diff --git a/package.json b/package.json
index 0e64c02..6d56055 100644
--- a/package.json
+++ b/package.json
@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@
     "ws": "^7.3.0"
   },
   "peerDependencies": {
-    "@replit/protocol": "0.x.x"
+    "@replit/protocol": ">=0.2.15"
   }
 }
diff --git a/src/index.ts b/src/index.ts
index 552f7a1..6ad6739 100644
--- a/src/index.ts
+++ b/src/index.ts
@@ -1,5 +1,4 @@
 import 'abortcontroller-polyfill/dist/abortcontroller-polyfill-only';
-import './util/utf8ReadMonkeypatch'; // pbjs's utf8 decoder is borked
 
 export { Client } from './client';
 export { Channel } from './channel';
diff --git a/src/util/utf8ReadMonkeypatch.ts b/src/util/utf8ReadMonkeypatch.ts
deleted file mode 100644
index 2454f8c..0000000
--- a/src/util/utf8ReadMonkeypatch.ts
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,67 +0,0 @@
-/**
-Looks like the homebrewed utf8 decoder of protobufjs can be a little broke
-sometimes in heavy unicode land. In here, we monkey patch protobufjs's standard
-utf8.read function to our own fixed version.
-*/
-
-// eslint-disable-next-line max-len
-/* eslint-disable no-bitwise, no-plusplus, import/no-extraneous-dependencies, no-eval, @typescript-eslint/ban-ts-comment  */
-import * as utf8 from '@protobufjs/utf8';
-
-function utf8ReadFixed(buffer: Uint8Array, start: number, end: number) {
-  // this function is really a utf8 -> utf16 encoder (decoder???). Ideally we'd
-  // be using the environment's built in TextDecoder but this has unreliable
-  // behavior around BOM chars in some environments.
-  if (end - start < 1) {
-    return '';
-  }
-
-  let str = '';
-  for (let i = start; i < end;) {
-    const t = buffer[i++];
-    if (t <= 0x7F) {
-      // regular ol ascii, easy peasy
-      // 0aaaaaaa
-      str += String.fromCharCode(t);
-    } else if (t >= 0xC0 && t < 0xE0) {
-      // the only time utf16 is actually a  bro. A two byte utf8 code point can
-      // be concated right into a utf16 code point.
-      //
-      // 110aaaaa 10bbbbbb
-      // -> 00000aaaaabbbbbb
-      str += String.fromCharCode(((t & 0x1F) << 6) | (buffer[i++] & 0x3F));
-    } else if (t >= 0xE0 && t < 0xF0) {
-      // also pretty straight forward. Worth noting this won't collide with
-      // surrogate pairs as that section has been reserved.
-      //
-      // 1110aaaa 10bbbbbb 10cccccc
-      // -> aaaabbbbbbcccccc
-      str += String.fromCharCode(
-        ((t & 0xF) << 12) |
-        ((buffer[i++] & 0x3F) << 6) |
-        (buffer[i++] & 0x3F),
-      );
-    } else if (t >= 0xF0) {
-      // here's where things really get nasty. These code points end up as
-      // utf16 surrogate pairs. It looks something like:
-      //
-      // 11110aaa 10bbbbbb 10cccccc 10dddddd
-      // concat the code units aaabbbbbbccccccdddddd
-      // subtract 0x10000
-      // -> 110110aabbbbbbcc 110111ccccdddddd
-      const t2 =
-        (((t & 7) << 18) |
-          ((buffer[i++] & 0x3F) << 12) |
-          ((buffer[i++] & 0x3F) << 6) |
-          (buffer[i++] & 0x3F)) -
-        0x10000;
-      str += String.fromCharCode(0xD800 + (t2 >> 10));
-      str += String.fromCharCode(0xDC00 + (t2 & 0x3FF));
-    }
-  }
-
-  return str;
-}
-
-// @ts-ignore we're monkey patching!
-utf8.read = utf8ReadFixed;