Your help needed: PhD research on why people choose to self-host

I submitted a response but if i may give some feedback, the second portion brings up:
I am willing to pay a substantial amount for hardware required for self-hosting.
This seemed out of place because there were no other value related questions (iirc). Such as:
I believe self hosting saves me money in the short term
i believe self hosting saves me money in the long run
I'm sure you could also think of more. But i think it's pretty important because between cloud service providers and any non-free apps you want to use, it can be quite costly compared to the cost of some hardware and time it takes to set things up.
The rest of my responses don't change but if you're wanting to understand the impact of money in all of this, i think some more questions are needed
Best of luck!
- I believe self hosting saves me money in the short term
  i believe self hosting saves me money in the long run
  I can add to the voices here that have this as one big consideration. With some second-hand hardware, it's very cheap to set up almost unlimited cloud space for personal use.
  
  That, and a lot of questions about ease of use too, but I answered them neutral because some are bears to set up, others are one click. Idk it depends.
  
  And unless you are expecting significant traffic, you can use an old Core2Quad with 2GB RAM and it will work just fine.
- Not to mention that a lot of self-hosting can be done on hardware you already had laying around.
- And I self-host precisely because of the money I save using surplussed hardware. I have a symmetrical 1Gb SOHO fibre connection from my ISP, so I can host whatever the hell I want, I just need to stand it up. And a beefy older system with oodles of RAM is perfect for spinning up VMs of various platforms for various tasks. This saves me craploads of money over even a single VM on cloud platforms like Vultr. Plus, even if I were to support a “heavy” service sufficiently in demand to warrant its own iron, it still costs me less than a year’s worth of hosting to obtain a decent platform for that service to run on all by it’s lonesome.
  My only cloud costs end up being those services which are distributed for redundancy and geographical distance, such as DNS and caching CDNs.
- I saved money by stea- I mean borrowing - work equipment
- My only quibble would be to swap “pay” for “invest” which captures both the dynamic of up front expense and expected savings from ending recurring subscription fees. That’s how I look at it. Every penny I put into my own digital sovereignty is an investment that will yield returns both financial and otherwise.
- Second this - so far it has cost me money, but as I am able to cancel more subscription services, the savings will add up.

I'm a little concerned about selection bias (because obviously).
I also want to know about people who are not aware of self-hosting. If they'd be interested or even try.
- That’s a very valid concern, and you’re absolutely right to bring it up.
  One existing study that surveyed the general population found that about 8.4% of respondents were self-hosting users, which means that in order to get enough self-hosters from the general population for meaningful analysis, we’d need a very large sample.
  Unfortunately, we don’t have the funding or resources to conduct such large-scale research through a representative panel or agency. That’s why this study is focusing on communities where self-hosting is already discussed, like this one.
  That said, we’re definitely aware of this limitation, and we’re also sharing the survey in broader, more general-interest online communities where we expect non-self-hosters (or people unfamiliar with the concept) to be more present. This will allow us to include comparisons between the two groups in the analysis.
  Really appreciate your thoughtful comment — thanks!
  
  One existing study that surveyed the general population found that about 8.4% of respondents were self-hosting users
  Wow! That's a lot higher than I would've expected. My guess would've been about 1%, or maybe even an order of magnitude or so less than that.
- I sort of fit that category. I am aware of self-hosting, even somewhat interested. But I know absolutely nothing about it, and if I'm being honest, too lazy to research it.
  Truthfully, I haven't owned my own PC/Laptop in over a decade. I just use the one I get from work if I need to do something on a computer. I preferred gaming on a PS4/5 so I could just relax on the couch with a controller instead of sitting in a chair at a desk. I recently got a steam deck and love it. I want to poke around desktop mode some more so I can get more familiar with Linux.

