Wrong, both clients and server are open-source.
>not federated,
This is intentional. See https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/
>uses phone number.
I think this is for the best. This means you can seamlessly add contacts you already have on your phonebook to Signal. No need for emails or separate user accounts. If you're worried about this, you can buy a prepaid SIM card for pennies, or use an online service. It's not an issue.
However moxie seems to have an outdated form of federation in mind when he gives examples of IRC and email. While it is true that these technologies have been quite rigid, there are other examples of distributed technologies that are quite flexible in implementation. Bitcoin and Mastodon are examples where changes and updates are pushed through regularly.
The determining factor seems to be the amount of control the principal developer holds over the ecosystem. Mastodon instances basically all run the same code, and (mostly) everyone is happy with the direction they are going. Thus, Eugen pushes a new release, everyone runs it, and protocol changes can propagate throughout the network. Old nodes get left behind. However, say Eugen (or Signal) massively screws up, and they get forked. Now, any protocol changes must be adopted by both camps (who by definition have differing philosophies) to be fully applied.
Also, Mastodon is built on open standards that have several competing and compatible implementations (GNUSocial and Pleorma are the main two), which are run by their own maintainers.
Signal is released under the GPL, meaning that if something did happen to shake user faith (data breach, data mining) a fork pointing at different servers could be instantly created with complete feature parity.
Every traditional barrier to user migration is removed. Features are the same. UX is the same. Compatibility is the same.
That's a precarious line to toe.
Also, Mastodon is built on open standards that have several competing and compatible implementations (GNUSocial and Pleorma are the main two), which are run by their own maintainers.
Yes, Mastodon is inter-operable with OStatus and ActivityPub. However I do not know of any significant user base that interacts with Mastodon through an alternative platform. Given the will, Mastodon could implement its own extensions to ActivityPub and break compatibility, with most users unaffected due to the strength behind the core development team.
But not federation. No one can talk to people on other servers. Such forks already exist, none of them are successful.
>Yes, Mastodon is inter-operable with OStatus and ActivityPub. However I do not know of any significant user base that interacts with Mastodon through an alternative platform.
I know of many people on both of the platforms I mentioned. Collaboration between all of these platforms is frequent and they drive improvements in each other.
They are not successful because Signal has not yet done anything particularly egregious. If they do, I believe that a fork would quickly gain popularity.
>I know of many people on both of the platforms I mentioned. Collaboration between all of these platforms is frequent and they drive improvements in each other.
We've both given anecdotes; user counts would be more conclusive. I've found +1 million [0] for Mastodon. Do you know how many users GNU Social and Pleroma have? I can't find these numbers from a quick Google search, but they might be somewhere.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastodon_(software)#Adoption]
Like I said: Moxie toes the line. He doesn't cross it. Well, everyone has a different line. He's crossed mine but not the lines the average user sets.
>We've both given anecdotes; user counts would be more conclusive. I've found +1 million [0] for Mastodon.
I question the methodology behind this figure. The nature of the decentralized network makes it difficult to get good estimates. All I have are anecdotes. Yes, the overwhelming majority of users are on Mastodon. However, I personally interact with several users on several different Pleroma instances and a couple on GNUSocial instances, and I did not seek them out for this purpose.
However they are the exception. Because the overwhelming majority of users are on Mastodon, the Mastodon developers have the power to modify protocol implementations. If it was closer to an even split, any breaking changes would fracture the community, while in this case some smaller groups may be lost.
[0]https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/13/17007100/google-amp-gmail...
In many countries you cannot buy a prepaid SIM card without showing identification. The seller must take a photocopy of your identification or enter your details into a government website. Consequently, any global network based on telephone numbers will force usage of real names just as much as privacy-violating commercial services.