Free Your Tech! - balint

Our Service Provider Choices Explained

Unknown — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Now that we've looked at what makes good technology, let's take an honest look at our current providers. No provider is perfect, but we've chosen ones that align with our values while being practical for our needs.

Domain Registration: Namesilo

Your domain name is fundamental to digital independence - it's your persistent identity on the internet that stays with you even if you change other services. When you own freeyourtech.org, for example, you can switch hosting providers, email services, or any other infrastructure without disrupting how people find and connect with you.

Domain registration is one of those services you can't really self-host - it requires being an accredited registrar and maintaining complex infrastructure to interact with the domain name system. This is a pragmatic limitation we have to work with, so our focus shifts to finding a provider that respects our freedom while delivering reliable service.

Namesilo stands out by focusing on their core service: domain registration. While they do offer additional services like hosting or SSL certificates, these remain truly optional - they're not pushed through aggressive upselling or complicated interfaces.

What makes them a good choice:

Consistent, transparent pricing without hidden renewal increases
Free WHOIS privacy included by default to protect your personal information
Standard domain management features that work with any hosting or email provider
Straightforward transfer process that respects your freedom to switch providers

Looking at alternatives like GoDaddy, we often see practices that conflict with our values: introductory prices that jump significantly at renewal, privacy protection sold as an extra, and interfaces designed to push additional services. While these providers might offer more features, they often come at the cost of clarity and freedom of choice.

Namesilo makes their money by providing a reliable service at a fair price, not by complicating things or creating artificial dependencies. If at some point we need to switch to another registrar, we can easily transfer our domain.

Email: Purelymail

Email remains the most reliable way to maintain independent digital communications. Unlike proprietary messaging platforms, email is based on open standards that no single company controls. With your own email domain, you maintain control over your digital identity and can communicate with anyone, regardless of what email service they use.

Email is notoriously difficult to self-host well. Getting emails delivered to Gmail or Outlook requires maintaining perfect server configurations, staying off spam lists, and constantly adapting to new anti-spam requirements. It's a full-time job that even experienced sysadmins often outsource.

When choosing an email provider, we looked at several privacy-focused options:

Migadu offers similar features with excellent privacy practices, but their pricing can increase significantly with usage
Posteo provides strong privacy and fair pricing, but doesn't support custom domains - limiting your independence
ProtonMail emphasizes security but relies heavily on their own ecosystem, making it harder to switch providers

Purelymail stands out by combining the best aspects of different approaches. They use standard protocols for everything (email, calendar, contacts), support custom domains, and work great with third party open source clients like Thunderbird - so we're never locked in. Their solid privacy policy and usage-based pricing without artificial tiers or limits gives us similar benefits to self-hosting without the hassle.

Though it's a small operation, we get direct responses to our issues and see new features and bugfixes implemented timely. There's also a real community on Discord where users offer help to each other. This transparent, community-focused approach aligns perfectly with our values. If at some point we need to transfer to another host, we can easily import our mail to the new provider and keep the same email addresses, as we can just point the domain to the new servers.

Financial Services

Banking: Wise

International banking shouldn't be complicated or expensive, yet traditional banks often make it both. They hide fees in their exchange rates and treat basic international services as premium features.

Wise takes a simpler approach. They use real market exchange rates, show their fees clearly, and provide proper multi-currency accounts. You get local bank details in different countries and can automate everything through their API.

We considered traditional banks and services like PayPal, but they all rely on hidden fees and poor exchange rates. Wise isn't perfect, but they're honest about their service and costs - which matches how we think about technology. If we ever need to transfer to a new bank, we just need to send the funds to the new accounts and make sure to update our bank account addresses in Open Collective and NemKonto.

Financial Management: Open Collective

Open Collective is built specifically for organizations like ours. It handles memberships, donations, expense tracking, and basic accounting. Members can easily submit expenses that get paid out automatically through Wise, and supporters can contribute through both card payments and bank transfers. Beyond the financial tools, it gives us a space to engage with our community. Members can discuss ideas in the forum-like conversations, and we can keep everyone updated through announcements.

It's a free and open-source tool developed by people who care about social economy and it is offered as a hosted service for free. On top of all that they are moving towards community ownership through exit to community. We could have used any combination of membership and accounting software, but Open Collective gives us a comprehensive toolset made by people who share our values.