People who influence my behavior think that I should use cloud services.
This question is going to get bad data. No one likes to think of themselves as being influenced. A more effective phrasing would be "...people I trust..."
- Thanks for the comment — that’s a valid observation, and I understand how the wording might feel a bit awkward.
  Just to clarify: the statement comes from a standardized construct called Subjective Norms, and follows the phrasing from the paper "A Theoretical Extension of the Technology Acceptance Model" by Venkatesh & Davis (2000).
  For all independent variables in the survey, we relied on validated scales and established practices from prior scientific research, to ensure consistency and reliability. That said, I really appreciate your feedback. :)

i smoked some good weed like half an hour ago, do i need to wait
- Uploaded your mind to the cloud
  
  nah, we smoke the cloud like ops

I use self-hosted services in the following categories as much as possible...
That question could really use a "not applicable" option. I don't operate any home automation solutions, so any answer from me would be invalid, and neutral answers because the item is not relevant will appear the same as neutral answers because I use both self-hosted and externally hosted solutions (e.g. Mullvad for privacy and Tailscale to get around CGNAT).
- Thanks for the comment: that’s a really good point to raise.
  Just to clarify: the statement "I use self-hosted services in the following categories as much as possible" is meant to reflect how fully you make use of self-hosted solutions in each area. A response like “Strongly agree” would indicate that you actively use and take full advantage of self-hosting in that category.
  If you don’t use solutions in a particular category at all — whether that’s because you don’t need them, aren’t interested, or use only external services — then it’s completely appropriate to select a disagreeing option (e.g. “Disagree” or “Strongly disagree”). In this context, lower agreement simply indicates low or no use, regardless of the reason.
  From a methodological standpoint, the data will be analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM). This approach requires a complete set of responses across the measured constructs. If we included a “not applicable” option, it would create missing values in the dataset and potentially lead to excluding the entire response for that part of the analysis — which would significantly reduce the usable sample size.
  That said, I really appreciate your feedback! :)
  
  Be prepared for some respondents to choose the middle option as a proxy for "not applicable," because that's what I did.
  
  I get why you're taking that approach but you risk serious misclassification bias. The replies have stated people are using both "disagree" and "neither agree nor disagree" to indicate they are not hosting a particular kind of service. From your description of your research it sounds like disagree and strongly disagree should indicate that the individual uses company hosted services instead of self hosted services for those domains. The relationship between views on privacy and types of services self hosted is going to be confounded by that.
  
  Yeh, I took "don't agree or disagree" to be the N/A.
  It seemed the most neutral.
  I don't really use anything for bookmark sharing/management. So I don't strongly disagree or strongly agree with self hosting it.

I'm old enough to consider the framing of the question to be weirdly loaded.
It does not feel that long ago where people would be asked to justify entrusting their product's functions and data to a bunch of strangers who can make unilateral decisions about your service with zero comeback. Now we're being asked to justify not doing that.
- Thank you for your comment. The use of similar statements is a common practice in survey research, as it helps to capture various dimensions of a construct more reliably and provides a clearer understanding of individual perspectives.
  Regarding your concern, the purpose of this study is not to ask anyone to justify or defend their choices, whether it’s about using third-party services or self-hosting. Instead, we aim to identify the factors that influence such decisions, from a scientific standpoint, to better understand the motivations behind them. The goal is not to judge whether one choice is better than another, but to gain insights into the different considerations that shape people’s decisions when it comes to managing their data and services. Thank you again for taking the time to complete the survey.
  
  Sure, I'm just bemoaning the fact that you've taken cloud hosting to be the default. It's as much a complaint about the world in general as anything specific to you. Good luck with it all.

Have you thought about contacting Louis Rossmann? He created an extensive video guide on how to self host using FOSS. Perhaps he'd be willing to highlight your survey to his over 2 million subscribers.
- That's a good idea, and maybe even Henry from Techlore.

I have answered, and had to put "Other" in employment status because I am self employed. An option for self employment would have been useful in my opinion!
- Thank you for your feedback! You're right, self-employment could be listed more clearly, but choosing “Other” was absolutely fine and your response is fully valid. Thanks again!

I self host for the same reason I'm not clicking some random link: distrust lol
- um.si is for University of Maribor in Maribor, Slovenia. It looks legit.
  
