidelyused,butGoogleeffectivelykilleditoffinpopularusagebysubsumingitsuserbaseintoGoogleTalkandthenpromptlyturningofffederationandkillingGoogleTalk.Thatdoesn't mean it'sgone,though.PeoplestilluseXMPPtotalktoeachother,runningonservershostedbythemselvesortheirfriends.</p>
<p>XMPPis,atitscore,designedforsimpletext-basedmessagingandpresence.Whiletheprotocolishighlyextensible,manyevenrelativelybasic-seemingfeatures,whilecommon,aren't universally supported. If you want them, you'llhavetofindaproviderthathasthem.</p>
<ul>
<li>Federatedprotocol.</li>
<li>Feature-bare;nogimmicks.</li>
<li>Generallysupportsfilesharing.</li>
<li>Supportsend-to-endencryption,butit's not the default and it'skindajanky.</li>
<li>You'll have to find a provider and choose a client program to connect with. Fortunately, there'splentyofoptions,andtheofficialXMPPwebsitelistssomeofeach.</li>
<p>MumbleandJitsiareself-hostablevoicechatandvideoconferencingapplications,respectively.They're not messaging systems, but I feel they bear mentioning here because they'rebothpopularforuseinconjunctionwithtextchatsystems,andsincenothingelseherecurrentlysupportsscreensharing.</p>
<h3><ahref="https://revolt.chat">Revolt</a></h3>
<p>We've about run out of open protocols (which is probably a good thing), so now on to the centralized services, starting with Revolt. Revolt is basically trying to be open-source Discord. It'scurrentlyinalpha,buttheuserexperienceisverysimilaranditalreadyhassomeofthefunstuff.</p>
<p>FromwhatIcouldfindRevoltisn't currently controlled by any kind of legal entity, so there'snoguaranteeitwon't eventually incorporate into a for-profit company and pull a Reddit (by which I mean, Reddit used to be open-source, but hasn'tbeensince2017),butatleastfornowtheprojectleadersexpressprinciplesthatmakethatseemunlikely.</p>
<p>I've now run out of Discord-likes - which is to say, programs that support the sort of multi-channel group chat thing Discord has going on. This and the next one function more in the vein of a Whatsapp clone, though I feel they still bear mentioning in the event that'sallyouneed.</p>
<p>Signaliskindof<em>the</em>privatemessagingapp.It's fundamentally built around end-to-end encryption in a way that its biggest direct competitors simply aren't.It's been proven in court that Signal literally doesn'thavetheabilitytoincriminateyou,sincetheycan'taccessthecontentsofyourmessages.Itdoesneedyourphonenumber,though,howeveryoucannowhideitwithausername.Italsosupportsvoiceandvideochat,andstickers,apparently.</p>
<p>Ilied,Sessionisn't centralized. But it'snotdecentralizedinthesamewayasthefederatedprotocolsupthere,either.Sessionrunsoverananonymizingonionroutingnetwork,Tor-style,meaningnotonlycanyourmessagesnotbereadbytheserver,thoseserversalsodon't know both the sender and the destination at the same time. Essentially, it'sdesignedtomaximizeprivacyandanonymityatallcosts.Butwouldn'tyouknowit,thatcomesatacostintermsoffeaturesanduserexperience.</p>
<p>That's about all I'vegot.IhopeI've impressed upon you the importance of Discord'scoreproblems,andintroducedyoutoatleastonealternativethatworksforyou.Ihavemypreferences,butI'm comfortable recommending all of these over Discord, otherwise I wouldn'thavelistedthem.</p>
<p>Ifthere's one thing I want you to take away from this article, it'sthis:Don't fall for the marketing and don'tletyourselfbewooedbyextraneousgimmicks.Bediscerningaboutwhichfancy-soundingfeaturesyouactuallyneed.Ifyouwanttohaveachanceofescapingtheviciouscorporatecycleofenshittification,bothwithchatplatformsandwitheverythingelse,makesuretheonesyouusehaveastrongfoundationofsustainabilityandtrustworthiness,beyondwhatevermarketingdrivelisonthefrontpageoftheirwebsite.HopefullyI'vegivenyouatleastsometoolstodetermineforyourselfwhichonesdo.</p>