I prefer good faith discussions please. I love the Fediverse and love what it can be long term. The problem is that parts of the culture want nothing to do with financial aspect. Many are opposed to ads, memberships, sponsorships etc The “small instances” response does nothing to positively contribute to the conversation. There are already massive instances and not everyone wants to self host. People are concerned with larger companies coming to the Fedi but these beliefs will drive everyday users to those instances. People don’t like feeling disposable and when you hamstring admins who then ultimately shut down their instances that’s exactly how people end up feeling. There has to be an ethical way of going about this. So many people were too hard just to be told “too bad” “small instances” I don’t want to end up with a Fediverse ran by corporations because they can provide stability.
Hmm. Does this mean that it’s expensive to run this whole Fediverse thing and that the money is running out?
The Fediverse can not run out of money.
In theory, every user could host their own Fedi Instance and it would still be the Fediverse. As a community we should work towards enabling people to do just that by providing comprehensive and multilingual tutorials and support. If the big instances really do crash, for whatever reason, people would be prepared.
Also, smaller instances don’t cost much money. A simple Minecraft server is more expensive to host. At least when it comes to Lemmy. Obviously something like a Peertube instance can become expensive when you want other users to make their accounts on it.
What about moderation? That makes it way more work than a Minecraft server right?
I can only say that when the provider of my instance ask for donations, I will donate. Because they do a bloody good service on all sides and that should be honoured. I guess that this is applicable to all instances?
Donations isn’t the way to go because most people don’t. I’ve seen about three polls that have had thousands of responses and the majority of people fell in the never donated category and many fell in the never donated and will not donate category. Something feels wrong about leaving people’s hard work to donations, obviously it should be a part of the equation.
I donate, and I’ll donate again, and as far as I know it is covering costs. I believe the person who runs this instance (Jonah) does so because he wants to, and if he should ever decide to close it, then I think he should, if it stops bringing him joy and fulfillment.
I feel like you are devaluing the fediverse by reducing it to monetary value. Simply put: If we are talking about bringing in corporate sponsors and ads, then speaking for myself, not only would I no longer donate, but I would no longer feel connected in any way to this platform.
There are plenty of other forums that aren’t federated but are sustained by people because they want to, not because of monetary gain.
Just look how monetization has leeched the soul out of things like podcasts and YouTube (I’d say reddit, but reddit was never good to begin with). Do you really want that here? I know I don’t. I’d rather see it end than become another site like that.
Where did I say corporate sponsors and ads? Please state where I said that. It’s obnoxious how often people state something incorrectly particularly when the original post wasn’t ambiguous. I feel that YOU and others are devaluing the Fediverse by poo pooing over people’s hard work and time. A thank you simply isn’t enough. If im wrong for valuing people that’s a hill I’m willing to die on.
