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This is all true, but IM is not email. What I want out of email that IM does not (generally) deliver: 1) UI optimized for longer form messages. 2) Decentralize

This is all true, but IM is not email. What I want out of email that IM does not (generally) deliver: 1) UI optimized for longer form messages. 2) Decentralized system where you can send to anyone if you know their address, which may be long-lasting and not tied to the fortunes of a single private company. I don't demand compatibility or interoperability with SMTP, but I also don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. It looks like an an email application layer is buildable on top of Matrix, so that's something I'm following and looking forward to.

tptacek 10y ago
The modern messaging services agree with you. Nobody has completely nailed the UX for long-term long-form conversations, but services like Signal are designed with those kinds of conversations in mind. At the same time: if you had to compare the UX of running a long-term secret conversation over Signal versus the UX of trying to reliably encrypt messages over email, no normal user would ever choose the latter. Secure messenger UX will get better long before email will be reliably encrypted (that's cheating, because email will probably never be reliably encrypted, but even if it wasn't, messenger protocols are going to win this race).
- newscracker 10y ago
  > Nobody has completely nailed the UX for long-term long-form conversations, but services like Signal are designed with those kinds of conversations in mind. No, they're actually not designed with any kind of "long termness" in mind! Case in point - one cannot move to a new device and still have access to conversations that happened on the older device with Signal. All old conversations just have to die with the old device, and the new device starts as if Signal was installed for the very first time - including starting conversations with people, getting into groups, etc. Backing up the old device and restoring that into the new one wouldn't help for this. There is no message migration feature available (separately) when one changes devices, and what's worse, in my limited observation, the Signal team just closes feature requests and issues filed on this front on Github. The ugliest part is that this is not even explained when someone installs the app or activates Signal on a new device. So Signal is good only for ephemeral messaging where one doesn't care about past messages and their availability. Wire has the exact same problem too. One might as well treat apps like Signal and Wire like voice call apps rather than as text/photo messaging apps. It seems like these apps make some naïve assumptions about the target user either not changing devices for many years (self-defeating in a way with smartphones, where security updates stop after 4-5 years, maximum) and/or not caring about having access to older messages whenever the users gets a new device.
  - NoGravitas 10y ago
    Also, no way to have multiple separate conversations with the same person, or threaded conversations. These may just be app problems -- there may be protocol support for future applications to provide these (this is where Matrix stands today). But the lack of interest in these things doesn't look good.
    - Arathorn 10y ago
      tbh there's significant interest in decentralised comms, at least from the geek community - the matrix.org server alone is pushing out around 1500 msg/s atm and we're having to panic around finding faster hosting hardware as a quick win whilst working on longer term homeserver scalability work. obviously this needs to transplant into mainstream interest, but we're hoping that clients like Riot will get the UX sufficiently good to bring decentralisation to the mainstream folks otherwise stuck with WhatsApp and friends.
    - confounded 10y ago
      I got a group of about 30 non-technies using Signal, not because they knew what what perfect forward secrecy is, but because they grew vaguely suspicious of the motivations of governments and Facebook, and people/Google-results they trusted were positive. The details don't matter to ordinary people, but our approval matters much more than you think. I have very high hopes for Matrix.org.
      - newscracker 10y ago
        I think your group of people would be highly disappointed whenever each person moves to a new device and finds that they have essentially "lost" all old messages and have to re-join groups afresh. > The details don't matter to ordinary people, but our approval matters much more than you think. I have very high hopes for Matrix.org. I agree on this part completely, and I try to introduce better tools to others too. But not having messages restored on a new device (even when a user backs up and restores all data) and not providing a way for that when changing devices is unacceptable for me. At this point I'm back to Telegram, which is a compromise, but provides a much better experience as far as usability and meeting the expectations of non-tech users go.

tptacek 10y ago

The modern messaging services agree with you. Nobody has completely nailed the UX for long-term long-form conversations, but services like Signal are designed with those kinds of conversations in mind. At the same time: if you had to compare the UX of running a long-term secret conversation over Signal versus the UX of trying to reliably encrypt messages over email, no normal user would ever choose the latter. Secure messenger UX will get better long before email will be reliably encrypted (that's cheating, because email will probably never be reliably encrypted, but even if it wasn't, messenger protocols are going to win this race).

newscracker 10y ago
> Nobody has completely nailed the UX for long-term long-form conversations, but services like Signal are designed with those kinds of conversations in mind. No, they're actually not designed with any kind of "long termness" in mind! Case in point - one cannot move to a new device and still have access to conversations that happened on the older device with Signal. All old conversations just have to die with the old device, and the new device starts as if Signal was installed for the very first time - including starting conversations with people, getting into groups, etc. Backing up the old device and restoring that into the new one wouldn't help for this. There is no message migration feature available (separately) when one changes devices, and what's worse, in my limited observation, the Signal team just closes feature requests and issues filed on this front on Github. The ugliest part is that this is not even explained when someone installs the app or activates Signal on a new device. So Signal is good only for ephemeral messaging where one doesn't care about past messages and their availability. Wire has the exact same problem too. One might as well treat apps like Signal and Wire like voice call apps rather than as text/photo messaging apps. It seems like these apps make some naïve assumptions about the target user either not changing devices for many years (self-defeating in a way with smartphones, where security updates stop after 4-5 years, maximum) and/or not caring about having access to older messages whenever the users gets a new device.
- NoGravitas 10y ago
  Also, no way to have multiple separate conversations with the same person, or threaded conversations. These may just be app problems -- there may be protocol support for future applications to provide these (this is where Matrix stands today). But the lack of interest in these things doesn't look good.
  - Arathorn 10y ago
    tbh there's significant interest in decentralised comms, at least from the geek community - the matrix.org server alone is pushing out around 1500 msg/s atm and we're having to panic around finding faster hosting hardware as a quick win whilst working on longer term homeserver scalability work. obviously this needs to transplant into mainstream interest, but we're hoping that clients like Riot will get the UX sufficiently good to bring decentralisation to the mainstream folks otherwise stuck with WhatsApp and friends.
  - confounded 10y ago
    I got a group of about 30 non-technies using Signal, not because they knew what what perfect forward secrecy is, but because they grew vaguely suspicious of the motivations of governments and Facebook, and people/Google-results they trusted were positive. The details don't matter to ordinary people, but our approval matters much more than you think. I have very high hopes for Matrix.org.
    - newscracker 10y ago
      I think your group of people would be highly disappointed whenever each person moves to a new device and finds that they have essentially "lost" all old messages and have to re-join groups afresh. > The details don't matter to ordinary people, but our approval matters much more than you think. I have very high hopes for Matrix.org. I agree on this part completely, and I try to introduce better tools to others too. But not having messages restored on a new device (even when a user backs up and restores all data) and not providing a way for that when changing devices is unacceptable for me. At this point I'm back to Telegram, which is a compromise, but provides a much better experience as far as usability and meeting the expectations of non-tech users go.