Frequently Asked Questions
As Mikoto is a rapidly evolving project, much of the information in this document may be outdated. We are working on keeping this document up-to-date, but we cannot guarantee that all of the information in this document is accurate.
Basics
What is Mikoto?
Mikoto is a channel-based messaging platform that allows you to create and join channels to chat with other users.
Why doesn't Mikoto build on top of Discord/Matrix/Slack/etc?
We have devised an unique threading system that allows users to reply to messages in a thread, and we believe that this is a feature that is not present in any of the existing messaging platforms. Retrofitting this feature into an existing platform would be difficult, and we believe that it would be easier to build a new platform from scratch.
Regardless, we will be working on integrations with other platforms in the future.
Who builds Mikoto?
The Mikoto Network Company of Earth is the company responsible for developing Mikoto. We are a small team of developers who are passionate about building a better messaging platform. We are open to countributions outside of our company, and we are open to hiring new developers to join our team.
Technicals
Is Mikoto decentralized?
Somewhat. Mikoto uses a decentralized storage system, but the server is still centralized. We are working on a decentralized server system, but it is not ready yet.
Will there be a mobile app?
Soon™. We are working on it. It's nowhere near feature-compatible with the web app yet, but we are working on it.
Should I use Mikoto right now?
For experimental purposes, yes. For production purposes, no. We are still in the early stages of development, and we are still working on the core features of Mikoto. We do not recommend using Mikoto for production purposes until we have reached a stable release.
Services
How does Mikoto make money?
While we're an open-source project, we are still operated by a for-profit company. While we have not fully decided on our business model yet, we are considering the following options:
- "Mikoto Pro" subscription, providing higher service quality and more features
- "Mikoto Enterprise" subscription, providing a self-hosted version of Mikoto
- In-app marketplace for themes, plugins, integrations, etc.
We're more focused on building a flourishing ecosystem before we can decide on a business model. From what we have observed from the trends in the industry, the majority of the profits come from the service offering, not the software itself even for closed-source projects. We do not believe that open-sourcing our software is incompatible with our business model.
Miscellaneous
Why the name "Mikoto"?
Mikoto is named after Mikoto Misaka (opens in a new tab) from the anime series A Certain Scientific Railgun (opens in a new tab). We chose this name because we wanted to name our project after a character that is both cute and powerful, and Mikoto Misaka fits the bill perfectly.