If we need to switch to a new membership software at some point, we can at least easily export all the membership and payment data from Open Collective in a simple format.

Payments: Stripe

Card payments are essential for making membership accessible to everyone and lowering the administrative burdern. While bank transfers and automatic bill payments can work well locally, they are much harder to do internationally. Through Open Collective's integration with Stripe, we can accept both without maintaining complex payment infrastructure ourselves.

Stripe is the most "big tech" of our providers, but they've earned their position through offering a solid product and service. There are no solid FOSS alternatives to card payment processing and as the only integrated tool in Open Collective, we decided to use it. If Open Collective ever replaces Stripe with something different or adds a better option we will also make the switch.

Code Hosting: Codeberg

Our code needs to be hosted somewhere accessible, but we want to avoid the centralization of platforms like GitHub. Codeberg is a non-profit alternative that keeps our code accessible while supporting a more independent internet.

What works for us:

Run by a non-profit focused on public good
Uses standard Git protocols so we're not locked in
Fully open source, including the infrastructure
Clear about their funding and operations
Integrates with common development tools

We could have used GitHub or GitLab, but they represent the kind of centralized control we're trying to move away from. Codeberg might be smaller and sometimes slower to add features, but they're building infrastructure that matches our vision of the internet. If one day Codeberg goes down, we can self-host the same solution ourselves and move the data, as it's just standard Git repositories.

Hosting: Hetzner

For hosting our infrastructure, we chose Hetzner. They provide reliable servers with full control at fair prices, without the complexity of cloud giants like AWS or Google Cloud.

Their approach is straightforward: good hardware, solid network connectivity, and no unnecessary frills. We get dedicated servers in data centers running on renewable energy, with the freedom to run our systems exactly how we want them.

The pricing is transparent and the support is professional. Being a European company, they operate under strong data protection regulations. Since we maintain full control over our server configurations, we can easily migrate to another provider if needed.

Why These Choices Matter

Our choices reflect both our vision and pragmatism. Each service solves a specific need:

Namesilo gives us our internet domain name
Purelymail provides email
Wise takes care of international banking
Open Collective handles memberships
Stripe processes payments
Codeberg hosts our code and enables collaboration
Hetzner provides our server infrastructure

But more importantly, these providers show what we value in technology providers: open standards and protocols, transparent business models, respect of our freedom to leave, and focus on offering a solid service. We can't avoid all commercial services, but we can choose ones that respect our freedom and align with our values. When better alternatives emerge, we can switch easily because we've avoided lock-in. That's the importance of making conscious technology choices.

What Makes Good Tech?

Unknown — Sun, 09 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

When we evaluate technology providers, we're not just looking at features or pricing - we're examining the fundamental relationship between a provider and their users. Think of it like any other relationship: it should be built on respect, honesty, and the freedom to leave if things aren't working out. Here are our key criteria to tell good and bad services apart.

1. Freedom

Remember trying to leave Facebook but feeling stuck because "everyone's on it"? Or wanting to switch away from iMessage but dreading the green bubble shame? That's exactly what we want to avoid. Good technology gives you the freedom to leave.

What this means in practice:

Follows open standards that other services can implement
Connects with other providers to avoid centralisation
Makes it easy to take your data to a new provider

E-mail is a great example for an open protocol where all the different implementations and providers can play nicely with each other. It's also decentralised, because there's no central authority controlling it, and it's federated - meaning all the servers can talk to each other to deliver mail between users. And when you switch to a new provider, you can often migrate your data with just a few clicks, giving you the freedom to switch.

2. Privacy & Security

We've all had that moment - you talk about something, and suddenly ads for it appear everywhere. That's what happens when tech companies disrespect your privacy. They can learn who you are by reading your emails, messages, search and browser history and even your journal. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Real privacy means:

No selling of any data
No tracking or profiling
Not using private data for anything

This is one of the reasons that makes open-source software so important and such a focus for us. With open-source you can always know what an app does and when, and if it starts doing shady things the community always makes a copy and removes the shady behaviour.

