That's why we need open-source software like GitLab that you can self-host.
For blogs there's Wordpress. For stores there's Magento. For files there's OwnCloud. Sadly, for communities and collaboration (Web 2.0) there isn't that much. Matrix, Mastodon? They are nowhere near the functionality of Facebook, Telegram, LinkedIn et al.
I spent 10 years reinvesting all our profits into building an open-source competitor to those centralized services, and it still needs some work to rival them:
https://qbix.com/blog/2021/01/15/open-source-communities/
But I'll tell you something. Having your OWN servers and data is very attractive. That's why everyone moved away from America Online "keyword NYTimes" and towards hosting a web site on nytimes.com using the open HTTP protocol. Today, Facebook's "NYTimes" page is analogous to AOL Keyword NYTimes, Mark Z is analogous to Steve Case, and notifications are analogous to "You've Got Mail!" Nothing new under the sun... now we just need something like the Web to come along and disrupt them by letting everyone self-host their own stuff on a service that's almost as good. The Web Browser in the beginning only had Bold, Italic, etc. but publishers switched in droves, and users followed.
For blogs there's Wordpress. For stores there's Magento. For files there's OwnCloud. Sadly, for communities and collaboration (Web 2.0) there isn't that much. Matrix, Mastodon? They are nowhere near the functionality of Facebook, Telegram, LinkedIn et al.
I spent 10 years reinvesting all our profits into building an open-source competitor to those centralized services, and it still needs some work to rival them: https://qbix.com/blog/2021/01/15/open-source-communities/
But I'll tell you something. Having your OWN servers and data is very attractive. That's why everyone moved away from America Online "keyword NYTimes" and towards hosting a web site on nytimes.com using the open HTTP protocol. Today, Facebook's "NYTimes" page is analogous to AOL Keyword NYTimes, Mark Z is analogous to Steve Case, and notifications are analogous to "You've Got Mail!" Nothing new under the sun... now we just need something like the Web to come along and disrupt them by letting everyone self-host their own stuff on a service that's almost as good. The Web Browser in the beginning only had Bold, Italic, etc. but publishers switched in droves, and users followed.