this post was submitted on 02 Nov 2023
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Privacy
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Matrix is developed by a for profit entity, a group of venture capitalists and having a spec doesn't mean everything. XMPP is an open standard, truly open and if you notice you've had a lot of implementations of it all able to properly integrate with each other without effort.
The way Matrix is designed is to force into jumping through hoops and kind of draw all attention to Matrix itself instead of the end result. The kind of open collaboration where the protocol becomes mostly invisible for the end user isn't just the objective of Matrix.
Sorry, but nothing you mentioned has anything to do with Matrix not being an open protocol. I don't know what you mean by "truly open". It sounds like a "no true Scotsman" argument.
The spec is absolutely open, and you can see it in what I linked. There are also several servers and several clients if you don't like one written by the Matrix or Element folks. Heck, there's even a client for emacs! Now there are compatibility issues since not every server and client implements the entire protocol yet, but that's not an issue of openness. I used to run into problems all the time with XMPP way back when for similar reasons. I even recall something about Google breaking the XMPP protocol in some ways and causing problems.
I'm not even sure your claim of VC funding is true, since the faq mentions several non VC sources of funding. I couldn't find anything about VC at element.io, so maybe it's hidden there, or something has changed a matrix.org?
Still, discussion about not liking their business model is orthogonal to whether the protocol is open or not. Maybe we run the risk of them pulling a HashiCorp and changing some licensing down the road, which would be terrible. But I think it's dishonest to say it's not open.
Try contributing to the Matrix specs. It literally has a paywall (only contributing foundation members can do it) and basically any proposal that does not further the business goals of Element gets shot down by the overwhelming majority of Element employees or affiliates on the Matrix foundation board.
So while the protocol is open to use, it does not really fulfill the typical requirement of openess in so far that it is also open for contributions and changes.
This is totally different from the truly open standardisation process for XMPP where anyone can contribute freely and no single company dominates the process.
Edit: the VC funding is for Element / New Vector, but that company fully controls the Matrix Foundation.
So is the Linux kernel not open because code has to go through review and may be rejected?
Is Gnu software not open because you have to sign over copyright or may have code rejected for ideological reasons?
Guido van Rossum was BDFL of Python until recently and had pretty much final say on anything that went into the langauge. So I guess Python isn't open?
Hopefully the XMPP Standards Foundation doesn't just blindly merge in every pull request that comes their way! I'm sure there have been plenty of people that had to beg and still had their proposal rejected.
You may not agree with the decisions being made about Matrix, but that doesn't mean it's not an open protocol or an open process. In fact it's extremely transparent as another commenter linked to their proposal pull requests on GitHub.
There's plenty to criticize about Matrix. It may be overly complicated and over-engineered. If there is significant VC involvement, then the threat of enshittification is very real. Element is also quite slow in larger rooms and the search is pretty terrible at the moment.
But, it's dishonest to say it's not open. I just don't want other readers to think it's somehow closed, when it isn't. Discord is closed. Slack is closed. Matrix is not.
Also, while being open is a good thing, it's not a virtue unto itself. Visual Studio Code is an open editor but I stay away from it because I don't trust Microsoft to not fuck it up. Likewise Chromium is open but I stay away from it because I trust Google even less.
You do not seem to understand the difference between source code of an implementation and the protocol specifications themselves.
I think you need to read up on that first before we can continue this discussion.
Sorry, but that's a bit of a rude conclusion to come to considering you know nothing about me or the fact that I've been writing software for over 20 years.
Anyway, I think we've both said our piece and I'm happy to just disagree. You seem like a cool person and I'd rather not have us get upset over semantics.
Take care! :)
No hard feelings and I didn't mean to be rude, but this was a rather factual observation.
What you are saying is basically because you have 20 years experience of driving a taxi you know how to operate a train service. Those are just two totally different things.