@leo As a server admin, I feel that supporting the development effort does support my own server. Just because the dollars don’t trickle down, doesn’t mean that we don’t benefit in other ways, through well-maintained code, not to mention access to the developers through Discord (not to mention supporting two of the largest instances, which are bound to uncover bugs and security gaps before my instance does).

I get what you’re saying, but some may interpret your message as discouraging people from participating in the “official” Patreon.

@frumble Perhaps @atomicpoet was being a little hyperbolic when he said that Mastodon’s “very survival” is at stake, but I don’t think it rises to the level of “misinformation.” He was just pointing out that it costs real money to maintain code and servers, and it’s incumbent upon those who can, to at least consider putting a few bucks toward that effort. If nothing else, it honors those who’ve put a lot more hours into building this community as well as its infrastructure, than any of us ever will.

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One last point: I’m not saying that people shouldn’t support their local server; quite the contrary, but for those of use who are running servers (even if we’re doing it out of our own pockets), you might consider sending a few bucks their way, in the same way that you might pay a monthly subscription fee for other pieces of software.

It’s just important to recognize that free software and services aren’t free; somebody’s paying real dollars and/or real hours of their time. And, as Mastodon (and the Fediverse) grows, the more that we can support the developers and server admins, the better off we’ll be in the long run.