This is my issue with finding a replacement, text and voice in one with specific channels.

I like to segregate my topics so things don't get too cluttered, it's why I moved from Skype to Discord originally. But I also want my voice chat and text chats to be in the same program.

I've used Ventrilo and TeamSpeak before for voice and I liked the self hosting option, but no text. IRC is text without voice. Matrix looks... complicated to self host.

So I'm looking at Stoat (formerly Revolt)

I never thought about that. I use the voice chat a little bit, but you are right that it works well enough and I can stream my games.

The only pain point would be for people that don't use steam for whatever reason. Discord offers the web interface which is useful when video chatting with non gamers.

There's Stoat (formerly Revolt) and Fluxer. Additionally, Steam has many Discord-like features in app.

The problem isn't that there are no alternatives. It's that there's like 50 alternatives. Centralization makes us vulnerable, but it's also super convenient.

There's a reason we preferred reddit and now Lemmy instead of different forums with different logins for everything.

The biggest problem with getting off Discord is fragmentation of communities.

Slack seems cool to me and my friends, is it not cool to other people?

IRC never left.

Matrix is not

With LiveKit for calls / screen share, it is for my group. Though I'm not saying it doesn't have issues.

will never be

Community-developed homeservers like continuwuity have gotten a lot of new support on the last few weeks. Clients like cinny are getting pretty close to a replacement ux wise (if you look at PR2599 on Cinny's GitHub, they are working on and will soon merge support for LiveKit in a way that is very close to voice channels).

I also generally think that the only way to replace Discord as an ecosystem where you talk to many people from different communities is a federated protocol, not a bunch of new silos, one for each community.

I've seen mentioned these:

• Stoat - pretty much same UI, based in UK, not sure where they get $$
• Fluxer - looks virtually like 1:1 Discord clone, based in Sweden, has paid tier pretty much like Nitro on Discord on official server
• Nerimity - a little different UI, but still very Discord-y, based in UK, sourced from donations
• Movim - this one is interesting, but it's not really Discord style app; it looks more like cross breed between IM and social network (FB/X), origin in France
• Strafe - looks like Discord, supposedly have e2ee
• Spacebar - reverse engineered Discord, IDK about maturity of this one
• Adapt - another wanna be

Its also closed source as i recently learned...

I use two tin cans and some string.

If only Mumble contained more than 10% of the features Discord does.

I'm tired of people suggesting replacements that only do one small part of what Discord does. It's like needing a new car, and all people keep suggesting is new engines. I don't care if the engine is better than my current car, an engine alone does not solve my needs.

Mumble is alive and well amongst Project Reality players. Same with Teamspeak for the Arma community as well as some roleplaying communities like on RedM.

I self host a mumble for my people I games with, works great

There was something kind of special about how simple Vent was. It didn't need a bunch of bells and whistles, it did one thing and it was relatively easy for people to use. Discord feels so cluttered and it's full of shit I don't want.

I liked it, it reminded me of AIM