Gregory's Server@jwildeboer do you think undernet and other IRC servers didn’t (don’t?) have a running cost? Or that the owners of those servers weren’t or had some special power to not monitor and collect all the data? You still needed an IRC client, half of which were shareware/nonfree. All the communication was unencrypted so any entity between you and the server could monitor and read all comms. Even trivially insert or delete messages if they wanted.
I don’t really see the distinction between entity 1 providing a free chat service and entity 2 doing it.
If your beef is more that people have gotten lazy about their decision making process, then I’m all for a mindset change. It sucks having decisions made and then no reference to them.
@nobletrout @jwildeboer Hard agree. For me this is about project governance, and infrastructure governance along with sustainable fund raising models (includes corporate sponsors). We must raise funding to support FOSS solution providers that respect privacy and user freedoms. Unpopular opinion: It does a disservice to our communities if we all stand up forgejo instances without considering that if we all put that money towards something like CodeBerg, that we might get a solution we all need.