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Comment on The admin of the third largest Mastodon instance (16k monthly active users) is asking for help to pay rent

The core argument here is should there be an expectation that donations should cover admins labor costs.

Personally, if an instance is run off of donations, then it’s a nice to have. As an admin, you shouldn’t have that expectation. If you no longer want to volunteer your time, then don’t. Shut the instance down, find someone to help you maintain the instance, or pass the instance off to someone else.

I’m also okay with paid instances and admins trying to make a reasonable salary or even making additional profit as long as it’s transparent to the users. It’s their choice to charge, it’s our choice to pay.

Overall, instances should be run by a group of volunteers, not a single individual. Otherwise, the long term viability of the instance is questionable.

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DigitalDruid@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
this is how it was in the BBS days. We volunteered our time to run the boards because we enjoyed it and had the hardware. I covered the telco costs and electricity because i could, and enjoyed providing the space for my friends. When it stopped being feasible you pass the torch.

I don’t mind pitching in now and then but I don’t feel like i owe any of the admins anything beyond gratitude.

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Wiz@midwest.social ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
My local Madison insurance is forming a steering committee and has created an LLC. (I’m a member of the committee.) We will solicit donations, because mostly it has been one guy paying for a small regional instance of about 100 AU.

We think of it like public broadcasting, like PBS. I will be happy to kick in a few dollars per month to pay for it. We have contests, online meetups, and other fun. It’s not just Mastodon, it’s an active regional online community, and it’s worth it.

(I also donate to my Lemmy instance, because it’s worth it too!)

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- recall519@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  I love this.
  
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- ilovepiracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Is it an Australian instance? whats the domain?
  
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  - Wiz@midwest.social ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    100 active users, sorry
    
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rglullis@communick.news ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

expectation that donations should cover admins labor costs

Not quite that. The argument is that admins shouldn’t be treated as a disposable entity who don’t need any money just because they are not directly asking for it.

It’s a “I want you to want to do the dishes” kind of thing.

Shut the instance down, find someone to help you maintain the instance, or pass the instance off to someone else.

Easier said than done. We already have a long list of instances that disappear suddenly because the admins burned out, and I have had long discussions with admins from other instances who keep begging for more donations every month instead of just saying “you know what? You don’t want to help me, so I don’t owe your lot anything”.

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- recall519@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  Well it’s not easy. They are unsung heroes. They aren’t the only volunteers in this world. Do you think the people in our communities volunteering to pick up trash or people at homeless shelters volunteering are requesting compensation or a pat on the back? Honestly, there’s more than enough instances and volunteers to host those instances.
  
  And just to clarify, I do think our admins deserve a pat on the back and donations. I am eternally grateful, but they shouldn’t resent their community for not donating to them.
  
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- Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  
  have had long discussions with admins from other instances who keep begging for more donations every month
  
  Are those Lemmy instances, or other software like Mastodon?
  
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  - rglullis@communick.news ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    Mastodon because it is the largest number of instances and users, but the principle is the same. It hasn’t happened with Lemmy yet because this subset of the Fediverse is ridiculously small compared to Mastodon/Pixelfed
    
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    Blaze@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    I’ve also heard that Lemmy is cheaper to run than Mastodon
    
    jlai.lu/comment/13035055
    
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    ThorrJo@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    Mastodon is also an ultra-heavyweight in terms of compute resources it consumes per daily active user served. This is one reason (among multiple) that I would never run Mastodon as an ActivityPub microblogging instance.
    
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Blackmist@feddit.uk ⁨4⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
This is one of the things that make me think the current “fediverse” isn’t going to be its final form. It’s a good stepping stone, but users and communities being locked to a single instance will become a bugbear sooner rather than later.

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