If you're interested in funding or helping us find funding for a Discord replacement that's federated and end-to-end encrypted, we're interested in implementing that at @spritely ... we even had been talking about that being our big focus for 2026.
We have the skills and the underlying tech to pull this off. What we need right now is resources. Funding for open source nonprofits like ours really fell apart in 2025. If you think you know how to help, feel free to reach out.
https://zulip.com is a good open source alternative
@cwebber @spritely if it can be made as simple to install and run as Mastodon, then I could see it being a great opportunity. I’m advocating for hyper local installs as a way around age verification. https://www.empathyforward.org/2025/12/community-based-fediverse-instances/
My own FOSS efforts are focused on making this easier to manage.
Funding-infrastructurally: one thing I'd like to see is some kind of mechanism where non-wealthy individuals with a little cash to spare can pledge $support if some corporate sponsor pulls out, especially if it's for questionable reasons.
(Just a thought.)(Hey have you heard of ActivityPub, maybe that would be good for this.)
@polyfloyd @cwebber @spritely can you name one that is any good? I can't. matrix probably comes the closest but it has fundamental issues that would be hard to fix retroactively.
@dthompson @cwebber @spritely The most mentioned one would be https://stoat.chat/. I heard it is decent but I have not tried it myself.
Alternatively:
* https://commet.chat/
* https://fluxer.app/
* https://fermi.chat/
* https://sharkord.com/
* https://www.rootapp.com/
And probably a few more that I have not yet discovered. This is a crowded space, holy shit
@polyfloyd wow I hadn't seen https://commet.chat before this, thanks, this is a super nice Matrix client. cc @douginamug
@liaizon @polyfloyd thanks! Movement in this space is strong... To add to the list in this thread:
@spritely @cwebber @richlv I know it's a personal preference, but I like the threaded replies model in Slack & Discord better than the "topic" approach in Zulip. Topic to me seems redundant with Channel - sort of like a long-lived email subject line, whereas threaded replies are much more focused and help me visually associate conversations.
@woody
> Isn't that XMPP?
Discord is, as people *experience* it, an interface with a set of affordances. XMPP is a protocol. It may be useful to a future Discord replacement, but no, it's not in and of itself a replacement.
You could try to build a Discord-a-like on top of XMPP. You could try building it on top of a bunch of different federation protocols, or variations thereon. I imagine @cwebber has some ideas about that ; )
@ekaitz_zarraga @cwebber @spritely It's often used by fandom communities as semi-private spaces apart from the more public Tumblr as well as by non profits and professional associations / communities of practice.
The UX is pretty great for moving between multiple servers with channels that have threaded conversations. Flexible admin controls and a lot of bots/add ons, too.
I never bothered with it until about two years ago when it became one of my main online social platforms.
@ekaitz_zarraga @cwebber @spritely It also has integrated audio and video chat (better than Slacks imho) and support things like watch parties really well (though I haven't used those features much).
@ekaitz_zarraga @cwebber @spritely Yeah, it has some quirks but is relatively intuitive for being so robust.
I was part of a 100+ person writing group that migrated from (private) Reddit chat (which sucked). There was the usual grumbling but even the very non-technical folks figured it out pretty quickly.
(They do not plan to move again and I can't think of what to even suggest... )
@maj
> They do not plan to move again and I can't think of what to even suggest
Discourse? Or Matrix, if you want your rooms and Space (kind of like a Discord "server") not to be tethered to any one service, and E2EE to give you privacy even from the admins.
We need more institutional support to get to the level where this can be our focus. But in the meanwhile, if you're an individual and you do want to help @spritely advance, you can donate here: https://spritely.institute/donate/
Framasoft has a longstanding practice of ''freeing out'' free services
Maybe they can beaucoup of some help?
@Framasoft
