Welp it was a nice run. What’s up element?
this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2025
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Element is run by a for-profit company. Plus, it's not even remotely similar to Discord. Apples and oranges.
Element is an app for "Matrix" (thats like lemmy but for discord) that is developed by a for-profit company (the company mostly manages deployments for big governments). But not only is it open source, its just one client of many for matrix. The vast majority are developed by individuals (Cinny, FluffyChat).
Plus, it's not even remotely similar to Discord.
There are probably discord features missing from matrix but they certainly have a lot of similarities. Though tbf Cinny is the closest to discord in terms of design and functionality not element (but they both are matrix clients).
They have business offerings, but the client is still free. There are also many other Matrix Clients.
Boooo, that sucks.
Enshittification ahoy !
Oh no…… anyway Here something discord alike that you can selfhost or join the existing instance.
It's not federated, no video call, no screen share. Pretty useless so far.
Shame its not federated. Makes the self hosting aspect kinda unappealing if I'd need to access a different instance for different servers.
Our mission is to create the most authentic, player-centric advertising platform in the galaxy
Look, the quiet part, right in the open.
What an excellent place to remind people of the Free and Open Source Element project built upon the Matrix platform.
They, in my opinion, desperately need contributors to provide the same level of features as Discord, particularly with community and moderation features such as a landing page where users can agree with rules and terms before using the server.
Unfortunately, while Element is great, it does not support push to talk or a minimum dB to transmit sound. Which makes it a dealbreaker for gaming with friends, unfortunately.
Element is run by a for-profit company.
And Lemmy is run by Tankies, we kind of have to have faith in the ability to self-host with these platforms and make minimal compromises between them and the competitors.
https://reddthat.com/post/37286760
I like Revolt better because it's actually designed to replace Discord. Matrix isn't designed to be Discord, and that's a problem, because what I want is FOSS Discord. Matrix doesn't bring any novel features that make me want it more than FOSS Discord.
I do agree that Matrix isn't a good replacement for Discord, but Revolt is largely centralized, so I have my doubt's about it as well. If users started to switch to it, how would the primary instance handle that level of traffic?
If users started to switch to it, how would the primary instance handle that level of traffic?
They can't. Not without enshittification and monetization. But I suspect that that is their goal. They have no interest in federation, not even on the future roadmap. The developer also stated elsewhere that he won't support self-hosting officially, and it only became a thing after long back and forth in the community. I already know where that project will go and I don't like it.
Oh. This is their vision quest optional ad thing. Not that its great but these exist on desktop already, and can be completely disabled in settings. This post just now reminded me that they made that, I turned it off and completely forgot.
They also say that the option to disable it will exist on mobile too. Its shitty that there are ads at all but this is about the least offensive option I've ever seen. Can't promise it won't creep out and get worse later but yeah.
Its shitty that there are ads
i mean there has to be a way to fund the business. ads are fine as long as there is a way to remove them through options or paying a reasonable fee.
They already offer a subscription service. And on top of that they have not-so-microtransactions in their shop.
Yeah seriously $8 for a small border? Crazy pricing
The setting says "If you opt out you might still see Quest promotions, but they won't be personalized to your activity". I'm on Nitro Basic (The 3 dollar a month plan.) and I don't see any method for disabling them completely.
I pay for Nitro yearly to the tune of $15 a month and the ads cannot be disabled, only hidden after they come up.
So yeah, I've cancelled my subscription, this is only going to get worse, especially once they're completely beholden to shareholders.
Yeahhh ive supported discord for about 5 years now with full nitro and if they’re going to show me ads no matter what then I’m canceling right now.
I had hope when they rejected Microsoft’s offer. But they were just waiting for the bigger fish.
That’s why I am moving out of discord, making it worse and have less features and now adding ads to communicator. Who had this genius idea?
Advertisers
Aliucord
This is to test the waters for desktop ads I'm sure of it.
These are the desktop ads that are already there, they’re bringing the quests (that, for now, have an off switch) to mobile
wat no
What about nitro users?
Fewer ads. Not zero, though
Best keep my ad blocker on then :)
This is a good excuse for us to cancel.
Does anyone know of an lgbt+ safe pokemon server for gaming and discussion on Matrix
Is there one on matrix.org? I don't use Matrix much.
Maybe blahaj.zone's server has a Pokemon channel
Welp, good thing I don't use discord on mobile. We'll see how it goes when they come to desktop.
Read the article. Its the quest thingy that's been on desktop for like a year.
I've literally never noticed an ad on desktop since I joined discord in like 2010.
You should also just use the webapp in browser instead of the desktop application, imo.
Yeah I was thinking about that if desktop gets ads, cause at least ublock origin can block most things.