Mattermost has replaced BCPGP’s Slack workspace – with the full archive of Slack channel posts since Autumn 2019 (and user accounts) transferred across from Slack.

Mattermost is an open-source app (self-hosted by BCPGP on a Virtual Private Server, with its database backed up on BCPGP’s shared drive). Other organisations using it for grassroots activist collaboration include Extinction Rebellion UK and Extinction Rebellion Global. Mattermost is designed as a complete replacement for internal email within a group. It also offers voice chat, screen sharing, and other collaboration functions.

Fundamentally, WhatsApp is an app optimised for casual chat/banter and day-to-day announcements, while Mattermost is an app optimised for collaborating on work within an organisation over time. This difference is important. Specifically…

• When someone new is added to any Mattermost channel, they can automatically see the entire discussion history in that channel. When someone new is added to a WhatsApp group, they can only see messages from after they are added. This is a big deal in our unstaffed local Green Party, as we are dependent on members being able to ‘self-start’, and we generally do NOT have the resources to manually dig out and recirculate to newcomers the information they need to see what’s been going on.
• Replies to any Mattermost post can be split off in a thread, without those replies risking ‘cluttering up’ the main channel view. Notifications about replies in a thread are only received by those who’ve contributed to the thread (or otherwise chosen to ‘follow’ it). This allows two people, or a small handful of people, to discuss any point freely without any need to move to a different space.
• All BCPGP channels – and only BCPGP channels – appear in one Mattermost window. No jumbling-up of local Green Party activist discussions next to discussions from totally different realms of your life here! The Mattermost channel view helps you see and understand at a glance all the strands of activity within your local Green Party.
• Mattermost is our most transparent and democratic platform. Unlike WhatsApp you do not have to reveal your mobile phone number to others, so as a collective we automatically make Mattermost access available to all members when they join.
• Mattermost has extra work tracking tools built in, available channel-by-channel, including ‘Boards’. [These are not included in these BCPGP training materials at this time; BCPGP’s use of this functionality will be developed at a later date.]