Matrix has become the messaging app of choice for top-secret communications

Same for mattermost. Both are unmanageable in my opinion once you've used Zulip, Slack or more recently RocketChat.

There isn't even a date for the release of threads in any of the available client :/

Eh? Matrix is heavily supported by Element (nee Vector), which operates development on the workhorse "home server" implementation, Synapse, and its hoped-to-be successor, Dendrite, and operates a business providing cloudy private homeservers.

I'm pretty sure the developers of Element are sponsoring matrix and also running servers as business. So it's not entirely non profit, though it's definitely open source and there's no limited 'community edition' :)

Matrix doesn't "use google captcha". Matrix.org, one instance among so many, uses google captcha. Matrix is a federated protocol, so you can choose another instance or setup your own

Matrix is decentralized, you don't have to use a server that connects to Google services.

Signal is Moxie and I personally don't trust Moxie and have some issues with his attitude. Does this make signal unsafe, no of course not but I don't trust it even if the encryption is top notch.

Also remember you must have a phone number to use signal.

Signal hides metadata better however it's based in the US, you are required to use your phone number as an identifier and Moxie refuses to allow Signal to be decentralised. Security-wise they both use the double-ratchet algorithm to encrypt messages.

Matrix uses the same encryption as signal, one of their implementations can be found here: https://gitlab.matrix.org/matrix-org/olm

Signal as a network is controlled by a single individual, or small staff of individuals. There is a central server. Also there is no way to use signal anonymously.

It is useful for talking to people you know in real life, but that's it.

As to the user friendliness, I find more infuriating bugs (and "features") with signal these days, although that was not always the case. For example, if history is not restored on launch it is lost forever, this is a problem if you're e.g. going to a privacy hostile nation and need your history clean for the trio but want to restore it when you get back. Another particularly heinous violation is that the signal app has code in it that slows it's functionality if the version is out of date, pressuring you to update.

What about Briar? https://briarproject.org/

Seems like it's decentralized and uses Tor natively.

My issue with Matrix is the philsophy attached to it. The founders and its most vitriolic supports are activists, through and through, and view Signal as a messaging app for activists.

When the Cellebrite malware was added to Signal by the developer(s) I mentioned that Cellebrite was used by legitimate phone carriers to transfer data between an old phone and a new phone.

I asked why my elderly mother, with whom I speak to over Signal, should be liable for a potentially broken Cellebrite machine (costing thousands) if the Signal malware were to break it. There's no precedent on whether or not she'd be liable, so there's a possibility she would be.

She never consented to her phone being used as a weapon. She doesn't understand the stuff going on. She uses Signal because it's simple, easy to understand, I'm just a few button presses away (we don't live near each other) and the call quality is unmatched.

I got a few very angry responses, telling me to uninstall Signal if I wasn't willing to be an activist for their agenda. They were perfectly okay with their philosophy being projected onto their users and didn't see any issue in the fact that users did not consent to it.

Which is strange, because they're annoyed with other Big Tech firms doing... well, the same exact thing.

I really hope Matrix improves its UX since I would immediately switch my family over to it if they could just understand how it worked.