79 ms·

Element One – All of Matrix, WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram in one place

530 points by mcjiggerlog 5y ago

mst 5y ago
I confess to finding this tempting just for the whatsapp bridge because frankly while https://matrix.org/docs/guides/whatsapp-bridging-mautrix-whatsapp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/whatsapp-bridging-mautrix-wha... is very clever I really don't want to actually have to maintain an instance of it.
solarkraft 5y ago
Matrix and a Element are great in theory, too bad the available clients still suck.
- maelito 5y ago
  Element for Android is far from bad. Lacks threads, though. But same for Telegram and Whatsapp.
  - leppr 5y ago
    Both the Android and web clients are promising, it's clear there's been a lot of work put into it, but they're also way too buggy and unpolished to recommend. As such, I'm really not eager to use this feature. I would pay/donate just for them to improve the clients, regardless of this "Element One" service. It's an extremely important project.
  - novocaine 5y ago
    Threads are currently under active development :)
    - maelito 5y ago
      Yes, they now work correctly on https://develop.element.io https://develop.element.io
craigmart 5y ago
So this service consists basically in paying to compromise E2EE, adding an attack vector, storing my otherwise encrypted conversations on centralised servers, using an arguably worse client with less features just for the convenience of not having to open 3 separate apps? Who is this for?
- uhtred 5y ago
  It's for all of us! Created by those nice folks over at the NSA! I make joke!
worble 5y ago
How safe is this to use? Couldn't WhatsApp or Signal detect you're routing everything to a shared hosting server somewhere and ban your account as a bot, stating the fact you're probably breaking some ToS clause?
- jakecopp 5y ago
  I can't speak to WhatsApp, but I've been using the self hosted Signal bridge [1] and it is brilliant, no bot troubles at all. Behind the scenes it uses signalid [2]. [1]: https://github.com/mautrix/signal https://github.com/mautrix/signal [2]: https://gitlab.com/signald/signald https://gitlab.com/signald/signald
- remram 5y ago
  I am wondering the same. Did WhatsApp ok this or will it get shut down the moment it gets any traction? Their terms of service [1] clearly state: > You must not (or assist others to) directly, indirectly, through automated or other means, access, use [..] our Services in impermissible or unauthorized manners [...] including that you must not directly or through automated means: [...] > (g) sell, resell, rent, or charge for our Services or data obtained from us or our Services in an unauthorized manner; > (h) distribute or make our Services available over a network where they could be used by multiple devices at the same time, except as authorized through tools we have expressly provided via our Services; > (i) create software or APIs that function substantially the same as our Services and offer them for use by third parties in an unauthorized manner [1]: https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/terms-of-service https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/terms-of-service
modeless 5y ago
I am in the Beeper beta. Beeper supports Matrix, Whatsapp, Signal, and Telegram, but also Slack, Discord, Hangouts, Instagram, Linkedin, Facebook Messenger, SMS, Twitter, and crucially, iMessage on non-Apple devices! It is a beta but it works pretty well so far. AMA
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
arianvanp 5y ago
The fact that content sent to signal and Whatsapp resides unencrypted at the matrix homeserver makes this product completely useless to me. I don't think I want to sacrifice the security for having all my chats in one place. If they can fix that I might reconsider. They already reverse engineered the Whatsapp protocol. I see little reason why it can't live in the client? I don't really follow why they move the bridge to the homeserver.
- radicalbyte 5y ago
  WhatsApp's backups are already stored unencrypted* on Google Drive if you use that feature. * Encrypted with a private key which Google have access to.
  - bogwog 5y ago
    So the encryption is there so that you can't access your own data (and migrate to a competing app/service), rather than to protect your privacy. I kind of ran into this issue myself when I was helping a family member move to iPhone. Since Whatsapp uses Drive on Android and iCloud on iOS, there was no way to transfer the data. I wonder if you can get them via one of those data access requests?
- iforgotpassword 5y ago
  Why don't you encrypt your hard drive?
  - krageon 5y ago
    What problem do you feel this would solve?
  - arianvanp 5y ago
    I don't follow. What does my hard drive have to do with plaintext messages on Element's servers?
    - square_usual 5y ago
maltalex 5y ago
I'm happy to see that element found another potential revenue stream, but will people pay the 5$/month to unify their messaging? I don't know about others but it's not that much of a pain point for me, and I'm using all of the apps they mention - WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram as well as few others like IRC and Discord.
- rglullis 5y ago
  I have nowhere near the same reach and marketing capacity as Element, but if my experience running a managed hosting service [0] for Matrix (and other messaging/social media services) is anything to go by: individuals really don't care enough about that to the point of paying $5/month, but there is a growing opportunity for business that want to have some control over their communications. These bridges can be amazing if you want to have a chatbot, or a support desk that can put all their conversations in one place, etc, but to replace the mainstream apps it is too much of a tall order. At the moment the mobile clients have so many bugs that makes it hard even for me to go when offering support for my "customers", which at this point is just the couple dozen friends and family that I managed to rope into it. They don't even have feature parity with any of the competitors, so for end-users it's just easier to switch apps on their phone depending on who they want to talk and their will have a better experience doing so. I still use and support Matrix, but their clients still need to improve a lot if they ever hope to reach mainstream. I am focused now on another project [1], but when/if I ever get to work back on communick, I will pivot away from end-users and into SMB. [0] https://communick.com https://communick.com [1] https://hub20.io https://hub20.io
- solarkraft 5y ago
  If the available Matrix clients were not a pain to use I probably would.
  - gtirloni 5y ago
    Exactly. The Element UI isn't the best selling point of Matrix right now and that would be a requirement for someone to switch from all those apps to Element.
- 5y ago
miguelrochefort 5y ago
Beeper provides a similar service for $10/month (private beta). https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/
- leohonexus 5y ago
  There's also one from Fitbit's founder, Texts app - this space is getting crowded! https://texts.com/ https://texts.com/
  - miguelrochefort 5y ago
    I can't find any link between Texts and Fitbit, but I know that Eric Migicovsky founded Pebble (acquired by Fitbit) before founding Beeper.
    - leohonexus 5y ago
      Ah my bad - I must have mixed them up.
  - jakecopp 5y ago
    There seems to be little information about the company/people who runs Texts on the website which is strange - where did you find the info of who runs it?
    - leohonexus 5y ago
      My bad - Beeper is the one that's founded by Pebble founder (not Fitbit). Kishan Bagaria is the one behind Texts. https://twitter.com/KishanBagaria https://twitter.com/KishanBagaria
- c0wb0yc0d3r 5y ago
  You can also self host it for free according to their website.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
krageon 5y ago
Does anyone know what this product is based on? Is it just a ready-made image with all the bridges preconfigured (and prerequisites such as a small android vm for a viable whatsapp bridge), or has there been some evolution on the existing package? Is there documentation on what was done to achieve this? Purely on the content of the article: Given that the messages are not stored encrypted locally and that this service is connected to the US, I do not see how it can be viable for the privacy-conscious.
- miguelrochefort 5y ago
  > Does anyone know what this product is based on? It's very likely based on https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy
  - ptman 5y ago
    IIRC element/EMS do their own automation not based on that ansible project. But the bridges are the same open source ones.
  - krageon 5y ago
    This is cool, thank you! Very well documented and (from the looks of things) feature-complete.
  - gnabgib 5y ago
    It is not, according to this comment[0] "although Element One doesn’t use slavi’s ansible playbooks but instead the Element Matrix Services hosted infra" [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29000978 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29000978
- jakecopp 5y ago
  > Purely on the content of the article: Given that the messages are not stored encrypted locally and that this service is connected to the US, I do not see how it can be viable for the privacy-conscious. Matrix chats (direct and group) are E2E by default. There is no bridge that will let you keep E2E encryption between Signal/WhatsApp and another service - it has to be broken somewhere. I believe Element is a UK company. The blog post on This Week In Matrix states it uses modified versions of the open source (and self hostable) Mautrix bridges which are primarily built by tulir [2] of Beeper [3]: https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element-one https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element... > However, in addition to being a fast, snappy Matrix account, it also comes with unlimited personal bridging to Whatsapp, Signal and Telegram thanks to mautrix-whatsapp/signal/telegram! [2]:https://github.com/tulir https://github.com/tulir [3]: https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/
