Discord starts down the dangerous road of ads this week

Another consideration is that nobody yet has consciously gone out to build a Discord killer on top of Matrix. Element is currently focused on being a WhatsApp replacement for government users (as a way to bring in $ to make payroll), which often explains why folks expecting it to be a drop in replacement for Discord users have to readjust their expectations a bit. That said, Element could certainly end up competing proactively with Discord in the longer term.

Meanwhile, Matrix certainly suffers from being successful enough to engender very strong feelings from folks who are disappointed in it. Whether that amounts to being run badly is probably a matter of perspective.