It was an idea that never went away. Many people have wanted to self host everything. Sadly companies have found it easier to centralise, and then as a bonus can monetise that data.
It wasn’t the companies but the users that found it easier. There’s a reason why everyone’s on Facebook, instagram, and gmail instead of running their own hosts—because it’s vastly easier for the majority of people to do so, and because everyone else is there. We have not solved decentralisation in an accessible and useful way yet, and the incentives won’t change until we do. If ever.
I, and many like me, would pay for centralised service or any other service if it meant that we own our data and can tune the algorithms to our own preferences. I wont pay for doom scrolling, but would gladly pay for algorithm to serve me content that would better my human experience.
Governments have given corporation to much power, people need to rise up agains that, if it remains the same in AI age, we humans, and our collective mind would erode to the point of no return.