Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The future is not self-hosted

drewlyton.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

411–420 of 459 posts

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#411

Post by smeej »

mindwork wrote: post #235
smeej wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want something easy to set up that lets me easily backup things like this within a user-chosen circle of family or friends. Build my own trusted "micro cloud."

have you tried CasaOs or Zima board? It's their premise your own micro cloud

They're missing the key feature I'm looking for: Decentralized backup to the same devices owned by people I choose. That's the "someone else's computer" part of what I want in a "cloud."

I can already easily run such things on my home computer. It's having remote (encrypted) backups and redundancy if my own system goes down that I'm looking for.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#412

Post by smeej »

ianopolous wrote: post #350
smeej wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The one thing I desperately wish Umbrel shipped with was an easy way to network with other Umbrel users for backup and accessibility. Let people set limits in terms of how much storage they're willing to allocate to others. REQUIRE end-to-end encryption on backed up files. But help people create their own community micro-clouds using each other's computers. To me, the risk of backing things up in one building is too…

You might be interested in Peergos which lets you easily live mirror to another instance and everything is E2EE.

I guess this is kind of like what I mean.

What I really want, though, is literally just for there to be an Umbrel "Backups" app that lets me choose as a backup location one (or more) friend's Umbrel(s).

Redundancy is the main thing all these Docker-wrapper systems are missing for general use.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#413

Post by valenterry »

MrJohz wrote: post #396
valenterry wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the other hand, it is now easier than ever to make copies of materials that we see. Is it? I feel it's the other way around. For example, just 10 years ago, there were no apps that forbid me from taking screenshots. Copying CDs and DVDs was comparably easy, even for normal folks. How do I copy a Netflix episode again?

I meant "now" in that sentence to refer to the internet era in general, in comparison with other technological leaps. But still, these protections are usually very limited, and fairly easy to circumvent. Most people I know might not be able to convince their laptop to let them screenshot Netflix, but they do normally know how to find pirated copies of the TV show they want to watch. Paying for the convenience of Netf…

I agree with that first sentence, but I think the trend matters more than the average over a few decades.

Also, you said "On the other hand, it is now easier than ever to make copies of materials that we see." - now you seem to be talking about finding a copy. But those are two very different things.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#414

Post by robmao »

I really appreciated this post. It goes much deeper than most critiques of cloud platforms, and I respect that the author didn’t just complain — he actually tried self-hosting, experienced its ups and downs, and came to an honest conclusion: self-hosting isn't the future.

I agree.

But I also believe that doesn’t mean we stop here. The real issue isn’t about where the server is — it’s about who owns the identity and the data, and whether we have a shared protocol layer to make true user agency possible.

In case it's useful to others thinking along similar lines, I wrote a response piece called “The future is not self-hosted, but self-sovereign” https://www.robertmao.com/blog/en/the-future-is-not-self-hos...

It builds on the same dilemma but goes further into decentralized identity (DID), protocol-level ownership, and why self-sovereign systems might be the real way forward — beyond both cloud and self-hosting.

Would love to hear what others here think about protocol vs platform thinking.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#415

Post by throw123xz »

_Algernon_ wrote: post #384
throw123xz wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The comment you replied to said it was a site about "self-hostable services". The site doesn't claim to be just about "self-hostable services".

How do you host Hugo? I understand that you can host a site generated by hugo, but how do you host Hugo itself?

I can tell you that technically Hugo has to be somewhere you control to generate a website, but I don't see the point in that discussion.

The list I can see on the site seems to be of tools you can self host or can help you create something that you can self host. That's it. It doesn't make sense to blame a site because a comment on HN didn't correctly describe the content of the website... like, the problem is the comment, not the site.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#416

Post by theshrike79 »

ksec wrote: post #187
lloeki wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember there was this short period of time around (lousy approximate timeframe) Snow Leopard where a confluence of features and hardware was suddenly available and which would have made this just within reach of Apple completely changing the game: - There were OOTB features on Mac OS X such as web page building and publishing - There was Mac OS X, but there was also Mac OS X Server, a full-fledged, easy(-ish) to…

Basically a Mac Server would have fixed 99% of our needs. Apple could make a Local iCloud Server / iOS Time Capsule where I still have all the content, but would require a subscription just for the backup services. And Apple could charge 3x the Amazon Cold Storage pricing just for reselling it. I do think this is within realm of possibility if Steve Jobs is still alive. Or at least could be convinced. Tim Coo only ca…

It’s coming.

