6 ms·

It's fine to want all your communication on an open protocol, but email is just plain clunky and not good at all for the types of online communication people ha

It's fine to want all your communication on an open protocol, but email is just plain clunky and not good at all for the types of online communication people have grown accustomed to. It literally is just an electronic equivalent of sending a letter, and inherits most of the limitations that implies. If any of us are ever going to convince friends and family to leave proprietary platforms like Messenger and Discord, we are going to need an open protocol that allows for the same features and level of polish. Trying to get everyone to just use email is a complete non-starter.

addicted 5y ago
Both Google and MS created excellent IM systems based on email. It can be done. It isn’t because there is no billion dollar exit possible on an email based system.
- atatatat 5y ago
  What IM systems are you referring to..?
  - stephenhuey 5y ago
    Pretty sure he's talking about the original chat embedded in the Gmail interface. The earliest records I can find in my logs are from February 2006. For at least 7 years I used it, and for many years my usage was quite extensive. Either due to changed preferences when I got older or iMessage or other things, it looks like I generally stopped chatting in there around May 2013. From my perspective, Google was sitting on a gold mine because so many people I knew in the USA and across the ocean were using it and it worked very well until they started fiddling with the product in ways that made it more clunky.
chii 5y ago
> It literally is just an electronic equivalent of sending a letter, and inherits most of the limitations that implies that's not giving email enough credit. Email has zero limitations unlike real snail mail - the email client is the limitation, and that's "just" software. The fact that gmail client was so successful is evidence that email could've been _the_ premiere platform for open communication. Instead, we now have many separate walled gardens vying for dominance. Imagine how the world would've been if snail mail back in the 20th century needed different stamps for different recipients!
- paxys 5y ago
  Email has very real limitations, imposed both by the protocol itself and by lack of consensus among all the major and minor clients.
  - darau1 5y ago
    Can you give some examples? I've never seen any mentioned.
    - pfranz 5y ago
      Sending private information is the first thing I think of--from a bunch of aspects. Secure in transit has had a bunch of different, awkward implementations. My biggest concern is sending tax documents and it sitting in someone's archive folder (or sent folder) for years until their account is compromised. So I often have organizations that send email pointing to their proprietary webmail. The alternative is sneakernet, hard copies, or even faxing.
      - darau1 5y ago
        Unless you physically hand your taxes in, isn't any solution technically vulnerable to being compromised? Also, wouldn't encryption fix this problem? I don't understand how it might be implemented in the real world, but if you encrypt with your private key, then their public key the message should be safe in transit, and at rest (unless they leave it decrypted on disk)
        pfranz 5y ago
        > Unless you physically hand your taxes in, isn't any solution technically vulnerable to being compromised? If that's all there is to it, then why do people use other solutions? > Also, wouldn't encryption fix this problem? Kind of. The problem is the protocol and lack of consensus prevents this from being feasibly implemented. Personally, I think encryption in transit is a low probability threat for me. I would also like certain data to "expire" or go into "cold storage" after a period of time. Sending it in a side-channel, like Dropbox or Google Drive means I can delete it or revoke access after a period of time but this breaks email.
ryandrake 5y ago
> If any of us are ever going to convince friends and family to leave proprietary platforms I’ve kind of thrown in the towel on this fight. People are going to use what they like. For me, it’s E-mail. My friends and family know how to get in touch with me if they need to: using E-mail. If they want to text each other or WhatsApp each other or Snapchat each other or whatever it is they do, they can go right ahead: it doesn’t affect me. And that’s all OK!
- MereInterest 5y ago
  > If they want to text each other or WhatsApp each other or Snapchat each other or whatever it is they do, they can go right ahead: it doesn’t affect me. So when Facebook slurps up your email address by virtue of your friends using WhatsApp, that doesn't affect you?
  - ryandrake 5y ago
    Not really, because I don't use Facebook. I'm avoiding the bulk of the harm from Facebook (e.g. the dopamine spikes, wasted time I'll never get back, feed addiction, emotional manipulation/experiments, etc.) by simply not using it. Until I start getting ads from them even off of Facebook properties, I don't really care what they think they know about me. Sure, they now have my E-mail address. I guess that sucks, but it was due to some other idiot's lack of OpSec, and there is nothing I can do about it. I'm not going to convince 2,000 people to stop using Facebook, let alone 2 million or 2 billion.
chagaif 5y ago
Matrix.org is exactly what you are describing

addicted 5y ago

Both Google and MS created excellent IM systems based on email. It can be done. It isn’t because there is no billion dollar exit possible on an email based system.

