Not at all, I have a bunch of friends on my private server and getting someone an XMPP client and account takes less than a minute. No phone number or email req

Not at all, I have a bunch of friends on my private server and getting someone an XMPP client and account takes less than a minute. No phone number or email required. Sure, everyone out there isn't going to be on my server - but for the close friends I care about - it's been flawless.