ekianjo 5y ago
Relevant if you want to do it on your own : https://boilingsteam.com/how-to-bridge-discord-in-matrix/ https://boilingsteam.com/how-to-bridge-discord-in-matrix/
mfer 5y ago
From the post… > It’s also worth noting that end-to-end encryption is necessarily broken as messages to (and from) WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram pass across the bridge(s). They store everything encrypted but this may open the door for legal requests to get access.
- est31 5y ago
  Yeah ideally they should sell e.g. raspberry pi devices which allow you to self host it at home.
  - mfer 5y ago
    That does not sound like the kind of experience general consumers expect and it doesn’t match Up with their subscription model.
  - jakecopp 5y ago
    They don't even need to sell this package, it's free and a lot of people do it: https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy/ https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy/ The benefit to hosting by a company is it should be more reliable.
    - superkuh 5y ago
      While the software support is there to run bridges to many other communications services, the actual bridges are direct agreements worked out between the various comporations and non-profits. You would have to be important enough to start such a dialog and relationship if you wanted to run the bridging features locally. So, don't expect to bridge to Libera IRC just because there's a software option. You can always run bots, but that's not a real bridge like what is being described here.
censormenow 5y ago
Let's save the NSA the trouble of hacking into all our secure chat clients and just drop our authentication for everything into an app they made.
- commoner 5y ago
  There is no evidence that Element was "made" by the NSA. Element is developed by New Vector Ltd., a UK company.
  - censormenow 5y ago
    The UK is a surveillance state. They have more CCTV cameras than China.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
Ndymium 5y ago
One thing I didn't spot, does this tier allow you to use a custom domain name on Matrix, or will you be :matrix.org still? $5/mo is an interesting price point for me if it can do that, I don't need the bridges but I could support the project this way.
- jakecopp 5y ago
  I believe this tier only lets you use the new ...one.ems.host domain [1]. Element Home pricing might be better for you if you have a few friends who are also interested ($10/month for 5 users), and won't use bridges [2]. [1]: https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element-one https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element... [2]: https://element.io/personal-plans https://element.io/personal-plans
  - Ndymium 5y ago
    Sadly I don't have a single friend on Matrix that I could consider doing this with, and it's unlikely I could convince my wife to use it either. So it would be double the money for only that piece of flair.
    - rglullis 5y ago
      You don't need to convince your wife to switch, you can start by helping her setup the app on her phone and tell her to use this app when talking to you. Lower the stakes and the expectations. Even if she is starting conversations with you on any other app, you can still start the conversations on Element. There will be bugs and quirks she will find, you just offer help and ask her for patience. With time, they get used to the app and will be okay with starting the conversation with you there. That's what I did with my wife, my parents, closer family and friends. Then you get one day like the recent Facebook outage, and they will come to you to ask if you can help their friends to sign up to it. Slow and steady is the way I found to run this race. I already managed to get rid of WhatsApp and Messenger on my phone, it's only telegram for the odd group chat that is still resisting a full change.
- andrewaylett 5y ago
noworld 5y ago
Welcome to WUPHF.com
- fleaaa 5y ago
  Seriously, should've named it WHUPF..
personjerry 5y ago
Back in the day before the rise of Facebook, there was an open source service that combined all the popular messaging protocols - MSN, AoL, IRC, etc. It was called Pidgin[0], and it never got particularly big. I see the same thing here. While it's interesting, I'm failing to see what the use case is. What's the niche that needs this solved in a big way? [0] https://www.pidgin.im/ https://www.pidgin.im/
- Gigachad 5y ago
  Agreed, not sure what the use case is. It’s super trivial to switch between messaging apps and it’s not often that you are having a conversation with multiple people over multiple apps at once and even then it’s still manageable. The only thing I can think of is people who do not wish to have the app installed for privacy / open source reasons.
  - TeMPOraL 5y ago
    Think of people who are: - Not tech-savvy and easily confused by keeping 6 different messengers around. - People for whom multiple clients becomes a cognitive burden. - Waste of storage space, memory and CPU power that those (hugely bloated, most of the time) clients incur, especially on mobile devices. - People like me, with diminished executive functioning capacity, who are fucking tired of bad ergonomics of all those clients together and each individually, and who'd prefer a single, consistent, ergonomic and powerful UI to manage the torrent of messages they receive.
    - Gigachad 5y ago
      The first two are not well solved by Matrix as the default client is far less user friendly than the proprietary alternatives. Storage space might be an issue on very low end phones but these days phones are starting with 128gb of storage which no IM app is close to filling. Mobile OSs are extremely good at sleeping apps and can receive messages while the app is not running at all using notification services. I would say that resource bloat is actually much more of an issue on desktop where you have 10 instances of chrome running and none can be closed while still receiving notifications.
upofadown 5y ago
Correct me if I am wrong, but this means that you have to trust the people running the bridging server with not just the content of your messages but your account identity/login information as well?
- jakecopp 5y ago
  > with not just the content of your messages Yes, for bridged chats. Matrix <-> Matrix direct & group chats are E2E by default. > but your account identity/login information as well Yes, however identity/login does not permit access to E2E messages (and cross signing prevents E2E compromise [1]). Matrix supports migrating accounts to other servers [2] while keeping your data/social graph (depending on your history viewability settings I believe, someone please correct me if I'm wrong!). [1]: https://matrix.org/blog/2020/05/06/cross-signing-and-end-to-end-encryption-by-default-is-here/ https://matrix.org/blog/2020/05/06/cross-signing-and-end-to-... [2]: https://ems.element.io/tools/matrix-migration https://ems.element.io/tools/matrix-migration
ho_schi 5y ago
This kind of stuff never works reliable of even fully. Because? There is no standard. And especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. If you send your data anyway over this questionable services you're already in a concerning situation adding more possibilities for failure doesn't help. I use Matrix and it is certainly a good thing and the connections to other stuff like IRC, too. The fix is getting rid of WhatsApp. Signal is fine, the non-native desktop applications (i.e. fat and ugly Electron with Chrome behind) needs a rewrite with Gtk and Qt.
- teitoklien 5y ago
  Telegram actively goes out of their way every day to support third party clients , and even keep their systems open to risk of heavy botting/spam , just to support third clients. (And they do have to fight against a lot of malicious bot activity). I use their client api to build cool stuff for my userbot all the time, i have great respect for telegram and matrix. Signal and Whatsapp are more apt when considering walled gardens, not telegram.
- skinkestek 5y ago
  > And especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. One of these is not like the others: Telegram both provides a library to bootstrap alternative clients and prior to that they also sponsored a competition to create a second semi official Telegram client for Android, Telegram X. So I guess Telegram won't be a big problem. But of course, saying something bad about Telegram, true or not, feels pretty safe here.
- arp242 5y ago
  > especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. Telegram at least seems to have pretty decent libraries available to communicate with their API. I don't know how often it breaks, but I've been using the "tg" CLI Telegram client in the last week, and it seems to work fairly well (better than their own web interface anyway). I looked a bit at writing my own as I have some issues with the tg UI; I haven't written the code yet but just looked at the options, and overall it seems fairly decent.
Steltek 5y ago
This is nicely timed. Brief history: when Hangouts was going away and Google Chat coming in, I pitched Matrix to my friends as a better alternative that didn't require unique phone numbers, awkward desktop limitations, and a better federated future. We stuck with Google Chat because inertia and networks suck that way. I revisited the instance I had setup and got the mautrix-googlechat bridge working. It's pretty nice but one friend lamented that he did not have the technical skills to self-host such a thing. And here comes this announcement! Sadly, there is a major hurdle: neither Google Chat nor SMS/GVoice are listed here and those are the major protocols that my social group uses. At the same time, my social group is conservative in adopting new core technologies and wary of cloud lock-in for critical roles (Google being both an unfortunate anchor and precipitator of that). I'm not sure adding those protocols would tip the balance.
- scrollaway 5y ago