But privacy isn't just about not collecting data - it's also about protecting the data that is necessary for the service. Think about your bank - they need to store your balance and transactions, but they better make sure nobody else can access it. Good providers:

Only store what's absolutely necessary
Use strong encryption to protect your data
Keep their systems up-to-date and secure
Are open about their security measures

3. Transparency & Fair Value

A good provider is like an open book - you should be able to understand exactly who they are, how they operate, and what you're getting for your money. This transparency builds trust and helps you make informed decisions.

Real transparency means being open about everything:

Where they're located and how they're funded
Their technical infrastructure and its limitations
Their business model and financial stability
Their strengths and yes, even their weaknesses
How they handle problems when they occur

You shouldn't have to dig through fine print or guess what's going on behind the scenes. When a provider is truly transparent, you can evaluate whether they're a good fit for your needs and trust they'll be around for the long haul.

And when it comes to value, it's about building a relationship that works for everyone. Good providers:

Don't trap you in expensive subscriptions you don't need
Scale pricing fairly as you grow
Price their service to be sustainable while staying competitive

Think about it - a provider needs to make enough money to maintain their service and keep improving it, but they shouldn't be gouging users just because they can. When the pricing is fair, everyone wins - the provider can thrive, and users get good value for their money.

Making the Choice

When we look at a service, we ask:

Can we leave if we need to?
Is our data protected and private?
Do we understand who they are and how they operate?
Are we getting fair value for our money?

The answers tell us whether a provider truly serves its users or is just another tech company building an empire at users' expense.

Good technology empowers you rather than trying to control you. It's that simple.

We are live!

Unknown — Sun, 02 Feb 2025 00:00:00 +0000

We found our domain name on Thursday - freeyourtech.org was available! An instant purchase through Namesilo, followed by setting up our email with Purelymail. With these basics in place, we're ready to start.

Friday was all about making it official: registering with Virk as a frivillig forening (voluntary association), writing our statutes, and getting all the paperwork done. Digital Post signup - check!

Online Presence

Saturday brought us to Codeberg, where we set up our website using Zola, a static site generator written in Rust. Static sites are perfect for Codeberg hosting - no server needed.

Markdown makes writing content easy, and Zola's themes help keep things simple. Woodpecker CI on Codeberg's infrastructure handles automatic deployments when we merge to main.

Our tech stack - Zola, Forgejo, Git, and Woodpecker CI - is all free and open source. Codeberg is a non-profit focused on supporting projects like ours. We're in good hands.

With everything configured - Codeberg pages, CI, DNS - Freeyourtech.org is now live. And yes, we made a LinkedIn page too (oh, the irony).

Finances

Next up: finances. We're setting up with Wise for an international bank account and Open Collective to handle membership payments, donations and expenses transparently. To make recurring membership payments managable we need to process card payments, so we also signed up for a Stripe account.

I explored several FOSS accounting solutions, including Frappe Books, but Open Collective's built-in financial tools might be all we need for now.

Work Ahead

With the basics in place, we can focus on what matters: sharing knowledge and building infrastructure. I'm excited to share what I've learned about Linux, GrapheneOS, FOSS apps, and federated social networks. For infrastructure, we'll start with Authelia for SSO, followed by Nextcloud and Collabora to provide community cloud storage and office tools.

Remarks

We are not the first ones down this path and we're glad to follow in the footsteps of many other great projects. We also deeply appreciate everyone who contributed to the free software and infrastructure we use. Today we're joining the good work. Here's a short list of websites with useful info on this topic:

The Opt Out Project for a blog
DigDeeper for comparisons
European Alternatives for alternatives
EU Cloud for EU values and EU based cloud providers
Global Ecovillage Network for a freedom-compatible toolbox for ecovillages

And here's a short list of service providers who are doing something similar to us:

data.coop is a Copenhagen based local coop offering services for members, chargin a membership fee. They run everything on their own hardware, which is quite impressive.
AdminForge is a German IT provider hosting a LOT of open-source services for free.
Commons Cloud is a spanish cooperative hosting a few services for a fee.

While these websites and organisations are helpful and instpirational, we don't necessarily agree with everything they do or trust them fully, so use your own judgement if you consider using them.

A note on our startup process: yes, we're using some proprietary services from businesses and governments. We use ethical, accessible services where they make sense or where we must, while working to provide alternatives where needed. These providers have proven themselves over years. For everything else, we'll build better solutions together. You can sign up to be a member here →.