Joining the POSSE

So... the last few months (longer really - since the Twitter acquisition) have demonstrated that something has shifted in society. Dependency on services being operated by massive companies is less desirable for many people, myself included. The time has come for POSSE - Publish on your Own Site, then Syndicate.

I'm hardly a big user of social media - I have accounts on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and X, though I rarely use them in the way they're intended. My one daily driver is Messenger, and that's only because my wife and I use it to chat. Then there's all the other websites that I've registered with and use from time to time.

But what about those of us who want to divest ourselves of these ecosystems - what replacements are out there, and what challenges to we face in adopting them? That's something I'll be writing about here. I'm in the midst of setting up a wide variety of self-hosted services and will detail my experiences of installing and configuring them.

I also recognize that I'm writing all this from a place of privilege; I'm a middle-aged white cis dude, so I'm playing life on the lowest challenge setting available. I have the means to buy computer hardware, a high-speed internet connection, and a home for those things to go. I also have an IT background, so I'm predisposed to messing around with "nerdery" and working through its challenges. While I could have gone the yunohost route, I've chosen to be a little more hands-on as I like having slightly more understanding and control over the tools I'm using.

Hopefully these posts will be helpful to others.