  Beeper implements Google Chat. I've been using it, it works really well. https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/
  - bluesign 5y ago
    Only if you can signup though, been very long time since I registered for invite.
  - your_challenger 5y ago
    Yup. And looks like element One is a direct competition to beeper
  - pimeys 5y ago
    I've been waiting for an invite for almost a year now. Even gave my credit card for them, but still waiting... I'm just yelling here to take my money, but nobody answers.
  - KoftaBob 5y ago
    Beeper's waitlist is probably the longest one I've ever had to wait on for a beta service. Still waiting, over a year later.
dncornholio 5y ago
Paying for this as a service? No thanks. Too many subscription based services already.
3np 5y ago
I wonder why Facebook Messenger is not included? From experience, the Messenger Matrix bridge has been surprisingly robust, moreso than the signald bridge.
johnisgood 5y ago
Any plans on making this free, or self-hosted?
- pimeys 5y ago
  It is possible. I've been running my own for a year, but it takes quite a hefty server at least with Synapse, and it's not cheaper compared to the quite nice 5 euros a month pricing here. If you want to give it a try, this is what I used: https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy
  - zfnmxt 5y ago
    You can run Synapse on a cheapo VPS for <$5/month; it doesn't exactly require much.
    - pimeys 5y ago
      I have Synapse and quite quite many bridges running and especially syncing a newbdevice takes a long time. Hope I could go with Conduit at some point.
- apetresc 5y ago
  It always has been, since the beginning. This is purely convenient hosting for those not inclined to self-host.
  - johnisgood 5y ago
    Oooh, I may have misunderstood something, I think. :P
elnygren 5y ago
I already have a way to unify my messaging across different apps. It's called MacOS and cmd+tab. Sometimes on the road I use something called iOS. Sure it's not the same. But is it that different either? All messaging apps have their own native features, some have E2E encryption etc. Not sure if there's a common subset that is enjoyable enough to use that it's worth it. That being said, I do wonder what will be the "Facebook Events" (invite all your friends to an event) equivalent in the future when everyone is in a closed garden chat platform instead of Facebook.
- yetanother-1 5y ago
  I use normal calendar event, it is forwardable, and I get confirmations per email who will be coming. I find it to work just as well.
- fastball 5y ago
  There is definitely a benefit to having a unified interface. The vast majority of the time I don't want to use each chat apps specific features, I just want to message people. And then sometimes I want to be distraction free and turn off notifications. This is much easier if everything is routed through one app. I'm also on macOS but I've been using Texts[1] for a few months and it has been a great experience. [1] https://texts.com/ https://texts.com/
  - chirau 5y ago
    Do you have an extra invite by any chance?
    - fastball 5y ago
      Sure if you DM me on Twitter I can send one your way.
titaniumtown 5y ago
what about discord? :(
- chayleaf 5y ago
  sadly, discord ToS forbid "self-botting", so the only legal option is to use a Discord bot, and that's far from seamless and requires guild admin cooperation, I assume that's why they aren't advertising it
  - anticensor 5y ago
    Discord's actual stance against third party clients is far more convoluted, and explained by this comment by Jake: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25224151 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25224151
tao_oat 5y ago
> It’s also worth noting that end-to-end encryption is necessarily broken as messages to (and from) WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram pass across the bridge(s). The bridge(s) operates in Element’s trusted EMS environment, with no content scanning or datamining, but currently bridged conversations are not stored end-to-end encrypted in Matrix (they will be in the future). As a Signal user, I kind of don't want this to take off. I like knowing that when I message someone on Signal, it's for their eyes only. It feels like this service starts fragmenting some of the privacy guarantees of the bridged providers.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- yosito 5y ago
  > this service starts fragmenting some of the privacy guarantees There is no guarantee of privacy with communication between two consumer smartphones. Encrypted Signal-to-Signal messages have always been susceptible to capture on either end, by something like this bridge or a rogue (or non-rogue) app on either end with access to read device notifications. I'm not saying that this service doesn't expose your messages to some additional risk, and should be used cautiously. But it is an illusion that just because the messaging protocol is using end-to-end encryption that the messages can't be intercepted.
- lvass 5y ago
  I concur. I really wouldn't mind anyone using this for whatsapp as I consider any message I send there is also available to 14-eyes, but bridge usage really should be disclosed to Signal users.
- pmlnr 5y ago
  I want this to take off. I'm tired of having to follow trends because people suddenly think there's a new shinyshinytrendy thing around: IRC to ICQ to MSN to Skype to Google Talk to Facebook Messenger to Whatsapp to Signal. Pidgin is good (I also miss the ancient Trillian, even though it was closed source), but limited to a local device. There are XMPP Transports as well for these (see https://git.eta.st/eta/whatsxmpp https://git.eta.st/eta/whatsxmpp , https://gitlab.com/nicocool84/spectrum2_signald https://gitlab.com/nicocool84/spectrum2_signald , but sadly https://spectrum.im/ https://spectrum.im/ is surprisingly finicky to set up.) EDIT: for encryption fans, I've been wondering for a long time now: why would you trust ANY 3rd party with your so sensitive data instead of running your own service? Are you not aware of OMEMO for XMPP? (See https://omemo.top/ https://omemo.top/ )
hnarn 5y ago
I just have a really hard time understanding who this is targeting. If you're on average more willing to sacrifice privacy over ease of use, you're very likely not using Signal or Matrix anyway. So if you're not, but you're using both WhatsApp and Telegram, how is using two apps a big enough problem to set up a third one? Even if we disregard that, I can honestly say that I don't think using four separate apps is a problem. I don't even think using ten different apps is a problem, because it's mostly transparent to the user anyway. You get (configurable) notifications from all of them when you need to care about something, and the "sharing" feature on both iOS and Android these days is normally smart enough to figure out who, or at least which app, you want to share something to -- so for me this "multi app confusion" is already pretty well solved on an OS level, at least on mobile.
- chayleaf 5y ago
  why would privacy enthusiasts not use Matrix, considering it's fairly easy to self-host?
  - hnarn 5y ago
    That’s not what I wrote.
- Arathorn 5y ago
  I constantly miss messages on TG, WA and Signal because I forget to check them regularly. It also really irks me that my conversations are trapped in those platforms without a public API, and I’d like to gather them together on an open platform like Matrix, and access them from every/any Matrix client i choose. Hence the use case for Element One :)
  - hnarn 5y ago
    Why do you need to “check them” in the first place though? And yes, I can understand that for some people the inability to easily transfer and collect those conversations is a problem, but for many people (imo probably more people) the ephemeral nature of these messages is a feature, not a problem to be solved. At least that’s why I use Signal over Messenger, for example.
lvass 5y ago
Do they also host the WhatsApp native instance (Android VM)? That'd be great for those using Pinephones who still want easy access to WA. Otherwise the WA bridge would only work if you run a client yourself.
- pimeys 5y ago
  They do not. You need to have the app installed to your phone, which is a big no for me.
MayeulC 5y ago
It would be nice to see PSTN/SMS as well, those are more complicated to self-host!
NikolaNovak 5y ago
I fully understand that for many, this is not an acceptable security risk. It may have technical compromises. For me, Whatsapp is used by my non-technical in-laws for the simple reason of "because everybody uses it". I find whatsapp extremely impractical (I communicate better via large ergonomic keyboard on my computer, vs via 1.5"-wide screen; to each their own), so anything that makes Whatsapp and other proliferation of incompatible annoying chat services easier... yes, yes, please yes :)
- rrrrrrrrrrrrr 5y ago
  There is desktop and web clients for WhatsApp by now tho
  - NikolaNovak 5y ago
    And they're broken broken broken, and such by design. Current app uses Phone as primary and allows for one other-non-phone-device. If you try to log in on e.g. your tablet and computer, or switch between them often, you'll hit any amount of trouble and will get locked out of account. The current beta has enhancements for multi-device support which may support several non-phone-devices at the same time, even if your phone is offline for short period of time. But it's buggy and your Phone is still your primary and it still won't allow you to sign up without one (it assumes Phone is Me and my life centers around my phone, which is true for my in-laws but not for me:), and the list of limitations is sky high and likely to remain that way. Whatsapp fundamentally prioritizes end to end encryption; primacy of phone; and convenience of contacts for privacy-non-conscious, over everything else. It is good for those who highly value end to end encryption, for reasons of need or principles. For those who need multi-device support, Whatsapp is way way way worse than other chat services of today or 1990s. Right now, I am logged in to Hangouts on three computers, tablet, phone and Galaxy Note (whatever we call that these days:). I am available via Hangouts whatever I do and wherever I am. And frankly I find it more private as it doesn't advertise my existence to all my contacts and siphon them off, doesn't require my phone number which is one of my most private pieces of identifying information, and provides me actual privacy and anonymity if I choose, but that's a whole other discussion. Whatsapp does not, and will for foreseeable future not support my use case. It may or may not be rare, it may or may not be something anybody else thinks is important, but Phone is not the centre of my existence or my sole & preferred method of communication, and as such whatsapp is completely unusable for me. I may be 1% or 0.00001%, and I'm open about that, but this whole notion of "Whatsapp totally works on multi-device" is just getting tiring to misspell - it's right on their FAQ that it is counter-indicated by design by current production version.
