centralization issues aside, why do people pay for hosting in the first place? you don't need a rack server to host something only used by yourself and some friends.
most 'cloud' services are not compute-bound. a 'server' is just an always-on computer that stores data you want to access over the network. i doubt your vps's util ever cracks 10%.
why pay for a vps each month when your core2duo desktop from 2009 can easily handle hosting 10 different services simultaneously for free, forever?
@balrogboogie @gc
This, yes. And also, static ip's are beyond some of our grasp from user isp's.
re: speeds - this hasn't happened to me, but let's assume this is true - ok, so what? how urgently does that 2mb document need to sync to nextcloud? plus my devices sync w nextcloud over the local network 90% of the time anyways
re: security - your browser is the easiest way to gain access to your lan, not your router firewall, but why open a port when you can access it via your selfhosted vpn?
re: your ip - dynamic dns is a Solved Problem
@gc I haven't had a desktop computer since the early 2000s, some of us are nomadic and only hoping from wi-fi hotspot to 4g tether on a laptop. Servers do have some advantages, in terms of always-on availability and bandwith. They also don't have to be expensive.
@gc old PCs like core2duo from 2009 are power hogs. Example Core2duo is 65W and that's just for the CPU. That's 1.56kWh/day or 46.8kWh/month. I pay $0.25/kWh for power, that's $11.70. Cheap VPS for personal use = $5/month, or replace the 2009 PC with a Raspberry Pi which uses about 5W.
@arden I mean, $10/month in extra electricity bills ain't that hard to swallow if you're saving $30+/month from all the cloud software subscriptions you're no longer paying for lol.
I totally recognize that electricity costs are ridiculously high for some people, though. thankfully, like you said, raspberry pis are a great solution if that's an issue. they can host nearly all of the projects mentioned above, and only use 0.12kWh/$0.03 of power per day, or 3.6kWh/$0.90 per month.
@arden oh, and I forgot to mention that using a solar panel to power a raspberry pi for actually free, for actually forever, is a very popular and straightforward thing to do!
@gc yep, all for the self-hosting and saving $$ with Pi's and other efficient home devices (I have about a dozen here). It's just time to scrap/recycle those old Core2Duo's. They're old, loud (usually the fan bearings have started to go, like my knees), and inefficient, like my knees.
@gc I've thought about putting some things on a RPi I have here, but I don't understand how to auto-update a DNS record after we unplug the router.
I have considered PageKite, but that costs money, and Tor onion services, but OrBot on my phone is unreliable.
@gc because I want to be able to get to my data from anywhere, not just my home network, and hosting your own server that's open to the internet is risky and requires lots of maint/security upkeep
@gc most residential isps throttle outbound traffic, right? Between that and not wanting to invite more attackers to try my home network, i'll stick with DO