Why you should stop paying Big Tech to hold your photos hostage and start self hosting instead
A deep dive into why everyone is suddenly putting old laptops in their closets to run their own private versions of Netflix and Google Photos.
- neuralshyam
- 6 min read
Let’s be real for a second: we’re all kind of tired of “The Cloud.” It started as this magical place where your photos lived forever, but now it’s just a monthly subscription bill that keeps getting higher while the features stay exactly the same (or get worse).
Every time Google tells you your storage is 99% full, or Netflix cracks down on your cousin using your password, a tiny part of your soul dies. But there’s a growing group of people who have decided to opt out of this digital rent-seeking. They aren’t all “Matrix”-level hackers, either. They’re just folks who realized that an old laptop sitting in a closet can do almost everything a billion-dollar tech company does—minus the tracking and the ads.
Welcome to the world of self-hosting. It’s a bit like gardening, but instead of tomatoes, you’re growing your own private Netflix.
It’s not a home lab, it’s a vibe
There’s this common misconception that to host your own services, you need a giant metal rack in your basement with blue blinking lights and a cooling system that sounds like a jet taking off. That’s a “home lab,” and while those guys are cool, that’s not what we’re talking about here.
Self-hosting is the more chill, practical cousin of the home lab. It’s about running the apps you actually use—like a calendar, a photo gallery, or a music player—on your own hardware. As Ethan Sholly, the guy behind the massive selfh.st community, points out, you can do this on a laptop tucked away in a corner. You don’t need a PhD in networking; you just need to be tired of Big Tech’s nonsense.
The guy who accidentally became a curator
Ethan Sholly’s story is basically the “gateway drug” for the whole movement. He doesn’t work in tech; he works in finance. He was just a guy who wanted his family to be able to watch movies without hunting through five different streaming apps.
He started with a basic Plex setup on a desktop PC. You know the drill: your friend calls you at 8:00 PM saying, “Hey, can you turn your computer on? It’s movie night.” Eventually, that gets old, so you build a dedicated server. Then you wonder, “What else can this thing do?”
Before you know it, you’re looking at GitHub repositories at 2:00 AM. Ethan realized there wasn’t a good place to find all these cool independent projects, so he built one. Now, he’s basically the town crier for the self-hosting world, tracking everything from privacy-focused photo tools to smart home hubs that don’t spy on you.
Why are we all doing this now?
If you feel like you’re hearing about self-hosting more often lately, you’re not crazy. It’s having a major moment. Why? Because the “mainstream” internet is kind of breaking.
- The Privacy Tax: People are starting to realize that “free” cloud storage usually means your data is being mined to sell you sneakers you don’t need.
- The Subscription Fatigue: Everything is a monthly fee now. Want more space? $2.99. Want no ads? $15.99. Self-hosting is a one-time hardware cost and then… silence. No bills.
- The “Magic” of Docker: This is a bit nerdy, but Docker changed everything. It basically lets you “package” an app so it runs on any computer with one click. It turned a weekend-long configuration nightmare into a five-minute task.
- Cheap Hardware: You can buy a mini-PC the size of a sandwich for $150 that is more powerful than the servers that powered the internet ten years ago.
The community is great, but we’re a little cheap
Ethan recently ran a survey of nearly 4,000 self-hosters, and the results are pretty hilarious in a “human nature” kind of way.
The top apps people love? Jellyfin (the free, open-source version of Netflix), Home Assistant (the “brain” for your smart home), and Immich (a Google Photos clone that is actually better than Google Photos).
But here’s the kicker: about 60% of people using these amazing, life-changing free tools haven’t donated a single cent to the developers in the last year. We’re all out here fighting the “greedy corporations” while being a little bit stingy ourselves. It’s a good reminder that if you find a tool that makes your life better, maybe buy the dev a coffee once in a while so the project doesn’t die.
The “Arr” Stack and the elephant in the room
We have to talk about it. A huge driver for self-hosting is “media management.” If you hang out on Reddit, you’ll see people talking about the “*arr” stack (Sonarr, Radarr, etc.). It’s a cheeky nod to the pirate life.
While streaming services continue to remove shows people love for tax write-offs, self-hosters are just downloading their own copies. When you own the file, it can’t be deleted by a corporate executive in a suit. Is it a legal gray area? Sure. But is it a reaction to a broken media landscape? Absolutely.
Is it worth the effort?
Look, self-hosting isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Sometimes a hard drive dies. Sometimes you update something and your whole dashboard breaks, and you have to spend a Tuesday night googling error codes.
But Ethan Sholly makes a great point: we shouldn’t have to do this. Privacy and control should be the default, not an “extra” you have to build yourself. But until the big companies stop treating our data like a commodity, the best way to protect yourself is to just own the machine.
You don’t have to go full “doomsday prepper” with your data. Start small. Find an old PC, install a basic OS, and try running one service. There’s a weirdly satisfying feeling when you realize you’re looking at your own photos on your own server, and no one—not Google, not Apple, not the government—is watching over your shoulder.
It’s your digital house. Why are you still paying rent?
Final thoughts from the closet server
Self-hosting is more than just a hobby for people who like computers. It’s a small, quiet rebellion against the “you will own nothing and be happy” era of the internet. Whether you’re doing it to save money, keep your family photos private, or just because you like the “arr” life, it’s one of the few ways left to actually own your digital existence.
So, next time you get that “Storage Full” notification? Don’t click “Upgrade.” Go buy a used Raspberry Pi instead. Your future self (and your wallet) will thank you.