  As a fellow comp sci graduate (different uni, long time ago) that doesn't fill me with a ton of confidence lol.
  This could actually be a study on phishing lol
  \ Or a less ethical study on virus propagation
  \ Or maybe he has just gone rogue and his university hasn't noticed because they probably don't actually monitor what students are hosting very closely, as long as it's not causing problematic network traffic.\
  I doubt it, but I'm still not gonna click a link that someone is asking me to click lol

If I have a file, I have it.
If google has my file, they say they have it. I'm told it's there. For how long? I dunno. Private? Hell no. Forever? Likely not.
This small discrepancy is the entire drive behind me selfhosting.
I'm a minimalist with selfhosting, a raspberrypi with a vpn connection, syncthing and a samba share is all most anyone really need-needs.
- Also there's that a file on a cloud service might change. E.g. Amazon sometimes updates ebook covers to advertise that there's a show - even for those who have paid extra to have the ad-free option.
  E.g. the sticker-type graphic on this and that the title is updated to "The Fires Of Heaven: Book 5 of the Wheel of Time (Now a major TV series)":
- I downloaded music I bought online and copied it to my Google drive once. This was years back, mid 2010s, this album just came out for my favorite artist back then. I'd downloaded it back to another pc and a week later - poof. No more mp3s. @.@

Filled in the survey. A few notes:
Some of my answers make no sense on the surface - like the "experiment with new technology" block (4 questions). I've answered "Agree" to all of them, because I have taken time into account, which is not represented on the questions. Long story short - I do love experimenting with new tech, I'm almost always the first one to try something among my peers, but at the same I never blindly jump in (I'm hesitant) as most of the "new technology" is just
Someone repackaging foss and relabeling it
Some LLM bullshit
An inferior product to what already exists
There are also scenarios where I have already found something that's the best solution for my case, so I won't even bother looking at something new, even if it might be the best thing since sliced bread for someone else.
TIme and effort setting up/maintaining (4 questions). It doesn't take much time nor effort to set anything up now, but it did when I was starting out initially. I knew very little and a bunch of concepts hadn't clicked, yet, so it took me days to set up Nextcloud and about half a year (on and off. Probably a week or so if it were all squeezed together) for email.
The performance and intent to use in the future questions are weird - they feel like the same question, just leveling off in intensity. I've selected the same answer for all of them. They probably should've been a single question with agree/disagree options swapped for intensity levels.
Good luck with your PhD!

Hmm. The first section about cloud service providers is a bit weird to me. There are providers which "keep my best interests in mind" as part of their business model, backblaze would be one. Their whole idea is to provide a good backup services. Encrypting my data before transit also doesn't make me worried that it will be accessed by them or any of their employees because they will only get some garbled mess.
Compare that to google, another cloud service provider. Their business model is to make money by selling me ads (foremost), they do that by gathering as much data as possible. Here all my answers would be negative.
This puts me in an awkward spot where I nearly every time answer with "Neither agree nor disagree", because there is more to it and not because I don't have an opinion.
- Thank you very much for your thoughtful feedback!
  You’ve raised an important point: cloud service providers are not all the same, and their business models can significantly influence how much trust users place in them. We fully agree that there's a big difference between providers like Backblaze, whose value proposition is built on privacy and reliability, and companies like Google, where monetization often relies on extensive data collection.
  The purpose of this section in the survey is to explore general perceptions and motivations behind, not to evaluate individual providers. However, we understand that this generalization can be limiting — especially for respondents who distinguish clearly between different types of services and trust models. Your situation, where you answered "Neither agree nor disagree" not out of indecision but due to the complexity of the issue, is very insightful.
  Thanks again for taking the time to share this, it’s greatly appreciated!
- Felt that too. Its throwing all providers in one bucket which makes it very hard to judge

Because I dont need to pay rent for my files and I don't have to worry about AI and VCs trying invade my privacy.

Did my part! Good luck!
- Thanks a lot, really appreciate it! :)

Done, though some of the questions were redundant or weirdly phrased.
- This is actually a technique to capture an honest answer from a respondent. Ask the same question a few different ways here and there, then take the average of the answers. (It could have been executed better in this survey, though.)
  