causi 5y ago
My concern is whether Element One is in it for the long haul. If I stick with using Whatsapp and Signal I can be fairly certain they'll still be working in five or maybe even ten years. Is Element One committed?
_pmf_ 5y ago
If we can also get Slack in there ...
anthk 5y ago
Run a local Bitlbee server with Hexchat or Quassel if you like GUI's and stop using middleware services. Yes, there are public Bitlbee servers out there, but these are for an emergency.
ulzeraj 5y ago
It doesn't look to be as good as it sounds. Privacy matters aside, you still have to keep WhatsApp installed on your phone. > To connect your WhatsApp account, scan the QR code below: > Open WhatsApp on your mobile device. > Go to "Linked devices" > Press "Link a device". > Scan the code below. Would pay money to get rid of Facebook software in my devices.
- aceArtGmbH 5y ago
  there are bridges for several Facebook services which you can self-host https://matrix.org/bridges/#facebook-messenger https://matrix.org/bridges/#facebook-messenger https://matrix.org/bridges/#instagram https://matrix.org/bridges/#instagram
stjohnswarts 5y ago
This seems like a really bad idea since it gives another attack vector if you're really trying to maintain secure communication.
efields 5y ago
What does this solve? Makes switching between apps on my phone easier?
ridaj 5y ago
The very story of each of WhatsApp, Signal, etc. is a testament to why interoperability across apps matters much less than user reach and feature velocity within an app ecosystem. Most people don't actually mind using different apps for different things once their friends are there, because functionality tends to break at the edges (even creating a simple group chat becomes a pain across non-cooperative networks)
a-dub 5y ago
this has been around since at least january of 2021. i looked into using something like this or setting up my own synapse+bridges and ultimately thought the synapse server had way too much in the way of complexity and attack surface for something that would ultimately end up being a consolidation of all my encrypted messaging. (it was also a bit weird to see public internet protocols using grpc, but i guess that's what people do now) that's the world we live in i guess. you either dedicate a bunch of time to watching your own infra, let tech giants read your messages or let hackers read your messages. this is fine.
5- 5y ago
> hosted by Element Matrix Services; constantly maintained to the highest standard and best practices by the experts who created Matrix - giving an infinitely better experience than the typical free-for-all of public homeservers. so much for the federation.
- feanaro 5y ago
  What's wrong with this? How is it opposed to federation?
- Arnavion 5y ago
  The only experience I have with EMS is that their bridge to the libera.chat IRC network doesn't work. Specifically, the libera.chat homeserver that they host sends like 10% of the events that it should be sending to my (self-hosted) homeserver. I know it's not a problem with my homeserver because multiple other (non-EMS-hosted) homeservers work with mine just fine. And there's no way to get help about it; none of the folk who run it are active in the #libera-matrix channel, and the libera.chat folks themselves don't have any knowledge of it because it's entirely maintained by EMS. People who use matrix.org as their homeserver reported no problems with it when I asked, but at least one other person using their own homeserver said it was broken in the same way for them too. "Infinitely better experience" my ass.
sorenjan 5y ago
What's the point of this? Matrix, Signal, and Telegram all have open source clients, so you could make a client that used the native protocols and not route your messages through this third party's servers. Like Pidgin, Miranda IM, Trillian, and others. But I guess a monthly fee and cloud services are the more modern approach.
crossroadsguy 5y ago
It’s for power users (assuming it actually works as advertised) - people who constantly keep messaging across apps; either for personal or professional needs. They already have multiple apps on their phones and they have to use them. Not for people who find two messaging apps too much to have on a phone, or for people who’re talking about privacy.
Animats 5y ago
This just has to be a backdoor. It shouldn't even be a service. It should be a local app that knows how to be a client for all those things. Just a unified inbox.
bubblethink 5y ago
Whatsapp was $1 a year when they launched, and even that was rolled back after the FB acquisition. Ain't nobody got money for this.
contradictioned 5y ago
Now, I miss Miranda. It was a multi protocol messenger I used for icq, aim, and jabber. Friends were more into trillian. But one always had bittlebee, I somehow envied this...
Thorentis 5y ago
Conspiracy: Element has been taken over secretly by the US government, and Element One bridges will now have access to all the encrypted messages across multiple platforms that people assume are only destined for the recipient. It's brilliant actually. The more I think about it, the more that Matrix bridges seem like a perfect NSA tool. It's a man-in-the-middle attack of grand proportions, hidden in plain sight.
quda 5y ago
Pay for chat ? Burn it!
mr_johnson22 5y ago
Launching with bridges to already-encrypted messengers, then immediately admitting this has to MITM them to work, doesn't make a good first impression...especially since users of these messengers will likely be more privacy-minded than most. This is also making a bet that the inconvenience of juggling these 3 particular messengers is worth $5 a month. IMO the real value in Matrix bridging that's been neglected (and has been mentioned elsewhere in these comments) is connecting different messengers _to each other_. Being able to connect friends/family scattered across different, otherwise-isolated protocols with a single "just works" tool is a much clearer value proposition than what feels like just another multi-protocol client. Alas, getting that kind of multi-connectivity is tricky...as is VoIP bridging, which this doesn't support either, but should be considered as crucial for any Matrix bridge. I don't doubt Matrix/Element will get there at some point, but for now this feels a tad premature.
Gargyle 5y ago
Do they deal with the hassle of maintaining phone numbers for me? I obviously want different numbers for my messengers and for the phone I walk around.
_carbyau_ 5y ago
Why do they need a bridge run by them that everyone's info goes through? Why can't you install the service on your own phone, and have all your stuff talk to it?
gorgoiler 5y ago
iOS notifications unifies all my chat apps pretty nicely already, but I would still be really interested in running this on my own host, to keep a live archive of all my chats. The thing I don’t have centralized is search, and too often some critical piece of information — which in the past would have been sent and later found by email — is buried in an IM from two years ago. If Element One’s search tools are up to scratch that could be killer. Support for Instagram DMs would be a must too. Dare I say it, support for email too? I’ve often wondered what that would look like, especially with buffering so that I can send a few messages and have them batched into one email. Most emails these days begin with one round of “Dear X, … All the best Y” but quickly become one liners, trying to get something done.
egberts1 5y ago
“it’s the weakest link that breaks the chain.”
zomars 5y ago
How does this compare to Beeper[0]? [0] https://www.beeper.com https://www.beeper.com
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  Maybe actually getting access :p. People have been waiting for Beeper access on waiting list forever.
perryizgr8 5y ago
Why are so many people trying to "solve" messaging? It's not a problem for 99.999% people in the world. They use SMS/Whatsapp/Telegram/Messenger. It works splendidly. We are happy. Please stop expending effort on this useless endeavour. Do something else.
afarviral 5y ago
The biggest things going for Element: Integration with other services could be a gateway drug! Works everywhere (any of the 5 devices I use), and can see all messages once I've entered my encryption key, while maintaining a good day-to-day level of privacy (I'm no expert but this is what I understood). This unlocks the potential to use the app as a go between for reminders and note taking! Without exposing that data or having it censored. All the flexibility of Discord, Signal and Telegram for organizing chats, people and contexts. The biggest let downs so far: Voice channels work like traditional VOIP calls, making it unsuitable as a replacement for discord. Integration with other platforms to solve this seems insufficient. To become de-facto it needs to offer the discord experience of joining a voice "room" or being in a voice room by yourself without needing additional set up. Confusion about spaces vs rooms etc. The interface is fine, but it could use some polish to distinguish between the different situations.

