The talk is about the history and current state of Matrix, an open network for secure and decentralized real-time communications used for chat, voiceover IP, IoT, VR, and other functions. Matrix was created to connect all existing networks, including bridged users and guests. There have been 87 million registered users and at least 100,000 known deployments, including governments, open source projects, and companies. The talk introduces the speakers and their mission, to be the real-time communication layer of the open web, and includes statistics and information about today's conference schedule.