atatatat 5y ago
What IM systems are you referring to..?
- stephenhuey 5y ago
  Pretty sure he's talking about the original chat embedded in the Gmail interface. The earliest records I can find in my logs are from February 2006. For at least 7 years I used it, and for many years my usage was quite extensive. Either due to changed preferences when I got older or iMessage or other things, it looks like I generally stopped chatting in there around May 2013. From my perspective, Google was sitting on a gold mine because so many people I knew in the USA and across the ocean were using it and it worked very well until they started fiddling with the product in ways that made it more clunky.

chii 5y ago

> It literally is just an electronic equivalent of sending a letter, and inherits most of the limitations that implies that's not giving email enough credit. Email has zero limitations unlike real snail mail - the email client is the limitation, and that's "just" software. The fact that gmail client was so successful is evidence that email could've been _the_ premiere platform for open communication. Instead, we now have many separate walled gardens vying for dominance. Imagine how the world would've been if snail mail back in the 20th century needed different stamps for different recipients!

paxys 5y ago
Email has very real limitations, imposed both by the protocol itself and by lack of consensus among all the major and minor clients.
- darau1 5y ago
  Can you give some examples? I've never seen any mentioned.
  - pfranz 5y ago
    Sending private information is the first thing I think of--from a bunch of aspects. Secure in transit has had a bunch of different, awkward implementations. My biggest concern is sending tax documents and it sitting in someone's archive folder (or sent folder) for years until their account is compromised. So I often have organizations that send email pointing to their proprietary webmail. The alternative is sneakernet, hard copies, or even faxing.
    - darau1 5y ago
      Unless you physically hand your taxes in, isn't any solution technically vulnerable to being compromised? Also, wouldn't encryption fix this problem? I don't understand how it might be implemented in the real world, but if you encrypt with your private key, then their public key the message should be safe in transit, and at rest (unless they leave it decrypted on disk)
      - pfranz 5y ago
        > Unless you physically hand your taxes in, isn't any solution technically vulnerable to being compromised? If that's all there is to it, then why do people use other solutions? > Also, wouldn't encryption fix this problem? Kind of. The problem is the protocol and lack of consensus prevents this from being feasibly implemented. Personally, I think encryption in transit is a low probability threat for me. I would also like certain data to "expire" or go into "cold storage" after a period of time. Sending it in a side-channel, like Dropbox or Google Drive means I can delete it or revoke access after a period of time but this breaks email.

ryandrake 5y ago

> If any of us are ever going to convince friends and family to leave proprietary platforms I’ve kind of thrown in the towel on this fight. People are going to use what they like. For me, it’s E-mail. My friends and family know how to get in touch with me if they need to: using E-mail. If they want to text each other or WhatsApp each other or Snapchat each other or whatever it is they do, they can go right ahead: it doesn’t affect me. And that’s all OK!

MereInterest 5y ago
> If they want to text each other or WhatsApp each other or Snapchat each other or whatever it is they do, they can go right ahead: it doesn’t affect me. So when Facebook slurps up your email address by virtue of your friends using WhatsApp, that doesn't affect you?
- ryandrake 5y ago
  Not really, because I don't use Facebook. I'm avoiding the bulk of the harm from Facebook (e.g. the dopamine spikes, wasted time I'll never get back, feed addiction, emotional manipulation/experiments, etc.) by simply not using it. Until I start getting ads from them even off of Facebook properties, I don't really care what they think they know about me. Sure, they now have my E-mail address. I guess that sucks, but it was due to some other idiot's lack of OpSec, and there is nothing I can do about it. I'm not going to convince 2,000 people to stop using Facebook, let alone 2 million or 2 billion.

chagaif 5y ago

Matrix.org is exactly what you are describing