Matrix.org homeserver grinds to a halt after RAID meltdown

Matrix.org homeserver grinds to a halt after RAID meltdown
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www.theregister.com/2025/09/03/matrixorg_raid_f…

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So thats why people with matrix.org accounts stopped responding to my messages...
Nice mention of the benefits of decentralization.

The incident demonstrates the benefits of a decentralized system. Users with their own homeservers aren't affected, nor are organizations such as Element, which have customer deployments that utilize the underlying technology.

One homeserver going down does not affect the rest, even one as visible as Matrix.org.

Matrix has become increasingly important in recent years as public and private sector organizations seek to reduce their dependency on centralized messaging services that might not meet sovereignty or privacy requirements. The Matrix.org outage, while embarrassing, serves to highlight that a decentralized approach can protect users from whoopsies on the part of those who run the service.

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"homeserver"

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Unfortunately Discord has redefined what "server" means in terms of chat services

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No it's real hardware that's broken, it's just in a data center and the only server for 50% of matrix users, so it's by no means a homeserver

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Matrix refers to a hosted server as a homeserver; the config file is literally called homeserver.yaml in synapse (and I believe dendrite too), when using a client like cinny/element etc... you will need to input your homeserver so the client knows where to authenticate. Saying the terminology is incorrect would be like saying the term 'EC2' is inaccurate when describing Aws VMs. The terminology is accurate because that's what it's called in the tech stack being discussed.

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Oh I see. I didn't realize that it could mean your server where your account lives instead of server at home xD

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I get it but saying "server" in chat app context has been tainted by Discord's misuse of the term so the journalists might be trying to avoid the word but introducing other issues in the process.

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when is it not real hardware?

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