this post was submitted on 09 May 2025
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How come nobody has forked Mumble to create a better Discord alternative? (lemm.ee)
submitted 8 hours ago by CptHacke@lemm.ee to c/foss@beehaw.org
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Please understand that I'm not a programmer and so this is probably a really dumb question, but Mumble works so great for voice chat and it already has text chat capabilities. It could just do with a UI refresh and maybe some added functionality to really provide a much better alternative to Discord. Any thoughts?

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[–] who@feddit.org 9 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago) (2 children)

Mumble is great, but there are some things that people have come to expect from group chat services that it is not designed to do. For example, running in a web browser, persistent message history, and multi-device access to a single account. Adding such things would be no small amount of work, which is probably the main rason it hasn't been done. (And, of course, the changes required would make the result incompatible with Mumble.)

Considering what exists today, I think Matrix has the best chance at becoming a Discord alternative. It already has a lot of the needed features, The new voice/video system (now in beta) looks very promising. And, of course, it also supports self-hosting and end-to-end encryption, both of which Discord lacks.

[–] CptHacke@lemm.ee 2 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Okay, what's the biggest and most active gamer community on Matrix? In fact, what's the biggest and most active community for anything, not counting software developers, on Matrix? I've tried using Matrix many, many times. It's a ghost town if you're not a software developer. It's not a viable replacement for Discord. At least not by user count. Why is that? I'm sure I'll get slammed with nasty replies for this, but I'm just telling the truth. Have at me, if you will.

[–] who@feddit.org 6 points 2 hours ago

Okay, what’s the biggest and most active gamer community on Matrix?

I don't know, and don't really care. I play games mostly with friends. Listening to a large chat room full of random people doesn't appeal to me at all.

Regardless of social preferences, I think you'll find that there is no Discord alternative with public chat rooms as big and active as Discord's, nor will there be any time soon. The network effect is strong there.

Nevertheless, we can choose tools that serve us better, and invite others to join us when it's practical. Ex-redditors have been doing this with Lemmy. Ex-Windows gamers have been doing this with Linux. Shifting away from an entrenched platform is usually slow and gradual, but not impossible.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Last I checked matrix only supported calls, not voice rooms you can freely join and leave