530 points by mcjiggerlog 5y ago

mst 5y ago

I confess to finding this tempting just for the whatsapp bridge because frankly while https://matrix.org/docs/guides/whatsapp-bridging-mautrix-whatsapp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/whatsapp-bridging-mautrix-wha... is very clever I really don't want to actually have to maintain an instance of it.

solarkraft 5y ago

Matrix and a Element are great in theory, too bad the available clients still suck.

maelito 5y ago
Element for Android is far from bad. Lacks threads, though. But same for Telegram and Whatsapp.
- leppr 5y ago
  Both the Android and web clients are promising, it's clear there's been a lot of work put into it, but they're also way too buggy and unpolished to recommend. As such, I'm really not eager to use this feature. I would pay/donate just for them to improve the clients, regardless of this "Element One" service. It's an extremely important project.
- novocaine 5y ago
  Threads are currently under active development :)
  - maelito 5y ago
    Yes, they now work correctly on https://develop.element.io https://develop.element.io

craigmart 5y ago

So this service consists basically in paying to compromise E2EE, adding an attack vector, storing my otherwise encrypted conversations on centralised servers, using an arguably worse client with less features just for the convenience of not having to open 3 separate apps? Who is this for?

uhtred 5y ago
It's for all of us! Created by those nice folks over at the NSA! I make joke!

worble 5y ago

How safe is this to use? Couldn't WhatsApp or Signal detect you're routing everything to a shared hosting server somewhere and ban your account as a bot, stating the fact you're probably breaking some ToS clause?

jakecopp 5y ago
I can't speak to WhatsApp, but I've been using the self hosted Signal bridge [1] and it is brilliant, no bot troubles at all. Behind the scenes it uses signalid [2]. [1]: https://github.com/mautrix/signal https://github.com/mautrix/signal [2]: https://gitlab.com/signald/signald https://gitlab.com/signald/signald
remram 5y ago
I am wondering the same. Did WhatsApp ok this or will it get shut down the moment it gets any traction? Their terms of service [1] clearly state: > You must not (or assist others to) directly, indirectly, through automated or other means, access, use [..] our Services in impermissible or unauthorized manners [...] including that you must not directly or through automated means: [...] > (g) sell, resell, rent, or charge for our Services or data obtained from us or our Services in an unauthorized manner; > (h) distribute or make our Services available over a network where they could be used by multiple devices at the same time, except as authorized through tools we have expressly provided via our Services; > (i) create software or APIs that function substantially the same as our Services and offer them for use by third parties in an unauthorized manner [1]: https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/terms-of-service https://www.whatsapp.com/legal/terms-of-service

modeless 5y ago

I am in the Beeper beta. Beeper supports Matrix, Whatsapp, Signal, and Telegram, but also Slack, Discord, Hangouts, Instagram, Linkedin, Facebook Messenger, SMS, Twitter, and crucially, iMessage on non-Apple devices! It is a beta but it works pretty well so far. AMA

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

arianvanp 5y ago

The fact that content sent to signal and Whatsapp resides unencrypted at the matrix homeserver makes this product completely useless to me. I don't think I want to sacrifice the security for having all my chats in one place. If they can fix that I might reconsider. They already reverse engineered the Whatsapp protocol. I see little reason why it can't live in the client? I don't really follow why they move the bridge to the homeserver.

radicalbyte 5y ago
WhatsApp's backups are already stored unencrypted* on Google Drive if you use that feature. * Encrypted with a private key which Google have access to.
- bogwog 5y ago
  So the encryption is there so that you can't access your own data (and migrate to a competing app/service), rather than to protect your privacy. I kind of ran into this issue myself when I was helping a family member move to iPhone. Since Whatsapp uses Drive on Android and iCloud on iOS, there was no way to transfer the data. I wonder if you can get them via one of those data access requests?
iforgotpassword 5y ago
Why don't you encrypt your hard drive?
- krageon 5y ago
  What problem do you feel this would solve?
- arianvanp 5y ago
  I don't follow. What does my hard drive have to do with plaintext messages on Element's servers?
  - square_usual 5y ago

maltalex 5y ago

I'm happy to see that element found another potential revenue stream, but will people pay the 5$/month to unify their messaging? I don't know about others but it's not that much of a pain point for me, and I'm using all of the apps they mention - WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram as well as few others like IRC and Discord.

rglullis 5y ago
I have nowhere near the same reach and marketing capacity as Element, but if my experience running a managed hosting service [0] for Matrix (and other messaging/social media services) is anything to go by: individuals really don't care enough about that to the point of paying $5/month, but there is a growing opportunity for business that want to have some control over their communications. These bridges can be amazing if you want to have a chatbot, or a support desk that can put all their conversations in one place, etc, but to replace the mainstream apps it is too much of a tall order. At the moment the mobile clients have so many bugs that makes it hard even for me to go when offering support for my "customers", which at this point is just the couple dozen friends and family that I managed to rope into it. They don't even have feature parity with any of the competitors, so for end-users it's just easier to switch apps on their phone depending on who they want to talk and their will have a better experience doing so. I still use and support Matrix, but their clients still need to improve a lot if they ever hope to reach mainstream. I am focused now on another project [1], but when/if I ever get to work back on communick, I will pivot away from end-users and into SMB. [0] https://communick.com https://communick.com [1] https://hub20.io https://hub20.io
solarkraft 5y ago
If the available Matrix clients were not a pain to use I probably would.
- gtirloni 5y ago
  Exactly. The Element UI isn't the best selling point of Matrix right now and that would be a requirement for someone to switch from all those apps to Element.
5y ago

miguelrochefort 5y ago

Beeper provides a similar service for $10/month (private beta). https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/

leohonexus 5y ago
There's also one from Fitbit's founder, Texts app - this space is getting crowded! https://texts.com/ https://texts.com/
- miguelrochefort 5y ago
  I can't find any link between Texts and Fitbit, but I know that Eric Migicovsky founded Pebble (acquired by Fitbit) before founding Beeper.
  - leohonexus 5y ago
    Ah my bad - I must have mixed them up.
- jakecopp 5y ago
  There seems to be little information about the company/people who runs Texts on the website which is strange - where did you find the info of who runs it?
  - leohonexus 5y ago
    My bad - Beeper is the one that's founded by Pebble founder (not Fitbit). Kishan Bagaria is the one behind Texts. https://twitter.com/KishanBagaria https://twitter.com/KishanBagaria
c0wb0yc0d3r 5y ago
You can also self host it for free according to their website.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

krageon 5y ago

Does anyone know what this product is based on? Is it just a ready-made image with all the bridges preconfigured (and prerequisites such as a small android vm for a viable whatsapp bridge), or has there been some evolution on the existing package? Is there documentation on what was done to achieve this? Purely on the content of the article: Given that the messages are not stored encrypted locally and that this service is connected to the US, I do not see how it can be viable for the privacy-conscious.

miguelrochefort 5y ago
> Does anyone know what this product is based on? It's very likely based on https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy
- ptman 5y ago
  IIRC element/EMS do their own automation not based on that ansible project. But the bridges are the same open source ones.
- krageon 5y ago
  This is cool, thank you! Very well documented and (from the looks of things) feature-complete.
- gnabgib 5y ago
  It is not, according to this comment[0] "although Element One doesn’t use slavi’s ansible playbooks but instead the Element Matrix Services hosted infra" [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29000978 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29000978
jakecopp 5y ago
> Purely on the content of the article: Given that the messages are not stored encrypted locally and that this service is connected to the US, I do not see how it can be viable for the privacy-conscious. Matrix chats (direct and group) are E2E by default. There is no bridge that will let you keep E2E encryption between Signal/WhatsApp and another service - it has to be broken somewhere. I believe Element is a UK company. The blog post on This Week In Matrix states it uses modified versions of the open source (and self hostable) Mautrix bridges which are primarily built by tulir [2] of Beeper [3]: https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element-one https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element... > However, in addition to being a fast, snappy Matrix account, it also comes with unlimited personal bridging to Whatsapp, Signal and Telegram thanks to mautrix-whatsapp/signal/telegram! [2]:https://github.com/tulir https://github.com/tulir [3]: https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/

ekianjo 5y ago

Relevant if you want to do it on your own : https://boilingsteam.com/how-to-bridge-discord-in-matrix/ https://boilingsteam.com/how-to-bridge-discord-in-matrix/

mfer 5y ago

From the post… > It’s also worth noting that end-to-end encryption is necessarily broken as messages to (and from) WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram pass across the bridge(s). They store everything encrypted but this may open the door for legal requests to get access.

