Discord has apparently reached out to Microsoft to discuss its sale.

That's interesting. Wonder if they would embed Discord in to Xbox somehow, or merge it in to Teams :LOL:. Personally can't stand Discord's UI - it feels cluttered and packed with useless features. However, I am turning in to a grumpy old man with dwindling e-friends who just wants to use Mumble/Vent/TS for Voice and Steam for chat. I don't want to stream my games, or constantly be reconnected to/reminded of previous channels I've connected to. I'm usually not bitter when it comes to new software, but something about Discord just makes me cringe. I can understand the allure for those social gamer butterflies out there though. I would guess they would also make Windows 10 a minimum requirement which would be pretty hilarious because I have a friend who refuses to jump from 7 to 10 and is constantly complaining about how his games run like trash/crash/glitch.
 
Embedding it in Xbox and leaving the PC side alone is the best case scenario. Consoles have been screaming for Discord support for a while.
 
When I set up a server for me and a few friends I thought it might be fun to customize the experience a little bit and make it our own space. I was really surprised to find that the only options seemed to be "server boost" and "Discord Nitro." Other than the higher voice quality (128kbps) which I'm guessing is not noticeable at all in a casual gaming setting, it looks like an elaborate way to spend $10/month on emojis that I don't want. Didn't end up spending any money.
 
That's interesting. Wonder if they would embed Discord in to Xbox somehow, or merge it in to Teams :LOL:. Personally can't stand Discord's UI - it feels cluttered and packed with useless features.
FINALLY I found someone sane! Discord's UI is terrible! I loathe it. How can people put up with non threaded message boards? Frankly I hope Microsoft or Epic Games buy it and kill it.
 
Don't see how this makes sense for Microsoft given that they already have Teams, unless Discord is worth it to them for the userbase.

I really hate how there's a constant push for consolidation of companies. I actually don't dislike Microsoft but I don't want them to own everything I use.
 
Too many sell-outs these days, but I know that's just my idealist talking since Discord is not profitable yet. I respect their stance to not fund with advertising. I would have liked to see a joint venture with Microsoft rather than a buy-out. (Discord + better UI = winner)
 
Considering that when Discord turned their lights on they instantly took a huge part of the market they deserve to make a little money. I considered Nitro but I don't feel I really get anything out of it.
The issue is that anyone who buys them is going to ruin it until the next big thing comes around.and replaces it. Best case? They go public and fill it with premium content and/or ads.
 
Would be a bad decision. We've seen how this played out before.

MSN/Live Messenger - great chat program. Was ditched in favor of Skype, which sucked. But was better for calls and video. Then that started to suck so much, the account management became a pain. They buy Discord, integrate MS account stuff and video things. Skype dies. Discord lags behind competition and becomes crap. Rinse repeat.
 
Don't see how this makes sense for Microsoft given that they already have Teams, unless Discord is worth it to them for the userbase.

I really hate how there's a constant push for consolidation of companies. I actually don't dislike Microsoft but I don't want them to own everything I use.
Xbox
 
For programming circles, discord can be a nice way to ping a dev.

Wouldn't care much if Microsoft decides to screw it up, tbh. Mumble was always better for gaming, since I hate social media shit, and the programmers will find the next best thing.
 
For programming circles, discord can be a nice way to ping a dev.
This is why I hate Discord. I used to play a game called Atlas Reactor and the devs were very active on Discord and ignored the official game forums and Steam forums. Now these devs have a game called Atlas Rouges and again the devs are very active on Discord and ignore the official game forums and Steam forums. If they were active on the official forums, the places where you can buy the game I could ignore Discord.
 
This is why I hate Discord. I used to play a game called Atlas Reactor and the devs were very active on Discord and ignored the official game forums and Steam forums. Now these devs have a game called Atlas Rouges and again the devs are very active on Discord and ignore the official game forums and Steam forums. If they were active on the official forums, the places where you can buy the game I could ignore Discord.

