I don’t know who’s out there in the shadows, but unknowns are not voids. And as mentioned, it was an extreme example - mainly for the sake of illustration - not necessarily a relevant one. Personally, I prefer Matrix because it strikes a nice balance between having a modern Discord-like feature set and being free software. There’s no way in hell I’d join a Discord server. For that I care too much about privacy.
One of the tempting things about Monero is that they have IRC and Matrix channels/rooms, listed on their website. And there are thousands of people there, because it aligns with the free software and privacy aspects of the project. People are more likely to pick a project that gets it, than joining a forum to get through to a project that doesn’t.
What Monero - like Zcash - doesn’t seem to understand, however, is that GitHub (albeit to a lesser extent) is also a no-go to some, for the very same reasons. You choose GitHub to include the masses, but you mirror on a more privacy/freedom respecting forge to include unwavering devotees. There is both power in numbers and high value in champions. It’s unfortunate that the acquisition by Microsoft created this split, but that’s just the way it is.
We’re steering a bit away from the main topic but I bite. I would have agreed with you a while back, but now I’ve realized that there are people into privacy because it’s hype mostly. So they use the tools they think are for the underground supercypherpunks. That’s the Monero project and community in a nutshell. People say it’s the best privacy so they don’t question it and they use that.
We’re different, we’re pragmatic here.
People in here know that I’m pushing for the exact same things you are pushing for. Yet again, I’m here and I try to contribute. I also read Discord sometimes even if I do not participate over there. We have the best people, as good in their values as they are with their skills, which is what gave us the best tech.
So, while I do think we should reflect on the tools we use and see if we can do better, I wouldn’t take shortcuts just for the sake of have x more people in our chat. We want to keep it quality oriented.
Values that aren’t lived up to amount to virtue signalling and lip service.
I call it hypocrisy. But, again, it’s not an either/or.
There is no doubt in my mind that Zcash is technologically superior to Monero.
I’m not a fan of discord. Although if the whole Zcash ecosystem doesn’t switch to it it means that I will have an extra platform to take care of and that’s something worth avoiding.
Only if you have no faith in your fellow community members.
Well, to correct myself, the main problem is that discord won’t go away. We will still have other sibling projects that rely on discord and we need to connect with them. Like telegram, they are evils we have to live with. Having less of these platforms is a huge win.
In response to your appreciation, it’s pretty much the opposite. I’m being faithful to them by pointing out that having an extra place to check out will make my daily work-life less efficient. Reading forums and chats is entertaining and self-comforting, but it produces a lot context switching and mental burden that affects productivity and the ratio of meaningful output per hour spent on that activity is rather low compared to others.
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I vehemently disagree. At least Telegram’s client is free software, which - for me - places it on the edge of acceptable, because the server is not. Discord is proprietary spyware. This does - objectively - not align with Zcash at all. Discord is the “evil we have to live with”. Coming from someone in a leadership position of a privacy-focussed free software project, your remark leaves me honestly somewhat flabbergasted.
Being faithful to and having faith in are two different things. And if by “checking out” you mean simply reading along and maybe adding to the conversation, for that you don’t need to be in every room if they are bridged.
@zooko and others have tons of opinions on how Telegram is an unencrypted honeypot. You should check those out.
First, I’m not in a leadership position whatsoever. Secondly, I’m actually against using discord. Don’t paraphrase me to imply things I didn’t.
Myself and other community members that have an active role within the Zcash ecosystem take conversations seriously and we try to respond meaningfully investing time and effort to engage with community members as I’m currently doing in this exchange. Skimming through conversations is not only unproductive but disrespectful to our community. We don’t treat community conversations as a “light read”. We care about what Zcashers have to say. It’s crucial input for out daily work that the community has given to us and we are very honored by it. They expect the best from us and they shouldn’t settle with less.
I’m pointing out that increasing the number of extra platforms will be in detriment to the quality of our conversations.
Although I share the concerns with Discord (and telegram), I’m raising this side-effect for the community to consider. That’s all.
As always I will respect and value the choices that the community makes.
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Most likely, but - unlike Discord or many other popular apps - at least the client I run locally can be audited.
My bad. The title next to your name suggested to me otherwise.
I read that too, here.
I did not paraphrase, I quoted.
Because it would mean more people? By that reasoning, Discord would be the worst option if only one had to be picked, because it has the most users. 
I see more people as having more hands on deck. Bringing us back to having faith in the community.
Isn’t it the case that any of us can create a new chat room in any platforms, and ultimately everybody can use whatever they like? I think that’s already what has been happening for a long time and it’s a reasonable state. I wish they would use platforms you and I prefer but I also respect their choice and if they are more productive with those tools then why not really.
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Without bridging, this would lead to compartmentalization, and introduce exactly the problem stated by @pacu of having extra places to check out. It does take a bit of coordination to add choice while also keeping thinks together. Currently, Telegram is the only chat that is listed on the Community Hub, btw.
A bridge goes a long way in keeping a room alive as well. Even one person might be glad to communicate with people that have different application preferences, and have great points to add to a conversation happening mostly on the other side. Without the bridge, there is no point for this one person to even be in that room.
This comes down to who will manage it and what will it cost? Thanks for the post I never realized there was a RUST based alternative for discord. I stated publicly before the reason I started using discord was because my son was and I wanted presence there, but as we move more dystopian I have zero issues migrating. The bigger issues isn’t me though, its everyone else. Getting the herd to migrate is hard, and could potentially waste a lot of resources.
Ok. I will step up. Cost is zero, I will do it for free.
Getting the herd to migrate is hard , and could potentially waste a lot of resources.
If nobody comes, nobody comes, I wasted a few hundred bucks to a grand.
I’m pretty flexible on which tools I use to communicate but I do have preferences. I tend to avoid telegram even though I think it has superious stickers that make me laugh. I tend to prefer easy to setup, easy to use, and as a third prong, is strong on the security/privacy front. Open source 'ness is a fourth prong. I try to avoid absolutes because that creates a brittleness that hurts more than helps my understanding. It also comes off as a purity test.
I am probably more liberal than most in this regard 
My bottom line, I dont want to waste too much time/resources on which tools I’m using. Id rather focus on my work and hear what others are saying, and I’ll adapt as needed (most of the time) to wherever the herd goes.
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Ive used IRC too, and as it turns out, I might have a neck beard. The reason I think IRC went into the shadows was because discord had superior mobile support and that is what most gen-z and gen-alpha use.
What will the domain name be and thank you!
I will tell you after I register it for obvious reasons 
Something cheap, it isn’t 2000 where you needed to own “activity”.com to do that business.
I fact I recently discovered that zcash.com has been floating around since time immemorial and everyone just ignored it.
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I can do it for free and cover whatever costs are necessary. I have no problem setting up a host to run tests and make improvements (note that this does not mean there are no other alternatives). We are simply looking for an app that adapts to us, not us to it.
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I’m in favor of moving off of Discord, I’ve never liked it as a platform and consequently I don’t use it as much in the Zcash community as I probably should.
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