> primarily to communicate with family located where there is high censorship and most messengers are blocked I was travelling frequently through Asia and the

> primarily to communicate with family located where there is high censorship and most messengers are blocked I was travelling frequently through Asia and the Middle East around a decade ago. I wanted a platform that just works, that is low on resources, that I can self-host, that I can "disguise" itself as something else when needed (run behind a different port, or IP, over ToR, etc). Matrix was new then, and promising to right every wrong from previous protocols (mild exaggeration). I bought into the hype, and got burnt by it, finally settled with XMPP (which Matrix had told me wasn't adequate), and stayed there to this day because when Matrix really didn't go anywhere since, XMPP kept getting better and better. That would be my recommendation to you.