Sadly that is the future. Few games have official forums, and forums are dying left and right. Xbox, Playstation, most new games don't have forms, the ones that had big fan bases were closed. Reddit is a half assed forum but is semi usable. Discord is terrible for information. Everything gets buried and it is impossible to scroll through everything to find the posts. Plus you get dozens upon dozens of notifications for everything. It makes zero logical sense.

Discord itself works as an okay replacement for peer to peer communication or chat rooms. But for discussions and information distribution it makes zero sense.
 
Wasn't there some new discord like app that was more gamer centric that came out awhile back?
 
I am scratching my head and just wondering why? Microsoft already has XBox Community and other forums, streaming etc. They can't make something better than Discord? Which I also think sucks and hate the format where the information is buried to oblivion. 10 billion to shut them down maybe or convert to something else to bring users for the ride.
 
The sale of Discord won't be for the core software, patents, or functionality.
A megacorp like Microsoft will purchase it for the near-endless chat logs and user data, which is far more valuable, useful, and marketable than any of Discord's patents and technology.
 
Last edited:
There goes Discords Linux support.

With Microsoft being a member of the Linux foundation, that seems unlikely. They've increasingly been spreading their tentacles into Linux for well over a decade now. I think they finally realized at some point they couldn't use FUD to destroy open source, so they decided to use their age old tactic of embrace, extend, extinguish.
 
With Microsoft being a member of the Linux foundation, that seems unlikely. They've increasingly been spreading their tentacles into Linux for well over a decade now. I think they finally realized at some point they couldn't use FUD to destroy open source, so they decided to use their age old tactic of embrace, extend, extinguish.
Agreed, the Linux foundation - that's like a who's who of megacorp influencers.
Case in point: https://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/about/board/
 
Agreed, the Linux foundation - that's like a who's who of megacorp influencers.
Case in point: https://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/about/board/
Yep, if your main source of income is not selling the OS but people using the OS which gives you data which you can do all sorts of things to bring in cash streams -> Linux starts looking really really good with that free free free tingle song with the unsuspecting data collection taking place. Plus not having to worry about updates, issues, versions etc since the community does the work for you, I am surprised Microsoft does not already have a LinuxWin Edition Distribution.
 
Sadly that is the future. Few games have official forums, and forums are dying left and right. Xbox, Playstation, most new games don't have forms, the ones that had big fan bases were closed. Reddit is a half assed forum but is semi usable. Discord is terrible for information. Everything gets buried and it is impossible to scroll through everything to find the posts. Plus you get dozens upon dozens of notifications for everything. It makes zero logical sense.

Discord itself works as an okay replacement for peer to peer communication or chat rooms. But for discussions and information distribution it makes zero sense.
But it’s better than Slack....
 
There goes Discords Linux support.
This is Microsoft, not Epic.

1616589089263.png
 
  • Like
Reactions: Axman
like this
I am scratching my head and just wondering why? Microsoft already has XBox Community and other forums, streaming etc. They can't make something better than Discord? Which I also think sucks and hate the format where the information is buried to oblivion. 10 billion to shut them down maybe or convert to something else to bring users for the ride.
They just want the userbase - they don't need the tech or the business. The sheer number of gamers they can try to get on the xbox ultimate game pass platform is reason enough.

Also if you can get those users to buy their games through microsoft/xbox store, instead of steam/epic, that's another win.

Problem is (for users) the microsoft store is a complete piece of shit and the integration with xbox windows pc app is atrocious. You essentially have to do everything twice, cause it was done wrong from the ground up and there is no fix other than to rewrite and start over. Your xbox live account isn't connected to your windows store account, so it creates issue, like when some of your games get purchased on one but not the other - and there's no way to combine them. I'll see my way out of this thread now, it's getting me furious.
 
