[nightpool]

Updating the source code of your software goes agains the spirit of a decentralized network? How? The whole point of decentralized networks is that people with different source code/implementations can communicate with each other.

[andrewzah]

Because it reduces the operators of said networks to people who know how to build rust/etc projects from source. That is limiting and off putting.

[rndmind]

That's true, compiling rust is harsh, but we're are talking about server admins and sysadmins here, I have faith that sysadmins will know how to compile and deploy rust.

TIL the Lemmy Server code is written in rust, hell yeah

[nightpool]

Yes. That's what the word "operator" means. You need to operate the software that the network depends on, or trust someone who does. You see this a lot of time in the Bitcoin/cryptocurrency community as well, where node operators complain about the changes "forced onto them" by developers. Ultimately, it's a labor problem—if someone else is writing your code for you, and you don't know how to modify it, you're at the mercy of their decisions.

[all2]

Sounds like a business opportunity.

Federated software vendor: we do the dirty work so you can start a new instance with one click.

[andrewzah]

There are services like that for Mastodon [0]. But a provider that lets you host from a choice of e.g. mastodon, pleroma, lemmy etc would be interesting.

[0]: https://masto.host/

[harpersealtako]

masto.host has a great deal of restrictive, somewhat arbitrary content moderation policies for what is basically just a server host[0].

Since that the original problem is that admins may want to override built-in censorship policies to suit their instance's needs and values, I don't think an even more censorious centralized authority is a great example of a solution.

[0]: https://masto.host/tos/

[andrewzah]

I have no affiliation, nor a recommendation. Just noticed that they do provide that service.

Using any hosting provider is ultimately a risk compared to hosting yourself, that's the price you pay for not having the know-how to host it yourself.

And even if you do selfhost, cloudflare may wake up one day and say "nah".

[coldacid]

Masto.host is run by one of those people who put inflexible ideology ahead of the wants and needs of their users. That is ever a concern when having a third party set up and manage everything for you.

[tedunangst]

Does that one click also edit the source code?

[all2]

I suppose users could apply patches and alter configurations? Caveat Emptor: we do not offer customer support for altered source/configs.

[BeFlatXIII]

Do you want your sysadmin to be someone who provably can't build from source?