Why not self-host?

For the past couple of years I have been moving away from subscription based services such as iCloud, Google Photos/Drive, Netflix and so on, and my getaway route has been self hosting software and my data.

I have built a computer just for the sake of storing my files and photos, which we could call a NAS ( Network Attached Storage ). But it even runs software that does pretty much the same thing as subscription based services like Google Photos.

I am running Immich to host my own version of Google Photos, and all pictures I take on my phone are being synced to my own computer.

It is important to remember that Google Photos is nothing more than a computer you don’t own, somewhere in the world, connected to the internet.

For the cost of a 2TB Google One yearly subscription, one could get a 4TB Hard Drive every year.

There’s much more that I can do beyond syncing photos from my phone, I can run my own files backups, automate my documents processing with Paperless-NGX , edit PDF files privately with StirlingPDF , and so much more.

I am excited to use the generative AI tools we have available today to build my own tools and be free from the constraints of third-party services.