They just want the userbase - they don't need the tech or the business. The sheer number of gamers they can try to get on the xbox ultimate game pass platform is reason enough.
I'm not a fan of the Xbox Game Pass stuff. I get it seems like a lot of value but most of those games are old and can be bought for less than $10. Right now you can get Control, Xcom, and 9 other games for the price of $12. You get to own those games for what is the price of a monthly fee on Xbox Game Pass. There are plenty of websites that offer most games for as low as a few bucks. Fallout New Vegas for $5.
Also if you can get those users to buy their games through microsoft/xbox store, instead of steam/epic, that's another win.
I hope that doesn't exclude games from Steam/Epic?
 
How many chat services does Microsoft need? They're getting to be as bad as Google.
 
Regarding the whole "Microsoft and Linux" thing I do understand continued skepticism. MS is especially noteworthy for "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" operations with supposed competitors so their "friendliness" to Linux while on the surface may be a good thing, is overall suspect. I'd love to see them go the extra mile to prove they're really in it for the long haul and won't simply make a couple of gestures but then allow it to die / strangle it over time but... we'll have to see. For instance, it would be a nice gesture if they released Minecraft's "Bedrock" edition for Linux natively when most of the official development is happening for Bedrock, as opposed to the ostensibly cross platform Java edition (which survives primarily thanks to its long history of modders, but its obvious MS would love to ditch the Java version) .

Regardless if a deal with Microsoft or similar goes through, it would be good to consider moving away from Discord regardless. While I admit it has some benefits ,I've always been concerned about Discord as a centralized, proprietary platform. It managed to usurp users on messengers, IRC-style chat, and gaming-style VOIP (much of which was distributed through personally hosted or rented servers for Ventrilo, Teamspeak, and a personal favorite the libre Mumble), through being easy to use, centralized, and "free". It also brought mobile era quality of life features that the later generations would appreciate (ie emoji style "reactions" to a message). However, this was all proprietary and centralized, started by a company with a ton of startup-style venture capital that was supposed to "get a ton of users, then monetize". They attempted to do a few things (thankfully their attempt a a game store platform, one of the few besides Epic that tried exclusivity, failed ) and I hoped that their Nitro optional subscriptions would be sufficient but alas, they still do a significant amount of data mining and survilance capitalism monetization.

While I see the allure of Discord, much like Twitter and Facebook there are many issues with privacy, security, and discourse being usurped by a single centralized for profit entity with a proprietary client - even if I can give them some credit for offering a Linux version (albeit I do wish it wasn't an Electron bundled application). I'd encourage anyone to get away from Discord the same way I do major social media platforms and similar services like YouTube or Twitch (if you want me to go more in depth on alternatives let me know). While there are many messenger programs now, even a few of them being open source/FOSS/libre the one that I think is the best alternative to Discord is likely the Matrix network ( https://matrix.org/ ) and specifically the Element client ( https://element.io/ ) which has a similar UI and feature set to Discord. It may not be all the way perfect yet, but its open source and federated, end to end encrypted, yet has a bunch of those Discord style quality of life features many enjoy. It can even bridge to other services like IRC , Slack, and even Discord itself with proper plug-ins, provided the service doesn't break these kind of bridges until they are updated yet again. In any case, its a better alternative to Discord no matter what may happen and though it may take quite some time to get people to move over unless Discord totally messes things up, its worth trying to leverage Matrix / Element as a preferable alternative.
 
most of the official development is happening for Bedrock, as opposed to the ostensibly cross platform Java edition (which survives primarily thanks to its long history of modders, but its obvious MS would love to ditch the Java version) .
Is that true? Mojang has maintained a constant stream of updates for Java Minecraft, just like they did before they were bought. It seems like new development is taking place on both versions simultaneously, but with periodic synchronization so the two versions are mostly the same. They're actively putting out betas of 1.17 right now, with a new one every week or two.

The only notable changes I've seen over the years is the recent gradual switch from using Mojang accounts to Microsoft ones, and the mildly-obnoxious nag about safety if you're not using the latest version (which means mainly that only the latest 1.16 release has a built-in ability to mute other players, as far as I can tell.)
 
Discords interface is already really fucking terrible, so I'm curious to see if microsoft can at least improve that aspect.

I'll honestly be impressed if they can somehow make it worse.
 
Back
Top