@whitequark There is this really vexing thing where, in the heyday of xmpp (and back when the thought that 'productifying'/'startupifying' a thing would ensure income+project longevity+wider usefulness to humanity - like 'we can get rich developing the thing we love via private property relations and business ontology!' was seen as obviously true among 'programmer society') so many pretty cool looking xmpp based IM systems were developed and 'productified' and are now gone or effectively gone.
@whitequark I have been looking at what would have to be done to get what I would consider a baseline 'good enough' IM system for the tech union I am a part of to move to - where eg it has to function in a way that a) we don't get 'cobblers children have no shoes-ed' b) it is actually useful as a space for organising c) it feels nice to use and not aversive d) we don't get instantly fucked using it e) it can't be bought out from underneath us or otherwise enclosed - and I weep.
@whitequark But yes, if I ever get funded in such a way that I'm not spending most of my time-energy on my dayjob (and we actually get enough active volunteers at the tech union so I'm not spending most of the rest of my energy holding things together there, and my health issues don't flare up, etc etc) so I actually have enough left over to not have to funnel everything left to only one personal project, then 'actually good enough IM' would be one of the things I'd spend my life trying to make.
@whitequark Anyway, the 'funny' part of this is that we are moving from Slack to Matrix some time soon (Slack always failed e, and has been worse and worse on points c, b, and a to the point it is a millstone around our necks). I was campaigning for XMPP, but we voted and Matrix won; I comfort myself that at least neither Discord nor Facebook won, even though the new committee member we just got was pushing both of those options very very hard.
(the reason this is funny is because I've been involved with IM systems in the past and know better than to get involved again; if I worked alone it would take several years of work before the result, whatever it's based on, is at all generally usable)
(the reason that is funny is that I'm already running and administering some of the absolute most cursed IM infrastructure anyone has ever deployed, so it's not like I'm _un_involved)
@whitequark i did one once - at a "startup". it sold, too. it did take us about a year or so, pared to the bones, and with "combat doll" skills. i wouldn't like to repeat that either. but it was very fast.
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