They’ll release an Apple TV that also handles local AI tasks for anyone in the family.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#417

Post by requilence »

Self‑hosting swaps one risk for another. A cleaner option may be local‑first apps that speak an open sync protocol: your data lives on your phone/laptop/homeserver; an optional, end‑to‑end‑encrypted relay just moves opaque blobs for backup and multi‑device access. Why this matters: the No. 1 failure I see isn’t servers getting hacked. It’s users losing the only copy of their files. * ~70 million phones are lost annually; most are never recovered. https://snohomishcountywa.gov/Archive.asp?ADID=543 * Consumer hard‑drive AFR hovers around 1‑2 %—≈7 % fail within five years. https://blocksandfiles.com/2024/05/02/disk-failure-rates-in-... * 29 % of people have already suffered data loss from deletion, ransomware, or disk death. https://www.worldbackupday.com/en With odds like these, an off‑device, unreadable backup is basic hygiene, not a luxury. Disclaimer: I work on Anytype, which follows this model: local ownership, open‑source sync protocol, source‑available clients.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#418

Post by eulenteufel »

d4rkn0d3z wrote: post #348

Not sure if others mentioned this but one can abstract away the configuration and sys-admin type tasks using a declarative language. Then the setup can be recreated effortlessly by others, reviewed and verified on an ongoing basis. If the author found a self-hosting setup that works, it should be packaged and automatically reproduced elsewhere. It is always 10% of the work to make something work, 90% of the work is a…

NixOS does enables this to a degree, for example with nixos-mailserver[0)].

It would be nice if it could enable people with little sysadmin experience to self-host easily, but right now the bar for using NixOS and configuring these projects is still pretty high. Still, with enough work I imagine it could be possible.

[0] https://gitlab.com/simple-nixos-mailserver/nixos-mailserver

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#419

Post by _jplc »

drew_lytle wrote: post #334
_jplc wrote: post #196

- Post about self hosting and how centralization is bad - Uses a centralised service for VPN: Tailscale Name a more iconic duo

Eh, I can see your point. But Tailscale is a very different kind of centralized. It's just fancy, more convenient Wireguard at the end of the day. If I wanted to move away from it, it's pretty easy. Moving off of something like Google Photos however, was much harder in comparison. Thanks for reading and commenting!

The convenient part is having a public IP address to connect to from anywhere. You would need either exposing your home infrastructure to the internet or a cheap VPS.

Not that hard to solve, but it's an extra hurdle in the setup for something as critical as the networking to connect to your stuff from anywhere. I just think everyone is over-reliant on Tailscale when it's pretty obvious they'll rug-pull as soon as they run out of VC money to burn or get acquired.

So, it's convenient... for now. A future migration is inevitable when using Tailscale, and I prefer to solve problems once.

Re: The future is not self-hosted

#420

Post by isaacremuant »

jtrn wrote: post #368
isaacremuant wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> centralized provider for digital identity and authentication. No. Stop pushing this crap. It's what all security companies are lobbying for to get that juicy money and surveillance heavy power hungry governments want to push on next to keep on the path of no anonymity and speech control. They already do it in many ways. Don't hand them the keys for the next oppression. I don't care if your intentions are good. The…

It's really hard not to become impolite with this kind of disrespectful comment, but I try. Let me articulate my thinking... The suggestion is not based on nothing; it's based on years of banging our heads against the wall with various governmental and non-governmental systems that we need to communicate with, in the context of our firm wanting to talk to government servers to, for instance, get money for providing h…

If you think I'm impolite then you haven't realized how impolite and insulting you can be while seeming polite.

Let me say this. There may be a misunderstanding and you simply may want easy standards and auth for a specific gov service validation. Like what the UK gov does for tax and the like. Or Ireland. YouGov OpenId kind of access.

The way you were talking about centralization implies, at least to me, some sort of digital id for internet usage which is absolutely terrible and being extremely pushed by lobbyists and governments who love surveillance. If you think this is a conspiracy theory I don't care. It's all a conspiracy theory when it goes against powerful money.

As for calling me naive or libertarian or any of that crap. Ok. Then you're an authoritarian. You're a danger to me and others and you'll claim you do it for my sake or claim that I myself are dangerous for protection "my freedumbs"

> But here in Norway, we seem to have found a stable balance of powers and a stable relationship between the people and our government. So maybe your situation you live in makes the "tyranny" claim more palpable.

Hahahahahahahaha. Yeah right. I know and have lived in Norway. I know the kind of "don't rock the boat" mentality. Everything works right? Because there's money and media won't address the Barnevernet or military abuses nor anything that actually goes wrong.

People who talk in favour of authoritarian tenets and dismiss criticism as "libertarians who come from " are super funny.

"I'm angry and not offering a solution", right?. That's just bullshit. You can use that to justify any government measure. The war on drugs, terrorism, etc.

Sweden already shows how surveillance can get insanely intense and nordics communitarian pushdown to prevent criticism of power is extremely effective. Not that you still don't consider yourself superior to others like you clearly express every time you think the world isn't looking. "Er typisk norsk å være god" eh? (Or however that phrase went).

Get offended. We've been through too much shit for me to care about your Overton window.

Post reply on HN