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The author notes: "Finally, we need to talk federation. Does it make moving fast and breaking things more difficult? Yes, yes it does, and that can be a good th

The author notes: "Finally, we need to talk federation. Does it make moving fast and breaking things more difficult? Yes, yes it does, and that can be a good thing." The other, super-underrated feature of federated systems is that antagonistic parties are willing to use them together. For example, the US military, Russian government, major international banks, Google, Facebook, etc ALL use email and happily exchange messages over SMTP. There's no centralized service you could get all these parties to agree to use (not even Signal). The result of this is that everyone has an email address, and that makes it the universal standard for business-to-business communication. I can loop in any number of parties on a single thread from all over the world and it just works. My startup Shortwave is trying to build a messaging future that is email. We're trying to evolve and upgrade email to have the look and feel and features of a product like Signal, but with all the universal, federated goodness of the global SMTP network. It's a long project -- federated systems evolve slowly! -- but it's the bright open future I think we need. I go into some detail here: https://www.shortwave.com/blog/future-of-messaging/ https://www.shortwave.com/blog/future-of-messaging/

greatjack613 4y ago
Are open shameless plugs like this allowed on hacker news without disclosure?
- junon 4y ago
  Yes. It's just typically not well received.
  - Aeolun 4y ago
    It’s fine if it’s on-topic I think? In this case it’s on topic.
- baisq 4y ago
  Isn't "My startup Shortwave" enough disclosure?
- matthiaswh 4y ago
  Open shameless plugs are a long and storied tradition on Hacker News. Full disclosure: I run a startup that specializes in shamelessly plugging your startup. Contact deets in profile. > My startup Shortwave Sounds like disclosure to me.
- tcbasche 4y ago
  Probably, the upshot is I know to not bother with whatever is being plugged
- mayop100 4y ago
  I would have avoided the shameless plug here if it wasn't so very topical... :)
  - dmix 4y ago
    Relevant plugs are always welcome on HN.
layer8 4y ago
> We're trying to evolve and upgrade email to have the look and feel and features of a product like Signal Please don’t. Email is not a chat.
- xoa 4y ago
  This. I've long advocated for and would be delighted to have an "Email" that was identical to current email except with cryptography built-in from the ground up, with public certs for any given domain based simply on DNS and coordinated through the server for that domain. Otherwise the same as email. It doesn't need to be "evolved" and "upgraded" beyond that, everyone is fine with and understands email already. At most I'd add "no remote resources", or a standard system around "so and so wants to talk to you" to make it easier to do whitelist/greylist, a standard API for 3rd party vouching services, all things to help transparently cut down on spam ahead of time. But overall less is more here. There is certainly a place for real time messaging/chatting/rich collaboration services as well, but they aren't "electronic mail". The focus should be on making a standard and then model implementations that work very well.
  - mort96 4y ago
    > an "Email" that was identical to current email Please don't. Current email is a mess. One person's email client will set the email background to dark gray and another person's email client will have a dark grey background and the result will be unreadable. One person's email client will put the quoted text at the bottom and another person's client will put the quoted text at the top and the thread will be unreadable. A sender's email client will use quotes in a way which a receiver's client doesn't understand and the receiver's client will show a thread view where each message in the thread also contains a copy of all previous messages in the thread. The sender's email client will use a symbol font which the receiver doesn't have so that symbols look like random letters to the receiver. Email is terrible. It does need to be radically overhauled. The lack of cryptography is far, far from its only problem. Plus there's the spam problem, which means you won't be able to send email reliably unless you're a major company. It's federated, but only multinationals are allowed to play.
sdze 4y ago
DeltaChat?
- spiffytech 4y ago
  I loved the idea of Delta Chat, but it ate some non-chat emails and wouldn't reliably notify me of new messages. But as far as holding conversations, it worked alright, though I missed having a typing indicator.
Aeolun 4y ago
Isn’t that just the Matrix protocol then? I think the hard part is adoption.
fl0id 4y ago
So basically deltachat?
pbronez 4y ago
Looks like this is built on the gmail api? Any plans to support Office 365? How well does this approach work when communicating outside your organization with non-shortwave users? Seems challenging to degrade the experience gracefully.
NoGravitas 4y ago
> We're trying to evolve and upgrade email to have the look and feel and features of a product like Signal, but with all the universal, federated goodness of the global SMTP network. This already exists. It's called Delta Chat. Please don't make your product incompatible.
denton-scratch 4y ago
> email still has two key advantages Three, actually; the third is that email is an asynchronous, store-and-forward system. That feature makes it unsuitable as the basis for an "instant chat" system. It also makes it challenging to put e2e encryption on email. Asynchrony is the feature I most value in email. I can send you a message if you're in the bath, if your device is switched off, or if you're AFK for the next 3 months. You can read it on your desktop, mobile device, or in a web cafe. I don't use chat, and I don't like SMS (which anyway only works with a SIM, so on a mobile phone; and your identity is tied to a specific SIM). The problems with email, as I see it, are: - text/html. HTML email has always sucked. It's the devil to craft HTML that works in programs like Outlook. And it's full of vulnerabilities. - Encryption. You can't e2e-encrypt email headers, because they're needed by intermediate nodes for routing. GPG/PGP has a horrible trust model, that deters people from using it (I've never really looked into S/MIME).

