tl;dr :
- Hexchat IRC client app development stopped
- Linux Mint team was building IRC client to replace Hexchat
- The team tried Matrix and liked it
- Linux Mint’s communication channels are moving from IRC to Matrix
- The desktop app will be named Matrix to avoid confusion
“some aspects of End-to-End Encryption are supported”
https://apps.kde.org/en-gb/neochat/
Whatever that means 😂