An alternative to skype that respects your freedom
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Greetings. I used Skype to talk with my family, and felt dirty and sick so I would be very glad if you could recommend me a good free as in freedom program that could replace that dirty one.
I must say that is necessary for us to be able to install it on windows (I'm trying to teach them to use Trisquel but some of them learns faster than the others).
I've heard that ekiga and jitsi are very good but I heard that jitsi have "Freedom Issues", that's why I'm asking before taking action.
Thank you a lot and take care.
Well, using Pidgin with OTR encryption you can have private (non anonymous) conversations with them, if they use the same program. Problem is, it will only encrypt text conversations, Pidgin has video conference chat available for XMPP protocol, you can use it, but it's not encrypted. So, if someone is spying on you, you will get your conversations recorded. I would therefore advise against using gmail ;)
But, if encryption is not necessary, you can use Pidgin and OTR. It can even be used in windows as a portable application, both of them, so, no need to even install anything.
If using phones, you can try to use Ostel. Take a look at the guardian project website. https://guardianproject.info/
Hope I helped somehow =)
Of course you helped GNUser, I didn't know that you could use Pidgin for vide conferences and that's some useful information and I will investigate about that
:-). The problem is that some people in my family are not very "computerish" kind of person... so I would discard Pidgin if I they have to use a pluguin, but I definetly want to try It up. :)
What do you think about Ekiga? I want to hear some opinions.
¿Can Ekiga encrypt?
https://securityinabox.org/en/pidgin_portable
Take a look at this website. It explains everything in great detail.
Of course, if they are using windows, your privacy is 0 already, so you can just have them downloading Pidgin, unziping it, and running it with gmail. You use a compatible xmpp account, and you can use video/voice chat. No big security, but still an improvement over skype.
With people who are more "computerish" as you put it, you can use text conversations encrypted with OTR.
My actual line of thought is "using security tools in an uncompromised system". That's the main reason I use Trisquel, even if I am sorry Trisquel does not put a big emphasis in security/privacy by default installation.
I'm extremely optimistic about Tox, but it hasn't been released yet.
What are the freedom issues with Jitsi?
Thank you for sharing :-)
And in relation to Jitsi... I don't know, I espect that someone in the Trisquel comunity would respond me. I've heard some things about dependecy problem with the definition of free software but i don't know the details.
I'm looking forward to Tox as well.
I tried Jitsi once a while ago but had trouble using it ... I'll give it another go.
I would personally recommended Jitsi as being the most feature complete and presumably secure... however I see it was not packaged in Debian due to a confusing build structure - http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=627362
Additionally it contained "third-party" libraries. Whether or not this third party code was non-blobbed and GPL compliant I do not know. Looks like they are actively working on getting it fixed though. Ya just never know these days. :P
There are a lot of options. Just know that what you're looking for is a VoIP client; there are several of them out there and a few standard protocols. You need you and your friend to be using the same protocol as each other. Unfortunately, Skype doesn't support any standard protocols, so you'll have to get your friends to use a different program as well, but on the plus side you're helping a friend as well as yourself.
Here's a few alternatives, feel free to add more
http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority-projects/priority-projects/highpriorityprojects#Replaceskype
Thank you all for give me options. I will first try Pidgin + the plugin because GNUser seems very glad that this combination exist and I must say that it seems a very interesting option and I cannot wait to test it.
Sadly, I cannot test Pidgin right away because I must first teach my mother how Trisquel works. I'm very glad that her laptop is completely compatible with free software.
Yeah, I was a big Skype user myself, but the security concerns became an issue for me. Now I use RHUB's appliance, which works from behind my firewall (instead of outside of it), so now I sleep a lot better at night.
Trisquel GNU/Linux is about freedom. RHUB's offering is proprietary just like Skype and thus no better. We don't advertise proprietary software here.
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