The free self hosted version is heavily limited. I will stick with Plausible which may be simpler but also doesn’t want to push me into a subscription.
Comment on Rybbit - Open source Google Analytics replacement
osprior@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Question is the self-hosted version less featured than the paid hosted version?
This looks amazing btw.
EarMaster@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
spacelord@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Plausible is at least honest about it being an “open core” business model. They openly document what’s missing and why (funding sustainability).
The premium features are likely not in the AGPL repo at all - they’re genuinely separate proprietary code. They seem to be AGPL compliant because they’re transparent that community edition is a subset, not claiming “everything’s there, just toggled off”.
Goldflag@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Only very slightly so. One of the reasons I created Rybbit is because platforms like plausible and fathom have much inferior self-hosted versions (very limited featureset and basically never updated). We have a comparison here
spacelord@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
@Goldflag** I appreciate the intent behind Rybbit, but I have to respectfully disagree with the “only very slightly so” characterization. Looking at your official comparison table, the self-hosted version is missing:
That’s 7 significant features—which seems more than “very slightly” different.
More importantly, this raises AGPL compliance questions. Under AGPLv3 Section 13, if users interact with modified AGPL software over a network (your cloud version), you’re required to make the complete corresponding source code available to those users. If these cloud-only features are integrated into the same AGPL-licensed codebase, withholding them from the public repository while running them as a network service appears to conflict with the license terms.
There are really only two compliant scenarios here:
If it’s neither—if these are AGPL-covered features running in your cloud service but withheld from the repo—that’s exactly the “loophole” the AGPL was designed to close. The irony is that you criticized Plausible and Fathom for having “much inferior self-hosted versions,” yet this appears to be a similar approach.
Could you clarify the licensing status of these cloud-only features? Are they in the public repo but disabled by default, or are they proprietary additions that don’t derive from the AGPL codebase?
ripcord@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Thank you for your service.
ITGuyLevi@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
OAuth is one thing I hate to see locked behind a paywall; it’s one thing for the pretty, management-geared stuff (dashboards and charts) to be a paid feature, but not security.
custard_swollower@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
AGPL means they are licensing it to you, they are not bound by the license because they are the copyright owners.
spacelord@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
That’s misleading. While copyright owners aren’t bound by their own license, AGPL Section 13 requires that when they run AGPL software as a network service, they must make the complete source available to users.
The AGPL was specifically designed to close the “SaaS loophole.” Being the copyright owner doesn’t exempt you from AGPL’s network service requirements if you’re distributing under that license.
Goldflag@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Everything is in the repo and cloud features are just toggled off in the self-hosted build.
spacelord@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
@Goldflag,
Thanks for clarifying! Good to hear everything’s in the repo and that it’s truly AGPL compliant.
Since as self-hosters we already carry the burden of maintenance, updates, security, and infrastructure costs that cloud users don’t, would you consider documenting how to enable the cloud features in self-hosted setups?
I see the docs cover basic environment variables, but not for Pages View, Web Vitals, or VPN/ASN tracking. Even if some features need extra config (SMTP, OAuth creds), having that documented would help those of us willing to do the work.
That would truly differentiate Rybbit from Plausible/Fathom—not just code parity, but empowering self-hosters with full feature access.
spacelord@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
Cloud features aren’t just a toggle away for self-hosters because setting CLOUD=true enables unwanted restrictions like Stripe billing endpoints and event limits—it was intended as a binary switch for enabling the entire cloud infrastructure.
Rybbit wasn’t architected so self-hosters could modularly enable advanced features. To solve this, I’ve forked the project and made all enterprise features modular and enabled by default, so people can test them.
Of course, it would be desirable that @Goldflag implements this himself because I’m sure he could do it more elegantly and maintain it properly as part of the official project going forward.
osprior@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
That’s excellent and very clear, thank you for the explanation.