est31 5y ago
Yeah ideally they should sell e.g. raspberry pi devices which allow you to self host it at home.
- mfer 5y ago
  That does not sound like the kind of experience general consumers expect and it doesn’t match Up with their subscription model.
- jakecopp 5y ago
  They don't even need to sell this package, it's free and a lot of people do it: https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy/ https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy/ The benefit to hosting by a company is it should be more reliable.
  - superkuh 5y ago
    While the software support is there to run bridges to many other communications services, the actual bridges are direct agreements worked out between the various comporations and non-profits. You would have to be important enough to start such a dialog and relationship if you wanted to run the bridging features locally. So, don't expect to bridge to Libera IRC just because there's a software option. You can always run bots, but that's not a real bridge like what is being described here.

censormenow 5y ago

Let's save the NSA the trouble of hacking into all our secure chat clients and just drop our authentication for everything into an app they made.

commoner 5y ago
There is no evidence that Element was "made" by the NSA. Element is developed by New Vector Ltd., a UK company.
- censormenow 5y ago
  The UK is a surveillance state. They have more CCTV cameras than China.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

Ndymium 5y ago

One thing I didn't spot, does this tier allow you to use a custom domain name on Matrix, or will you be :matrix.org still? $5/mo is an interesting price point for me if it can do that, I don't need the bridges but I could support the project this way.

jakecopp 5y ago
I believe this tier only lets you use the new ...one.ems.host domain [1]. Element Home pricing might be better for you if you have a few friends who are also interested ($10/month for 5 users), and won't use bridges [2]. [1]: https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element-one https://matrix.org/blog/category/this-week-in-matrix#element... [2]: https://element.io/personal-plans https://element.io/personal-plans
- Ndymium 5y ago
  Sadly I don't have a single friend on Matrix that I could consider doing this with, and it's unlikely I could convince my wife to use it either. So it would be double the money for only that piece of flair.
  - rglullis 5y ago
    You don't need to convince your wife to switch, you can start by helping her setup the app on her phone and tell her to use this app when talking to you. Lower the stakes and the expectations. Even if she is starting conversations with you on any other app, you can still start the conversations on Element. There will be bugs and quirks she will find, you just offer help and ask her for patience. With time, they get used to the app and will be okay with starting the conversation with you there. That's what I did with my wife, my parents, closer family and friends. Then you get one day like the recent Facebook outage, and they will come to you to ask if you can help their friends to sign up to it. Slow and steady is the way I found to run this race. I already managed to get rid of WhatsApp and Messenger on my phone, it's only telegram for the odd group chat that is still resisting a full change.
andrewaylett 5y ago

noworld 5y ago

Welcome to WUPHF.com

fleaaa 5y ago
Seriously, should've named it WHUPF..

personjerry 5y ago

Back in the day before the rise of Facebook, there was an open source service that combined all the popular messaging protocols - MSN, AoL, IRC, etc. It was called Pidgin[0], and it never got particularly big. I see the same thing here. While it's interesting, I'm failing to see what the use case is. What's the niche that needs this solved in a big way? [0] https://www.pidgin.im/ https://www.pidgin.im/

Gigachad 5y ago
Agreed, not sure what the use case is. It’s super trivial to switch between messaging apps and it’s not often that you are having a conversation with multiple people over multiple apps at once and even then it’s still manageable. The only thing I can think of is people who do not wish to have the app installed for privacy / open source reasons.
- TeMPOraL 5y ago
  Think of people who are: - Not tech-savvy and easily confused by keeping 6 different messengers around. - People for whom multiple clients becomes a cognitive burden. - Waste of storage space, memory and CPU power that those (hugely bloated, most of the time) clients incur, especially on mobile devices. - People like me, with diminished executive functioning capacity, who are fucking tired of bad ergonomics of all those clients together and each individually, and who'd prefer a single, consistent, ergonomic and powerful UI to manage the torrent of messages they receive.
  - Gigachad 5y ago
    The first two are not well solved by Matrix as the default client is far less user friendly than the proprietary alternatives. Storage space might be an issue on very low end phones but these days phones are starting with 128gb of storage which no IM app is close to filling. Mobile OSs are extremely good at sleeping apps and can receive messages while the app is not running at all using notification services. I would say that resource bloat is actually much more of an issue on desktop where you have 10 instances of chrome running and none can be closed while still receiving notifications.

upofadown 5y ago

Correct me if I am wrong, but this means that you have to trust the people running the bridging server with not just the content of your messages but your account identity/login information as well?

jakecopp 5y ago
> with not just the content of your messages Yes, for bridged chats. Matrix <-> Matrix direct & group chats are E2E by default. > but your account identity/login information as well Yes, however identity/login does not permit access to E2E messages (and cross signing prevents E2E compromise [1]). Matrix supports migrating accounts to other servers [2] while keeping your data/social graph (depending on your history viewability settings I believe, someone please correct me if I'm wrong!). [1]: https://matrix.org/blog/2020/05/06/cross-signing-and-end-to-end-encryption-by-default-is-here/ https://matrix.org/blog/2020/05/06/cross-signing-and-end-to-... [2]: https://ems.element.io/tools/matrix-migration https://ems.element.io/tools/matrix-migration

ho_schi 5y ago

This kind of stuff never works reliable of even fully. Because? There is no standard. And especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. If you send your data anyway over this questionable services you're already in a concerning situation adding more possibilities for failure doesn't help. I use Matrix and it is certainly a good thing and the connections to other stuff like IRC, too. The fix is getting rid of WhatsApp. Signal is fine, the non-native desktop applications (i.e. fat and ugly Electron with Chrome behind) needs a rewrite with Gtk and Qt.

teitoklien 5y ago
Telegram actively goes out of their way every day to support third party clients , and even keep their systems open to risk of heavy botting/spam , just to support third clients. (And they do have to fight against a lot of malicious bot activity). I use their client api to build cool stuff for my userbot all the time, i have great respect for telegram and matrix. Signal and Whatsapp are more apt when considering walled gardens, not telegram.
skinkestek 5y ago
> And especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. One of these is not like the others: Telegram both provides a library to bootstrap alternative clients and prior to that they also sponsored a competition to create a second semi official Telegram client for Android, Telegram X. So I guess Telegram won't be a big problem. But of course, saying something bad about Telegram, true or not, feels pretty safe here.
arp242 5y ago
> especially Telegram and WhatsApp will have absolutely no interest in keeping it working reliable. Telegram at least seems to have pretty decent libraries available to communicate with their API. I don't know how often it breaks, but I've been using the "tg" CLI Telegram client in the last week, and it seems to work fairly well (better than their own web interface anyway). I looked a bit at writing my own as I have some issues with the tg UI; I haven't written the code yet but just looked at the options, and overall it seems fairly decent.

Steltek 5y ago

This is nicely timed. Brief history: when Hangouts was going away and Google Chat coming in, I pitched Matrix to my friends as a better alternative that didn't require unique phone numbers, awkward desktop limitations, and a better federated future. We stuck with Google Chat because inertia and networks suck that way. I revisited the instance I had setup and got the mautrix-googlechat bridge working. It's pretty nice but one friend lamented that he did not have the technical skills to self-host such a thing. And here comes this announcement! Sadly, there is a major hurdle: neither Google Chat nor SMS/GVoice are listed here and those are the major protocols that my social group uses. At the same time, my social group is conservative in adopting new core technologies and wary of cloud lock-in for critical roles (Google being both an unfortunate anchor and precipitator of that). I'm not sure adding those protocols would tip the balance.

scrollaway 5y ago
Beeper implements Google Chat. I've been using it, it works really well. https://www.beeper.com/ https://www.beeper.com/
- bluesign 5y ago
  Only if you can signup though, been very long time since I registered for invite.
- your_challenger 5y ago
  Yup. And looks like element One is a direct competition to beeper
- pimeys 5y ago
  I've been waiting for an invite for almost a year now. Even gave my credit card for them, but still waiting... I'm just yelling here to take my money, but nobody answers.
- KoftaBob 5y ago
  Beeper's waitlist is probably the longest one I've ever had to wait on for a beta service. Still waiting, over a year later.

dncornholio 5y ago

Paying for this as a service? No thanks. Too many subscription based services already.

