[haupt]

>Discord start as "your private place for your friends to talk" during a time where there were a lot of privacy issues with other communication methods.

Discord started as a way for gamers to chat with one another. Initially the developers even wanted to sell games directly from the platform [1].

I think it would be incorrect to position Discord as a privacy-oriented platform when the desktop client needs to be run in a sandbox because there's no real way to disable data collection.

1. https://www.pcgamer.com/the-discord-game-store-is-now-open/

[Dalewyn]

This.

Discord came about because all the instant messaging services (eg: AIM, MSN) had recently died, Skype was hot flaming gasoline garbage, Teamspeak and Ventrilo were tedious and expensive (for gamers), and otherwise there were no other means of reliable, easy, free, convenient means of voice communications.

[barrysteve]

Mumble was the best free voice communications app and briefly took over after Teamspeak fell out of popularity.

Discord was really the best place to hang out with your friends outside of games. Social media was too distant and Steam friends didnt do enough. The old IRC chatroom / Discord format with voice comms and screen sharing is THE way to relate to friends online now.