greatjack613 4y ago

Are open shameless plugs like this allowed on hacker news without disclosure?

junon 4y ago
Yes. It's just typically not well received.
- Aeolun 4y ago
  It’s fine if it’s on-topic I think? In this case it’s on topic.
baisq 4y ago
Isn't "My startup Shortwave" enough disclosure?
matthiaswh 4y ago
Open shameless plugs are a long and storied tradition on Hacker News. Full disclosure: I run a startup that specializes in shamelessly plugging your startup. Contact deets in profile. > My startup Shortwave Sounds like disclosure to me.
tcbasche 4y ago
Probably, the upshot is I know to not bother with whatever is being plugged
mayop100 4y ago
I would have avoided the shameless plug here if it wasn't so very topical... :)
- dmix 4y ago
  Relevant plugs are always welcome on HN.

layer8 4y ago

> We're trying to evolve and upgrade email to have the look and feel and features of a product like Signal Please don’t. Email is not a chat.

xoa 4y ago
This. I've long advocated for and would be delighted to have an "Email" that was identical to current email except with cryptography built-in from the ground up, with public certs for any given domain based simply on DNS and coordinated through the server for that domain. Otherwise the same as email. It doesn't need to be "evolved" and "upgraded" beyond that, everyone is fine with and understands email already. At most I'd add "no remote resources", or a standard system around "so and so wants to talk to you" to make it easier to do whitelist/greylist, a standard API for 3rd party vouching services, all things to help transparently cut down on spam ahead of time. But overall less is more here. There is certainly a place for real time messaging/chatting/rich collaboration services as well, but they aren't "electronic mail". The focus should be on making a standard and then model implementations that work very well.
- mort96 4y ago
  > an "Email" that was identical to current email Please don't. Current email is a mess. One person's email client will set the email background to dark gray and another person's email client will have a dark grey background and the result will be unreadable. One person's email client will put the quoted text at the bottom and another person's client will put the quoted text at the top and the thread will be unreadable. A sender's email client will use quotes in a way which a receiver's client doesn't understand and the receiver's client will show a thread view where each message in the thread also contains a copy of all previous messages in the thread. The sender's email client will use a symbol font which the receiver doesn't have so that symbols look like random letters to the receiver. Email is terrible. It does need to be radically overhauled. The lack of cryptography is far, far from its only problem. Plus there's the spam problem, which means you won't be able to send email reliably unless you're a major company. It's federated, but only multinationals are allowed to play.

sdze 4y ago

DeltaChat?

spiffytech 4y ago
I loved the idea of Delta Chat, but it ate some non-chat emails and wouldn't reliably notify me of new messages. But as far as holding conversations, it worked alright, though I missed having a typing indicator.

Aeolun 4y ago

Isn’t that just the Matrix protocol then? I think the hard part is adoption.

fl0id 4y ago

So basically deltachat?

pbronez 4y ago

Looks like this is built on the gmail api? Any plans to support Office 365? How well does this approach work when communicating outside your organization with non-shortwave users? Seems challenging to degrade the experience gracefully.

NoGravitas 4y ago

> We're trying to evolve and upgrade email to have the look and feel and features of a product like Signal, but with all the universal, federated goodness of the global SMTP network. This already exists. It's called Delta Chat. Please don't make your product incompatible.

denton-scratch 4y ago

> email still has two key advantages Three, actually; the third is that email is an asynchronous, store-and-forward system. That feature makes it unsuitable as the basis for an "instant chat" system. It also makes it challenging to put e2e encryption on email. Asynchrony is the feature I most value in email. I can send you a message if you're in the bath, if your device is switched off, or if you're AFK for the next 3 months. You can read it on your desktop, mobile device, or in a web cafe. I don't use chat, and I don't like SMS (which anyway only works with a SIM, so on a mobile phone; and your identity is tied to a specific SIM). The problems with email, as I see it, are: - text/html. HTML email has always sucked. It's the devil to craft HTML that works in programs like Outlook. And it's full of vulnerabilities. - Encryption. You can't e2e-encrypt email headers, because they're needed by intermediate nodes for routing. GPG/PGP has a horrible trust model, that deters people from using it (I've never really looked into S/MIME).