Why is this any better? It doesn't solve any of the identity and end-to-end encryption problems centralized messengers do; it just changes the underlying connectivity model, which is the least interesting part of the system.

>In an alternate universe, messaging on the Internet could have been:

I don't think so, and I think the very reason is because the people who opt for these decentralized solutions never really sit down and try and design a product, they just want decentralization for the sake of decentralization. For them decentralization is the product. Your alternate universe evaporates when you ask the question "what happens if Alice's device is offline?".

If you squint, the exact system you are describing is e-mail, and that has become effectively centralized, and it happened long before we had tech mega corps.

Decentralized cooperation and associated protocols is a lot harder than just inserting messages into a MySQL database and then displaying those messages.

If people spent half the time they do wishing for decentralized messaging working on the actual problems with it, we would have decentralized messaging.

Didn't you just describe email?

> now every chat message

"It hurts when I do that."

"Don't do that."

Have a look at Keet, it’s a p2p IM app, works on mobile and desktop, behind NAT and all. To be honest it’s not even the only app in this game.

It just seems like nobody cares about these things until the frog already boiled.

Big question is how to put sgt.cia.gov or mayor.fbi.gov in the middle between alice.home.her.isp and bob.mobile.his.isp.

That is why centralised messengers are pushed hard.

And this is not to protect society from harm, as many would assume.