@fionafokus The involvement of VC was always one of the (many) reasons the #XMPP user community has been wary of #Matrix.
XMPP is still around, improving all the time, and backed by communities and non-VC-funded companies.
#ejabberd is freedom-respecting software, and scalable enough for WhatsApp, League of Legends, and Nintendo Switch Push Notifications - dare I say even "nation-scale".