Hi all, I’ve been noticing a pattern in self-hosting communities, and I’m curious if others see it too.
Whenever someone asks for a more beginner-friendly solution, something with a UI, automated setup, or fewer manual configs, there’s often a response like:
“If you can’t configure Docker, reverse proxies, and Yaml files, you shouldn’t be self-hosting.”
Sometimes it feels like a portion of the community views complexity as a badge of honour. Don’t get me wrong, I love the technical side of self-hosting. I enjoy tinkering, breaking things, fixing them, learning along the way. That’s how most of us got into it.
But here’s the question: Is gatekeeping slowing down the adoption of self-hosting?
If we want more people to own their data, escape Big Tech, and embrace open-source alternatives, shouldn’t we welcome solutions that lower the entry barrier?
There’s room for everyone:
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people who want full control and custom setups,
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people who want semi-manual but guided,
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and people who want it to work with minimal friction.
Just like not every Linux user compiles from source, but they’re still Linux users.
Where do you stand? Should self-hosting stay DIY-only or is there value in easier, more accessible ways to self-host?
My project focuses on building a tool that makes self-hosting more accessible without sacrificing data ownership, so I genuinely want your honest take before releasing it more widely.
I don’t mind power users in general … but holy molly the militant foss and privacy advocates can be really annoying. Better not mention any proprietary software or you’ll get a dozens answers to a question no one asked.
People who don’t pay for the software they use are some of the worst, most demanding, most opinionated and most ignorant users. Source: I use free software and avoid people who “hate systemd”.
I suspect there are a number of people who self host at least in part because they’ve been burned by proprietary software and enshittification, so it’s not a surprise that there’s strong opposition to those solutions.
“Militant foss” reads like the old saying “militant atheist”…
Maybe you aught to take your own advice and not mention this again, otherwise you’ll hear opinions that conflict with your own.
Yes, that was very much the comparison I was going for.
Also I’m already taking my own advice here and generally don’t go around lecturing people on things they didn’t asked for.