3np 5y ago

I wonder why Facebook Messenger is not included? From experience, the Messenger Matrix bridge has been surprisingly robust, moreso than the signald bridge.

johnisgood 5y ago

Any plans on making this free, or self-hosted?

pimeys 5y ago
It is possible. I've been running my own for a year, but it takes quite a hefty server at least with Synapse, and it's not cheaper compared to the quite nice 5 euros a month pricing here. If you want to give it a try, this is what I used: https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy https://github.com/spantaleev/matrix-docker-ansible-deploy
- zfnmxt 5y ago
  You can run Synapse on a cheapo VPS for <$5/month; it doesn't exactly require much.
  - pimeys 5y ago
    I have Synapse and quite quite many bridges running and especially syncing a newbdevice takes a long time. Hope I could go with Conduit at some point.
apetresc 5y ago
It always has been, since the beginning. This is purely convenient hosting for those not inclined to self-host.
- johnisgood 5y ago
  Oooh, I may have misunderstood something, I think. :P

elnygren 5y ago

I already have a way to unify my messaging across different apps. It's called MacOS and cmd+tab. Sometimes on the road I use something called iOS. Sure it's not the same. But is it that different either? All messaging apps have their own native features, some have E2E encryption etc. Not sure if there's a common subset that is enjoyable enough to use that it's worth it. That being said, I do wonder what will be the "Facebook Events" (invite all your friends to an event) equivalent in the future when everyone is in a closed garden chat platform instead of Facebook.

yetanother-1 5y ago
I use normal calendar event, it is forwardable, and I get confirmations per email who will be coming. I find it to work just as well.
fastball 5y ago
There is definitely a benefit to having a unified interface. The vast majority of the time I don't want to use each chat apps specific features, I just want to message people. And then sometimes I want to be distraction free and turn off notifications. This is much easier if everything is routed through one app. I'm also on macOS but I've been using Texts[1] for a few months and it has been a great experience. [1] https://texts.com/ https://texts.com/
- chirau 5y ago
  Do you have an extra invite by any chance?
  - fastball 5y ago
    Sure if you DM me on Twitter I can send one your way.

titaniumtown 5y ago

what about discord? :(

chayleaf 5y ago
sadly, discord ToS forbid "self-botting", so the only legal option is to use a Discord bot, and that's far from seamless and requires guild admin cooperation, I assume that's why they aren't advertising it
- anticensor 5y ago
  Discord's actual stance against third party clients is far more convoluted, and explained by this comment by Jake: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25224151 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25224151

tao_oat 5y ago

> It’s also worth noting that end-to-end encryption is necessarily broken as messages to (and from) WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram pass across the bridge(s). The bridge(s) operates in Element’s trusted EMS environment, with no content scanning or datamining, but currently bridged conversations are not stored end-to-end encrypted in Matrix (they will be in the future). As a Signal user, I kind of don't want this to take off. I like knowing that when I message someone on Signal, it's for their eyes only. It feels like this service starts fragmenting some of the privacy guarantees of the bridged providers.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
yosito 5y ago
> this service starts fragmenting some of the privacy guarantees There is no guarantee of privacy with communication between two consumer smartphones. Encrypted Signal-to-Signal messages have always been susceptible to capture on either end, by something like this bridge or a rogue (or non-rogue) app on either end with access to read device notifications. I'm not saying that this service doesn't expose your messages to some additional risk, and should be used cautiously. But it is an illusion that just because the messaging protocol is using end-to-end encryption that the messages can't be intercepted.
lvass 5y ago
I concur. I really wouldn't mind anyone using this for whatsapp as I consider any message I send there is also available to 14-eyes, but bridge usage really should be disclosed to Signal users.
pmlnr 5y ago
I want this to take off. I'm tired of having to follow trends because people suddenly think there's a new shinyshinytrendy thing around: IRC to ICQ to MSN to Skype to Google Talk to Facebook Messenger to Whatsapp to Signal. Pidgin is good (I also miss the ancient Trillian, even though it was closed source), but limited to a local device. There are XMPP Transports as well for these (see https://git.eta.st/eta/whatsxmpp https://git.eta.st/eta/whatsxmpp , https://gitlab.com/nicocool84/spectrum2_signald https://gitlab.com/nicocool84/spectrum2_signald , but sadly https://spectrum.im/ https://spectrum.im/ is surprisingly finicky to set up.) EDIT: for encryption fans, I've been wondering for a long time now: why would you trust ANY 3rd party with your so sensitive data instead of running your own service? Are you not aware of OMEMO for XMPP? (See https://omemo.top/ https://omemo.top/ )

hnarn 5y ago

I just have a really hard time understanding who this is targeting. If you're on average more willing to sacrifice privacy over ease of use, you're very likely not using Signal or Matrix anyway. So if you're not, but you're using both WhatsApp and Telegram, how is using two apps a big enough problem to set up a third one? Even if we disregard that, I can honestly say that I don't think using four separate apps is a problem. I don't even think using ten different apps is a problem, because it's mostly transparent to the user anyway. You get (configurable) notifications from all of them when you need to care about something, and the "sharing" feature on both iOS and Android these days is normally smart enough to figure out who, or at least which app, you want to share something to -- so for me this "multi app confusion" is already pretty well solved on an OS level, at least on mobile.

chayleaf 5y ago
why would privacy enthusiasts not use Matrix, considering it's fairly easy to self-host?
- hnarn 5y ago
  That’s not what I wrote.
Arathorn 5y ago
I constantly miss messages on TG, WA and Signal because I forget to check them regularly. It also really irks me that my conversations are trapped in those platforms without a public API, and I’d like to gather them together on an open platform like Matrix, and access them from every/any Matrix client i choose. Hence the use case for Element One :)
- hnarn 5y ago
  Why do you need to “check them” in the first place though? And yes, I can understand that for some people the inability to easily transfer and collect those conversations is a problem, but for many people (imo probably more people) the ephemeral nature of these messages is a feature, not a problem to be solved. At least that’s why I use Signal over Messenger, for example.

lvass 5y ago

Do they also host the WhatsApp native instance (Android VM)? That'd be great for those using Pinephones who still want easy access to WA. Otherwise the WA bridge would only work if you run a client yourself.

pimeys 5y ago
They do not. You need to have the app installed to your phone, which is a big no for me.

MayeulC 5y ago

It would be nice to see PSTN/SMS as well, those are more complicated to self-host!

NikolaNovak 5y ago

I fully understand that for many, this is not an acceptable security risk. It may have technical compromises. For me, Whatsapp is used by my non-technical in-laws for the simple reason of "because everybody uses it". I find whatsapp extremely impractical (I communicate better via large ergonomic keyboard on my computer, vs via 1.5"-wide screen; to each their own), so anything that makes Whatsapp and other proliferation of incompatible annoying chat services easier... yes, yes, please yes :)

rrrrrrrrrrrrr 5y ago
There is desktop and web clients for WhatsApp by now tho
- NikolaNovak 5y ago
  And they're broken broken broken, and such by design. Current app uses Phone as primary and allows for one other-non-phone-device. If you try to log in on e.g. your tablet and computer, or switch between them often, you'll hit any amount of trouble and will get locked out of account. The current beta has enhancements for multi-device support which may support several non-phone-devices at the same time, even if your phone is offline for short period of time. But it's buggy and your Phone is still your primary and it still won't allow you to sign up without one (it assumes Phone is Me and my life centers around my phone, which is true for my in-laws but not for me:), and the list of limitations is sky high and likely to remain that way. Whatsapp fundamentally prioritizes end to end encryption; primacy of phone; and convenience of contacts for privacy-non-conscious, over everything else. It is good for those who highly value end to end encryption, for reasons of need or principles. For those who need multi-device support, Whatsapp is way way way worse than other chat services of today or 1990s. Right now, I am logged in to Hangouts on three computers, tablet, phone and Galaxy Note (whatever we call that these days:). I am available via Hangouts whatever I do and wherever I am. And frankly I find it more private as it doesn't advertise my existence to all my contacts and siphon them off, doesn't require my phone number which is one of my most private pieces of identifying information, and provides me actual privacy and anonymity if I choose, but that's a whole other discussion. Whatsapp does not, and will for foreseeable future not support my use case. It may or may not be rare, it may or may not be something anybody else thinks is important, but Phone is not the centre of my existence or my sole & preferred method of communication, and as such whatsapp is completely unusable for me. I may be 1% or 0.00001%, and I'm open about that, but this whole notion of "Whatsapp totally works on multi-device" is just getting tiring to misspell - it's right on their FAQ that it is counter-indicated by design by current production version.

causi 5y ago

My concern is whether Element One is in it for the long haul. If I stick with using Whatsapp and Signal I can be fairly certain they'll still be working in five or maybe even ten years. Is Element One committed?

