Hi Duncan - another option is matrix.org - we're similar to XMPP although at the same time different: Matrix is effectively an eventually consistent DB with open federation and pubsub semantics - it's all about synchronising state, whereas XMPP is about federated messaging - sending stanzas around rather than synchronising conversation history.

In fact in Matrix we don't even have the concept of sending a message over federation - the only thing you can do is to synchronise the history datastructure.

We don't see Matrix as undermining XMPP: if you want decentralised conversation history then use Matrix. If you want fast stateless message passing, use XMPP. Infact, we're building an XMPP<->Matrix bridge, so that XMPP can federate with Matrix - so it's not like we're fragmenting things further. The point for Matrix is to try to defragment all the different protocols out there.

I've updated the getting started link to https://xmpp.net/directory.php after feedback from Lloyd Watkin ( https://github.com/lloydwatkin ) and intosi ( https://github.com/intosi ).

I don't see any mention of any Hangouts or XMPP issues over at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google.

LOL, best to program and host stuff yourself than rely on an ad agency like Google.

There's a middle road, though: pay for a service that uses open protocols. That way a) you're not the product, b) you can interop with other open services, and c) you can migrate in the case of failures.

That's why I'm with Fastmail :)