I self host because it replaces services I’d have to pay for and because it’s a cool hobby. You also have the other advantages of the cloud: easy access from anywhere on all your devices, you can easily share stuff with less computer literate friends and family.

Self-hoster here. I don’t need it either. For me, it’s mostly a hobby. I enjoy setting up and maintaining my own server. There's also the fact that I don't have to subscribe to and browse through one hundred different streaming services to watch everything I want. As for my music library, I returned to self-hosting after streaming services repeatedly removed tracks from my playlists or replaced them with different versions, it annoyed the hell out of me.

Well, its hard to vlc your myvideo.mp4 to your mom, brothers, and friends. Selfhosting let's you de-corp a larger group of people easier that might be less tech savvy

i genuinely don’t understand why people ‘self-host.’

I self host an XMPP server for family and friends. No electron anywhere near it. It's tiny, will run on a potato. But it's ample for the 16-ish of us on the thing.

I do it because it let us avoid big tech surveilence IM services.

I also self host web pages. I am 100% sure they have no tracking pixels, no analytics scripts, no enshittification of any kind. The moment I use a commercial "build your web site with our super easy app!" thing, enshittification gets bundled right in behind the scenes.

I agree. It's a weird phenomenon where people mimic an industry.