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> What do you need from Email that a messenger lacks? Discussion threads. Say I work on two different projects with the same colleague, or that I am also frien

by twanvl 9y ago

> What do you need from Email that a messenger lacks? Discussion threads. Say I work on two different projects with the same colleague, or that I am also friends with a coworker and do things together outside of work. In whatsapp the different topics would all be mixed together into a big mess. With email I can just reply to a particular thread.

eitland 9y ago
I prefer Telegram now but this should work in Whatsapp as well: Just create a group for each context and name them properly.
PuffinBlue 9y ago
Huh, i think you've just identified (for me at least) the crux of the issue. What messaging system other than email allows for topic based discussion? I guess you could abuse groups to donsomething similar, but its not wuite the same. The underlying one person to one person philosophy of messaging apps is infuriating for organised discussion over time. It makes finding info discussed harder too. Does anyone have any suggestions for messaging apps that don't put person to person front and center but topic discussion like email? (You might argue the last point i made there, but go and make two separately stored discussions with the same person on whatsapp or signal or wharever... I'll wait).
- tmail21 9y ago
  You might want to check out TMail21 ( https://tmail21.com https://tmail21.com ). It is thread (topic)-oriented. It also adds shared (versioned) facts to threads which opens up an interesting set of use cases.
- ryukafalz 9y ago
  >Does anyone have any suggestions for messaging apps that don't put person to person front and center but topic discussion like email? IRC, Riot (Matrix in general), Slack, Discord, Rocket.Chat. There are quite a few. I'm partial to Matrix, personally - you can invite a few friends for a room, and naming that room/setting a topic are optional, so either use case is fairly natural.
  - PuffinBlue 9y ago
    Hmm, not really. All those apps fall into the trap of following a UX design where it's all about a group or person and the conversation within. IRC is channels, Slack is channels, Riot seems to just basically be IRC, Discord is another take on the same genre. None of them give you what email gives you. With email there's not a person or group in sight in the UX, save for perhaps a 'from' entry in the thread list. It's all about info. I can start 100 conversations with the same person and have those threads organised into a timeline separately from each other. I can then also arrange them into arbitrary collections. I can possibly achieve something sort of like this by abusing groups or channels in these other apps, but then what? I just get a sidebar full of the things - what do I do with them? Can I search them and the info within from a global panel? Can I organise them into folders? Copy them to other accounts with a simple drag and drop? Email has quite a different focus than all those apps you mentioned which is probably why nothing has replaced it.

by twanvl 9y ago

eitland 9y ago

I prefer Telegram now but this should work in Whatsapp as well: Just create a group for each context and name them properly.

PuffinBlue 9y ago

Huh, i think you've just identified (for me at least) the crux of the issue. What messaging system other than email allows for topic based discussion? I guess you could abuse groups to donsomething similar, but its not wuite the same. The underlying one person to one person philosophy of messaging apps is infuriating for organised discussion over time. It makes finding info discussed harder too. Does anyone have any suggestions for messaging apps that don't put person to person front and center but topic discussion like email? (You might argue the last point i made there, but go and make two separately stored discussions with the same person on whatsapp or signal or wharever... I'll wait).

tmail21 9y ago
You might want to check out TMail21 ( https://tmail21.com https://tmail21.com ). It is thread (topic)-oriented. It also adds shared (versioned) facts to threads which opens up an interesting set of use cases.
ryukafalz 9y ago
>Does anyone have any suggestions for messaging apps that don't put person to person front and center but topic discussion like email? IRC, Riot (Matrix in general), Slack, Discord, Rocket.Chat. There are quite a few. I'm partial to Matrix, personally - you can invite a few friends for a room, and naming that room/setting a topic are optional, so either use case is fairly natural.
- PuffinBlue 9y ago
  Hmm, not really. All those apps fall into the trap of following a UX design where it's all about a group or person and the conversation within. IRC is channels, Slack is channels, Riot seems to just basically be IRC, Discord is another take on the same genre. None of them give you what email gives you. With email there's not a person or group in sight in the UX, save for perhaps a 'from' entry in the thread list. It's all about info. I can start 100 conversations with the same person and have those threads organised into a timeline separately from each other. I can then also arrange them into arbitrary collections. I can possibly achieve something sort of like this by abusing groups or channels in these other apps, but then what? I just get a sidebar full of the things - what do I do with them? Can I search them and the info within from a global panel? Can I organise them into folders? Copy them to other accounts with a simple drag and drop? Email has quite a different focus than all those apps you mentioned which is probably why nothing has replaced it.