As others have pointed out, we use jitsi.riot.im, which is provided by New Vector (the company behind Riot) rather than anything to do with Atlassian/Jitsi/8x8.
I tried it a while back but never really liked it. Clunky UI and the project in general seemed to have a lot of problems. The kickstarter project was basically a ripoff, the project management is (or at least was) scattered and basically non-existing.
I have much better experience with Matrix[1]/Riot[2].
Matrix is an open protocol with end-to-end encryption (still beta IIRC) and is federated (like IRC) rather than fully distributed.
Matrix is now a stable project with funding and riot has a future business plan to also continue develop.
Matrix.org is a non-profit open source project that publishes an open standard for decentralised interoperable communications (IM, VoIP, etc), an example server implementation and a bunch of example client SDKs, bridges, bots, etc. 'Matrix' is the name of the resulting ecosystem on the 'net.
Riot.im is one of the various client apps for Matrix, supporting iOS & Android, and is probably the most advanced at this point.
EDIT: clarify org structure: Matrix.org is being set up as a non-profit UK company owned by the various individuals running it. The business model is to create a new ecosystem for interoperable comms that everyone can benefit from.
Riot is a for-profit company (technically called Vector Creations Ltd) which is a subsiduary of Amdocs (a big telco supplier company). The business model is to offer paid hosted services in future for users wanting commercial-grade hosting and hosting private bots/bridges/etc.
aka Matrix, (Riot is the main client) is a good one because it is decentralized and federated. This means there can be many servers and they can all be linked up. Additionally IRC can be be bridged among other things
the first image is Riot circa 2015 (back when it was called Vector). You can run it if you really want from https://riots.im.
Tchap meanwhile is opensource at https://github.com/dinsic-pim and there are unofficial builds which let you use it as a general purpose Matrix client.
However, we're busy improving Riot's UX in general to make it easier to grip - on Mobile that ends up being a rewrite (RiotX), on Web we're iterating incrementally.
It's not a marketed use case though, so I'm sure you could find places the app will still refer to itself as Riot (or now Element).
Alternatively the protocol is open so many third party clients exist: https://matrix.org/clients/ . Feature support in third party clients is pretty unevenly distributed though, E2EE in particular is supported in Riot and Seaglass, experimental in weechat-matrix and nheko, and absent in basically every other client.
Do note that matrix.org is the homepage for Matrix, which is more about the protocol itself. https://riot.im is probably more relevant for design / UI / UX work.
Note that they will need UI/UX experience more and more as time goes on, especially if Purism's Librem 5 is fully funded.
Matrix.org/Riot.im via New Vector | REMOTE | Full-time
Matrix is an open standard for decentralized secure communications. Matrix’s mission is to make messaging as open as email.
Currently, we are especially keen to talk to Mobile developers and people who care a lot about anti-abuse tooling.
However, whatever your background, feel free to contact me via https://riot.im on @neilj:matrix.org I am always keen to chat with engineers of all disciplines about the project.
Register matrix.org accounts there. There's a web client, desktop clients and mobile clients (called Riot.im). It's open source and federated. And, there are IRC bridges!
Matrix is a federated chat protocol. It is like IRC or XMPP but synchronizes history and uses HTTP-based protocol. There are bridges to IRC, XMPP, and Gitter.
Matrix is totally open sourced. Server side and the official client (Riot) can be deployed anywhere under your own control.
Also, deploying a bridge you can connect Matrix and IRC rooms, creating a hybrid channel mixing Matrix and IRC clients in the same room. It's pretty cool.
As others have pointed out, we use jitsi.riot.im, which is provided by New Vector (the company behind Riot) rather than anything to do with Atlassian/Jitsi/8x8.
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