Recovered trust and motivation on XMPP and RTC

After the XMPP Summit and the FOSDEM in Brussels this week-end (on Thu 28 + Fri 29 and Sat 30 + Sun 31), I can now expose and share my feelings.

Having been an XMPP evangelist for many years, at some point I simply lacked motivation and belief. Since I was hired at Erlang Solutions as a Product Owner for the MongooseIM XMPP server, I met a highly competent and clever team. I was wondering since, if I should wear again my promoter hat. Now I know.

At the XMPP Summit, a lot of discussions took place, and we definitely say we have moved one strong step forward (MIX, E2E, simpler reconnection). It has been a highly productive edition, with applied core values, such as openness, ownership and responsibility.

At the FOSDEM, three interesting talks took place

Daniel Pocock on network effect, and basic requirements, plus the probable freertc initiative (non-XMPP-specific)
Matthew Wild’s on probable modernxmpp initiative to reach masses beyond techies
My talk, on the three generations of IM, our own trough of disillusionment, and the clean up we need to make

If you allow me to enlarge the view outside the XMPP world:

The SIP community might suffer some similar illness and trough of disillusionment
The WebRTC is trendy but lacks features and implementations, such as signalling, for which there is still no open standard
Overall, the RTC communities want to to change the landscape of Real Time communications, making it more open, decentralised, privacy, security, and free/libre

I believe we have here the basis of renewal, with some initiatives that need to include a larger crowd for more feedback, in order to build a real vision.

Can you please participate in this little poll?