What if you could buy off the shelf a box based on #opensource software and hardware that you could plug into your internet connection. You could connect to via Wifi and it would allow an average person to fairly easily configure, via a guided setup, a self hosted Cloud Drive, Social Media server, home automation service, VPN end point, email server and other commonly useful software?
What if that box allowed that person’s friends to authenticate and to that box and link a box they own, either close by or remotely. It could extend connectivity and estabilish a chain of trus, provide a level of encrypted backup of content from that box and make assertions about the users on that box such as - This user account is owned by this person, this user account is over 18?
This is a dream. I know I’m rambling. #openwrt, #yunohost, #seflhost, #chainoftrust, #fediverse
I share this pipe dream. Increased awareness of and access to self-hosted services encourages decentralization, reduces our reliance on massive data centers, and empowers the public to own their data. For the hobbyist, I think this is already in reach.
However, in order for such a system to succeed in the wider market, it needs to also be cheap and convenient. Even a Raspberry Pi goes for around $80 these days, and storage is becoming more expensive by the day thanks to AI companies. iCloud storage is only 99 cents a month. If, for example, ISPs were to bundle this software and storage with their modem hardware, it could happen. Hell, they could even charge a small fee to provide you with a publicly accesible domain.
I suspect you could get the price on something like this down to maybe $100-$150. Basically a small low-power Intel box with an SSD and at least 8G of RAM could handle all of these services.
The hard part would be pre-configuring each of them and building/adapting software to make this kind of stuff easy for end users.
Cosmos, Yunohost, CasaOS etc are pretty straight forward packages.
@vhstape I’m expecting cloud hosting services to slowly creep up as people get hooked on them - I spent about $150 on a #BananaPiR3 and I think about £80 on a #DellMicro to run Proxmox on (Which I am failing at spectacularly) - There are several reasons why I think its useful - I think we are starting to see the fragility and lack of control that we have with some of these services but also Opensource is slowly pushing back the smoke and mirrors - There is a part of me that wonders whether if something such as this developed ISPs might provide basic versions of then as edge devices - or people might accept that they buy them as the accept a couple hundred quid on an an Alexa or GoogleHome.