the short version was that it was an up-and-coming federated protocol, with people working on clients and stuff, and trying to attract users. then everyone got really excited when Google decided to start using XMPP in their Google Talk product, because it would mean instant adoption by a ton of people! except now everyone just used Google Talk as their client, because it was ahead of the existing XMPP clients in terms of usability/UX, and UX work on other clients kinda died. but over time, Google being Google, they got distracted and started neglecting Google Talk, failing to enable TLS support while the rest of the XMPP ecosystem started making it mandatory, essentially cutting off all Google Talk users from the rest of the XMPP network. so now you had a Google Talk network that everyone was using with a decent-ish client, and an XMPP network that a bunch of people were using with clients that sucked, and they couldn’t talk, and all the momentum in developing a strong stand-alone network was lost due to people letting Google control the whole thing

Over the years, open-source has kinda turned from “let’s build a public commons” into “let’s do free work for big corporations” and it’s… not a good change, to say the least

  • Sam@community.xmpp.net
    13·
    3 years ago

    When people say “killed” they obviously don’t mean “literally no one uses it”. Also no one really cares that Whatsapp or Google are still using it internally. Google did serious damage to the public network and the broader XMPP ecosystem and it’s worth acknowledging and learning from that instead of just complaining that someone wasn’t absolutely precise in their language. For all intents and purposes, XMPP is effectively dead to the general public. Let’s try to bring it back to popular use and make sure Google et al. can’t do their “embrace, extend, extinguish” thing again.

    TL;DR — please stop being snarky to the OP.

    • TheConquestOfBed
      7·
      3 years ago

      Internet users in the 00s: “We need to maintain awareness of the rise of walled gardens and the negative impact they can have on online social behavior.”

      Internet users in the 20s: “I love my walled garden. Google’s boot tastes delicious!”

      • Sam@community.xmpp.net
        6·
        3 years ago

        This is exactly why we should stop pretending everything is fine and actually try to address the problem of Google doing damage to open ecosystems.

          • pep@community.xmpp.net
            4·
            3 years ago

            I doubt they’ve “done” anything to GitHub. GitHub has done that to themselves by buying into capitalism, being a centralized platform, etc. I’m not sure what else people expected of it.

  • tardigrada
    5·
    3 years ago

    Thank god I didn’t know it’s dead, so I have already been using it for years ¯_(ツ)_/¯

  • jakob@soc.schuerz.at
    4·
    3 years ago

    @meloo google. did not kill xmpp… they use it intensively till now…

    i would say, xmpp is the most used protocoll over all chat protocolls…

    google use xmpp for communication from playstore to every fucking google-play-app on every android-phone with google.
    google uses xmpp for cloud-printing
    whatsapp is still xmpp, but with proprietary xeps and without federation.
    facebook-chat is maybe still xmpp - also with proprietary xeps and without federation.
    google hangout is still xmpp with proprietary xep and without federation

    maybe something turned in the last years… but i’m sure… all this services are still xmpp…

    so xmpp is NOT dead… it’s alive and most frequently used on earth…

      • jakob@soc.schuerz.at
        4·
        3 years ago

        @poVoq That’s right…

        XMPP slept, while smartphones grow up… there was a lack of good clients. and they grow this days… but good clients are not developed in 1 year, when the whole system slept for 12 years…

        conversations is ok.
        gajim gets a big relaunch
        some web-clients are forcefully developed (jsxc, movim,…)

        it takes time… it’s late… and matrix is a big concurrent…

        • electrodynamica@mander.xyz
          1·
          3 years ago

          it takes time… it’s late… and matrix is a big concurrent…

          XMPP with all the XEPs can be intimidating, but at least I can easily construct a server by following spec. Matrix OTOH is very confusing and I get stuck on MegaOLM and the consistency algorithm (which changes every 5 months anyway).

  • OsrsNeedsF2P
    51·
    3 years ago

    Over the years, open-source has kinda turned from “let’s build a public commons” into “let’s do free work for big corporations” and it’s… not a good change, to say the least

    Which is why I do NOT respect MIT and similarly licensed projects

    • sean
      22·
      3 years ago

      The GPL requires copyright, cops, and violence to function. Without copyright, how can the GPL restrict others from copying? Without cops, how can the GPL threaten others with a legal process and summon them to courts? Without violence, how can the GPL have any serious threat against anyone?

      The GPL relies on copyright, cops, and violence to maintain its threat against others. Without the threat, the GPL is nothing.

      • OsrsNeedsF2P
        22·
        3 years ago

        Man, you’re the modern age equivalent of someone who thinks the rooster makes the sun come up in the morning

        What a dumb take. Never thought I’d see someone with this opinion in my life rofl

          • ralf_muschall@feddit.de
            1·
            3 years ago

            GPL does not need copyright. GPL is a way to make stuff work despite the existence of copyright. Without copyright, everything would be legally free anyway (but one might discuss how much of the stuff would exist in the first place without monetary incentive for corporations to hire programmers to create stuff, and then tu publish it).