  You're absolutely right, rephrasing similar questions is a common technique in survey design to reduce bias and improve reliability.
  Some questions may feel a bit redundant or oddly phrased because we based the survey on validated constructs from prior academic research, especially well-established models like the Technology Acceptance Model. Using these standardized scales helps ensure the results are scientifically sound and comparable with previous studies - though I totally get that it can feel repetitive from a participant’s point of view.
  That said, I really appreciate the feedback from both of you.
  
  I have a feeling for that to be effective they should be spread-out and not appear one after another though.

Done. Nobody else wants to know why I have 3 RasPi’s running stuff around the house, so I get to tell you in the survey, lol.
- I want to know 👉👈

I hope you share the results when your thesis is done :)
- Thanks so much – I definitely will! The results will be published in my PhD dissertation, and since publication in a scientific journal is a requirement for completing the degree, they’ll be shared there as well. I’ll make sure to post a link here once everything is available! :)
  
  Hopefully you can publish in an open-access journal --- if not it would be great if you could share an arXiv preprint :)

I added my answers. Good luck on your thesis!
- Thanks a lot for your input and kind wishes, really appreciate it!

Good Luck Luka!
I feel like I'm a minority in this group in that I really don't like self hosting but I do it anyways because it gives me the things I want from a content/privacy/control/ownership perspective.
- Thanks so much – really appreciate it! :)
  
  PhDs are hard, don't get discouraged if you get told to rewrite tons of things. My Dad had to rewrite many parts to his dissertation, the arbitrary nature of the rewrites was the hardest part to deal with for him. Hopefully you have better advisors!

Done, good luck!
- Thank you so much – I really appreciate it!

It's educational for those who have a lust for learning.
It's fun.
It's far more private than using commercial cloud services.

Page 2 seems to have a lot of redundant question.
I intend to continue using self-hosting services in the future if possible.
I will use self-hosting services regularly in the future if possible.
I will frequently use self-hosting services in the future if possible
- Questions in surveys like this are sometimes repeated with slight variations to get more accurate results.
- They are different enough in intention though.
  I intend - I plan to try, but I might not.
  I will - I am definitely going to, but maybe not very often or for limited uses
  I will frequently - I am definitely going to, and it will be a common/important part of my work/life-flow

I did it for ya....good luck with your phd
- Thank you so much, really appreciate it! :)

I was kind of surprised by my answers when I stopped to reflect. I realized I:
don't really like self-hosting
know a lot about new tech, but am not very excited about it
don't use a lot of the popular services
Anyway, I hope the results are useful! I don't know if you've done it already, but it would be interesting to compare results from different sources, like Lemmy vs Reddit or wherever you posted it.

Good luck on the thesis and I hope my data points can assist your research! I'm sure the community would love to see your finished thesis when it is done

This survey doesn't distinguish between levels of cloud service provider, so I was a little confused.
Virtual private servers, cloud virtual servers (like AWS), cloud-based software where you provide code or a program and the cloud system runs it on a server of its choosing, and cloud-based systems where someone else provides the software (like Google Docs).
- Thank you for your feedback and for completing the survey. The first part of the survey primarily focuses on Software as a Service (SaaS). We appreciate your input and will consider ways to clarify this in future surveys.

I had a hard time answering these because my opinion on cloud service depends on the cloud. (Google vs nextcloud for instance)

The thing I don't get about these self-host apps is why so many of them exist when the thing they do would be better to implement as a run of the mill offline program.
I just want to auto-import recipes from websites into a cookbook app without any fuss. We do not need to bring a server into this equation!
- When making an application instead of coding for one platform you have to code for 5 and also convince Apple and Google to accept your app (Nextcloud is really feeling this one).
  Meanwhile HTML + JavaScript works on most smart fridges.

Done! I've been selfhosting for over 20 years now.

Done.
I feel that it may be helpful to try to capture the motivation for each type of service.
For example. The reasons I host a media server are different than the reasons I host a photo backup solution.
Thank you for doing this research. I dream of the day that self hosting becomes as easy as spinning up a consumer router.

That domain is probably a whole story in another language lol
- It's true! :) Starting with TLD: si - Slovenia; um - University of Maribor; feri - Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; lpt - Laboratory for Data technologies; and survey for LimeSurvey.
  