_pmf_ 5y ago

If we can also get Slack in there ...

anthk 5y ago

Run a local Bitlbee server with Hexchat or Quassel if you like GUI's and stop using middleware services. Yes, there are public Bitlbee servers out there, but these are for an emergency.

ulzeraj 5y ago

It doesn't look to be as good as it sounds. Privacy matters aside, you still have to keep WhatsApp installed on your phone. > To connect your WhatsApp account, scan the QR code below: > Open WhatsApp on your mobile device. > Go to "Linked devices" > Press "Link a device". > Scan the code below. Would pay money to get rid of Facebook software in my devices.

aceArtGmbH 5y ago
there are bridges for several Facebook services which you can self-host https://matrix.org/bridges/#facebook-messenger https://matrix.org/bridges/#facebook-messenger https://matrix.org/bridges/#instagram https://matrix.org/bridges/#instagram

stjohnswarts 5y ago

This seems like a really bad idea since it gives another attack vector if you're really trying to maintain secure communication.

efields 5y ago

What does this solve? Makes switching between apps on my phone easier?

ridaj 5y ago

The very story of each of WhatsApp, Signal, etc. is a testament to why interoperability across apps matters much less than user reach and feature velocity within an app ecosystem. Most people don't actually mind using different apps for different things once their friends are there, because functionality tends to break at the edges (even creating a simple group chat becomes a pain across non-cooperative networks)

a-dub 5y ago

this has been around since at least january of 2021. i looked into using something like this or setting up my own synapse+bridges and ultimately thought the synapse server had way too much in the way of complexity and attack surface for something that would ultimately end up being a consolidation of all my encrypted messaging. (it was also a bit weird to see public internet protocols using grpc, but i guess that's what people do now) that's the world we live in i guess. you either dedicate a bunch of time to watching your own infra, let tech giants read your messages or let hackers read your messages. this is fine.

5- 5y ago

> hosted by Element Matrix Services; constantly maintained to the highest standard and best practices by the experts who created Matrix - giving an infinitely better experience than the typical free-for-all of public homeservers. so much for the federation.

feanaro 5y ago
What's wrong with this? How is it opposed to federation?
Arnavion 5y ago
The only experience I have with EMS is that their bridge to the libera.chat IRC network doesn't work. Specifically, the libera.chat homeserver that they host sends like 10% of the events that it should be sending to my (self-hosted) homeserver. I know it's not a problem with my homeserver because multiple other (non-EMS-hosted) homeservers work with mine just fine. And there's no way to get help about it; none of the folk who run it are active in the #libera-matrix channel, and the libera.chat folks themselves don't have any knowledge of it because it's entirely maintained by EMS. People who use matrix.org as their homeserver reported no problems with it when I asked, but at least one other person using their own homeserver said it was broken in the same way for them too. "Infinitely better experience" my ass.

sorenjan 5y ago

What's the point of this? Matrix, Signal, and Telegram all have open source clients, so you could make a client that used the native protocols and not route your messages through this third party's servers. Like Pidgin, Miranda IM, Trillian, and others. But I guess a monthly fee and cloud services are the more modern approach.

crossroadsguy 5y ago

It’s for power users (assuming it actually works as advertised) - people who constantly keep messaging across apps; either for personal or professional needs. They already have multiple apps on their phones and they have to use them. Not for people who find two messaging apps too much to have on a phone, or for people who’re talking about privacy.

Animats 5y ago

This just has to be a backdoor. It shouldn't even be a service. It should be a local app that knows how to be a client for all those things. Just a unified inbox.

bubblethink 5y ago

Whatsapp was $1 a year when they launched, and even that was rolled back after the FB acquisition. Ain't nobody got money for this.

contradictioned 5y ago

Now, I miss Miranda. It was a multi protocol messenger I used for icq, aim, and jabber. Friends were more into trillian. But one always had bittlebee, I somehow envied this...

Thorentis 5y ago

Conspiracy: Element has been taken over secretly by the US government, and Element One bridges will now have access to all the encrypted messages across multiple platforms that people assume are only destined for the recipient. It's brilliant actually. The more I think about it, the more that Matrix bridges seem like a perfect NSA tool. It's a man-in-the-middle attack of grand proportions, hidden in plain sight.

quda 5y ago

Pay for chat ? Burn it!

mr_johnson22 5y ago

Launching with bridges to already-encrypted messengers, then immediately admitting this has to MITM them to work, doesn't make a good first impression...especially since users of these messengers will likely be more privacy-minded than most. This is also making a bet that the inconvenience of juggling these 3 particular messengers is worth $5 a month. IMO the real value in Matrix bridging that's been neglected (and has been mentioned elsewhere in these comments) is connecting different messengers _to each other_. Being able to connect friends/family scattered across different, otherwise-isolated protocols with a single "just works" tool is a much clearer value proposition than what feels like just another multi-protocol client. Alas, getting that kind of multi-connectivity is tricky...as is VoIP bridging, which this doesn't support either, but should be considered as crucial for any Matrix bridge. I don't doubt Matrix/Element will get there at some point, but for now this feels a tad premature.

Gargyle 5y ago

Do they deal with the hassle of maintaining phone numbers for me? I obviously want different numbers for my messengers and for the phone I walk around.

_carbyau_ 5y ago

Why do they need a bridge run by them that everyone's info goes through? Why can't you install the service on your own phone, and have all your stuff talk to it?

gorgoiler 5y ago

iOS notifications unifies all my chat apps pretty nicely already, but I would still be really interested in running this on my own host, to keep a live archive of all my chats. The thing I don’t have centralized is search, and too often some critical piece of information — which in the past would have been sent and later found by email — is buried in an IM from two years ago. If Element One’s search tools are up to scratch that could be killer. Support for Instagram DMs would be a must too. Dare I say it, support for email too? I’ve often wondered what that would look like, especially with buffering so that I can send a few messages and have them batched into one email. Most emails these days begin with one round of “Dear X, … All the best Y” but quickly become one liners, trying to get something done.

egberts1 5y ago

“it’s the weakest link that breaks the chain.”

zomars 5y ago

How does this compare to Beeper[0]? [0] https://www.beeper.com https://www.beeper.com

skinnymuch 5y ago
Maybe actually getting access :p. People have been waiting for Beeper access on waiting list forever.

perryizgr8 5y ago

Why are so many people trying to "solve" messaging? It's not a problem for 99.999% people in the world. They use SMS/Whatsapp/Telegram/Messenger. It works splendidly. We are happy. Please stop expending effort on this useless endeavour. Do something else.

afarviral 5y ago

The biggest things going for Element: Integration with other services could be a gateway drug! Works everywhere (any of the 5 devices I use), and can see all messages once I've entered my encryption key, while maintaining a good day-to-day level of privacy (I'm no expert but this is what I understood). This unlocks the potential to use the app as a go between for reminders and note taking! Without exposing that data or having it censored. All the flexibility of Discord, Signal and Telegram for organizing chats, people and contexts. The biggest let downs so far: Voice channels work like traditional VOIP calls, making it unsuitable as a replacement for discord. Integration with other platforms to solve this seems insufficient. To become de-facto it needs to offer the discord experience of joining a voice "room" or being in a voice room by yourself without needing additional set up. Confusion about spaces vs rooms etc. The interface is fine, but it could use some polish to distinguish between the different situations.