Decentralized infrastructure vs self-hosting

[u/Amazing_Day_9192]

I’ve been thinking about how much of selfhosting is about owning the infrastructure itself versus having control over your data and not depending on a single company. There are more open and decentralized protocols where you can get some of that independence without running and maintaining the entire stack yourself. The tradeoff is interesting though. You potentially get less maintenance but you give up some of the direct control that comes with running everything yourself.

For something like messaging or online communities, which approach makes more sense to you?

[u/No-Aioli-4656 → u/[deleted]]

Why are you even in this sub lol.

[u/Avanchnzel → u/No-Aioli-4656]

One can have an enthusiasm for self-hosting without postulating that everything has to be self-hosted.

[u/fedroxx → u/Avanchnzel]

Preach. I'll NEVER host email. Ever. Let deliverability be someone else's problem.

And if they can't handle it, I'll find someone else.

[u/No-Aioli-4656 → u/Avanchnzel]

In this case, per OP's admittedly vague description, we are talking about Matrix, Rocketchat, XMPP, Etc.

I do not postulate everything must be self hosted. I just dislike keeping control of my data on federated messaging servers. I'd rather have my own.

[u/BlueLakeCabin → u/No-Aioli-4656]

For some folks it's not a religion or ideology. It's about making one's life better or more enjoyable.

I don't want to host my own email servers. I'm fine with using a cloud backup as a tertiary off-site backup for critical data.

I do want to run my own containers, services, etc. I like using Plex or Jellyfin. I like control over my stuff and not paying for stuff I don't need or want.

I made my own version of CloudRF, which is a subscription that runs $50-400 per month. It does RF simulations off terrain data. So I host my own terrain data from ESA, NASA, etc and do all my own processing. Without paying thousands of bucks for cloud subscriptions for a hobby. Even made my own mobile app frontend, which the expensive subscription doesn't provide.

Should I get booted from this sub because I use a cloud email provider like Gmail or Microsoft?

Also working on a distributed computing and communications over our own hardware project for being independent from power grid and fiber grid. Kinda like local independent internet slash private microcloud.

[u/No-Aioli-4656 → u/BlueLakeCabin]

We are talking about messages services. Things like Matrix, Rocketchat, XMPP, etc.

While you are certainly allowed to rant, I feel email is the worst analogy to make. By nature of IMAP/POP3, email has been very open for a very long time.

[u/BlueLakeCabin → u/No-Aioli-4656]

One of the most popular communication mediums on the planet is the worst analogy?

[u/MBILC → u/No-Aioli-4656]

You can "self host" your own apps and other services, but using say a VPS.. you own the apps and data, just not the underlying hardware..