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The future is not self-hosted

drewlyton.com

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Re: The future is not self-hosted

#111

Post by drew_lytle »

VikingCoder wrote: post #26

So, the thing we have right now is Tailscale - and it's freaking awesome. But I want the next thing. Which is like Tailscale2, but for people, not machines. I want to tell Tailscale2 about all of the people in my life, and which of my self-hosted apps they're allowed to talk to. And if they're also running a self-hosted app, then I want our apps to federate together. It feels like we're suuuuuper close to having this…

Sounds interesting and kind of similar to https://solidproject.org/. Thanks for reading and commenting!

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#112

Post by kreco »

esseph wrote: post #85
kreco wrote: post #30

I strongly agree with the global sentiment. If you can't actually download a copy of a digital content as a mere file, then you can't really host it and serve it. You can't host your own Spotify-clone even if you are allowed to listen to songs. However, you can still download music on Bandcamp to feed your Spotify-clone. You can't host your own your own digital Video Game Store usually because of various DRM, or beca…

Can't backup game save on switch, then what am I doing with these memory cards with switch games data on them?

Yeah.

The website [0] is pretty clear that the content of the game can go into a SD card, but the game save resides only in the internal memory.

You can find some ways to get them with some modding but nothing official.

[0] https://www.nintendo.com/ph/support/switch/data_management/i...

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#113

Post by drew_lytle »

V__ wrote: post #50

I disagree with some of the authors takes here: > Self-hosting is when you have a computer in your house do those same things Self-hosting is more about deploying self-selected software onto a server. It can be a server at home, but I for one have a lot of services running on a VPS. Self-hosting is more about control of the data and software, than the location of the hardware. > Well...since our friends can't access…

Thanks for your comment! Yes, I ignored the VPS angle simply for ease of narrative, but you're right. I also updated the shared album example to hopefully better explain why this is hard from a technical and UX perspective.

As to the "convince people to switch" angle, I think the benefits of data interoperability would be pretty significant and eventually lead people to switch to providers that have that or would likely incentivize providers like Apple to implement that into their products.

Ideally, no one would have to switch and everything would just get better.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#114

Post by palata »

bayindirh wrote: post #66
palata wrote: post #61

I sometimes wonder about "managed hosting" (or whatever it is called). For instance, some providers like Hetzner or Infomaniak offer a "Nextcloud managed instance". So you pay a subscription and they maintain your Nextcloud instance for you. Which is presumably simpler and safer than doing it yourself at home. On such an instance, one can share a folder with a friend, for instance. And I think Nextcloud is even worki…

> One disadvantage is that they have access to your data, but at least you choose the cloud provider (maybe you want one that is in your country). You can apparently encrypt your Nextcloud data at rest at Hetzner. I host my own Nextcloud, and I know it supports encryption, but apparently Hetzner also allows you to do so. On the other hand, if you want a standard cloud provider, pCloud provides good encryption support…

> You can apparently encrypt your Nextcloud data at rest at Hetzner.

Doesn't it mean that they can still access your data while the server is running? I mean, they run the server, they must have access to it, right?

> pCloud provides good encryption support

You mean e2ee? If it's about sending files to an untrusted server, I use restic. Works with pretty much everything (including pCloud) :-).

> BTW, keeping a Nextcloud instance is really easy

Sure, but what I was saying is that either you do it at home and it makes it harder (you want your home LAN to be secure :-) ) or you do it on a VPS, and someone else has access to your data.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#115

Post by drew_lytle »

enobrev wrote: post #76

This is what I imagined when reading Neuromancer and other sci-fi of that time. A public online space that we share. Sure, some corners will get gross and dangerous. But that's what humanity looks like. It's strange to me that we never included public spaces in our growth and innovation of the internet over the past 30 years. Of course I expect companies to do their thing as they've had free reign to do, but it would…

Couldn't agree more – bring back the radio – thanks for reading and commenting!

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#116

Post by drew_lytle »

will5421 wrote: post #57

Could the friends access the server through the VPN? > It's secured behind our own VPN. > So, how do I create a shared photo album with my friends where we can all upload pictures from our latest trip? Well...since our friends can't access our server

Definitely! But even if I could convince everyone I know to do that, that feels like a nightmare to manage haha. Thanks for reading and commenting!

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#118

Post by drew_lytle »

arscan wrote: post #23
rs186 wrote: post #13

> My wife and I now have a computer in our house that runs open-source equivalents to Google Drive, Google Photos, Audible, Kindle, and Netflix. It syncs to all of our devices. It's secured behind our own VPN. And it's wholly, truly owned by us. Good for you. But for most people, it is an endeavor with zero gain, meaning no positive impact to their daily life, if not full of negative impact.

A danger with the arrangement of this article is that it takes awhile to get to the point, which actually in line with your view. He hints at it in the title and the very next paragraph, but maybe you didn’t get that far? > And this week, I want to share with you how I did it, what I learned, and why I think self-hosting is NOT the future we should be fighting for.

Haha yes I have a tendency to bury the lede a little – thanks for reading!

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#119

Post by drew_lytle »

mmstgshj wrote: post #36

I don't know if this idea was inspired by the Library Socialism movement or if it is an instance of "great minds think alike", but people who like this idea, may find Library Socialism appealing as well https://librarysocialism.org/

Seems very inline! Thanks for sharing!

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#120

Post by meonkeys »

9x39 wrote: post #70

I agree with the title, but not the solution and that’s okay. Is the future endlessly tinkering with and running stuff out of your house? I think nope, that’s just your hobby. I think of the centralization of content and the licensing as something that works so long as it’s a commodity market, that is, it’s hard to 2x the price of an ebook over a dead tree which I can own. Investors may wish otherwise, but they have…

Will you clarify "centralization of content and the licensing"? Regarding DRM, specifically. If you own said content then sure, you can E2EE and store it in whatever cloud you prefer while avoiding common attention/control/data hoarding (read: enshittification) of commercial online cloud & online services. If you're saying DRM is OK then you're conflating commercial commodities with public utilities. The point of the former is to make money, the latter is to enrich our lives by taking care of basic human needs.
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