  Self-hosting the survey form is an amazing cherry on top

Shouldn't the control questions / variations of the same be a bit scattered? For me they were all packed together.
- Thank you for your comment and for completing the survey. It is common practice in research to group together statements that measure the same construct. This arrangement makes it easier for respondents to follow and compare answers on related topics, which contributes to more reliable measurement by helping maintain focus on the subject matter.

Done!
- Thanks a lot!

@SelfhostedResearch Done. But I found the survey design redundant and repetitive. Could demotivate people to complete ;(
- Thank you for your honest feedback and for completing the survey. We understand that some questions may have felt redundant or repetitive, but this design is intended to ensure the reliability and accuracy of measuring the same concepts from different perspectives.

Many of my self hosted solutions are just DIY cludges. I was talking to a friend of a friend on Saturday about media streaming and he told me all about his Jellyfin setup and then asked about mine and I was just like "I just store MP4s on an SSHFS drive and play them in VLC on my TV (which runs Linux Mint)." When the survey asked about the various types of software I was like "No... I don't use anything like that... wait... yes I do! I just don't use a prebuilt solution!"

Done. Are you going to be sharing the results here? That would be cool.
- Thank you very much – I really appreciate your participation! Yes, the results will be published as part of my PhD dissertation, and also in one of the peer-reviewed journals in the field of Computer Science. Once everything is finalized and publicly available, I’ll definitely share a summary and a link to the publication here as well. Thanks again for your interest and support!
  
  Awesome. I'm very curious about your findings. Looking forward to it.

Done but I felt lots of questions to be very similar. Maybe there is a form platform that can show only a subset of control questions for every survey.
- Thank you for completing the survey and for your thoughtful feedback. The similarity between some questions is intentional and follows common scientific practice when measuring complex or abstract concepts. Using multiple, slightly varied items that target the same construct increases the reliability and validity of the data by capturing subtle nuances and reducing the influence of random response variation. While your suggestion to show only a subset of such items through adaptive platforms is valid and worth exploring, fixed item sets are generally preferred in research settings to ensure consistent and robust measurement. We appreciate your input and will consider it in future survey design improvements.
  
  To be honest, if 3-4 questions in a row had same-ish wording, I just replied the same thing 3-4 times.

Done, and link forwarded to my non Lemmy using selfhosting mentor. Maybe can get at least one more respondant. Maybe more. Good luck!

Done. Many questions which are the same or almost similar.
- Thank you for participating in the survey and for providing your feedback.
  We are aware that some of the statements may appear similar or closely related. This is an intentional aspect of the survey design, aimed at capturing different dimensions of the same underlying construct or thematic area. In scientific research, it is a well-established and widely used practice to include multiple, conceptually related items when measuring a specific concept.
  
  Good luck with your research!

Just submitted, I hope my answers are useful for your research
- Thank you very much – I really appreciate your time! And yes, absolutely – every response adds valuable insight to the research. :)

Hope it helps. There are whole categories of self hosted software I hadn't thought of before. Maybe I should try some of them! 😁
- Thank you for completing the survey! Glad it helped you discover new self-hosted software to try! :)

Yeah, those data questions are really loaded. I don't host for privacy or what not. It's because of a learning objective, to study, experiment, and run automated stock trading algorithms. I don't exactly have anything to hide from private companies.
- Thank you for your comment. The use of similar statements is a common practice in this type of research, as it helps to better capture different aspects of a construct and ensures reliability. I understand that privacy may not be your personal motivation for self-hosting, and that’s perfectly fine. The purpose of this survey is to explore a variety of factors that can influence why individuals choose to self-host, and to determine the relative importance of each. Even if certain factors don’t apply to you, your responses contribute to a broader understanding of the motivations behind self-hosting. Thank you again for taking the time to complete the survey.

Done. Hope it helps.
- Thanks, really appreciate it!

Using self-hosting services enables me to accomplish tasks more quickly.
As opposed to what? Using a cloud SaaS alternative, or not having that service at all?
- My intuition says "whatever you would do if you didn't selfhost"

Done 👍
- Thanks a lot, really appreciate it!

Done
- Thanks, much appreciated!

Good luck on your thesis!
- Thank you so much! I really appreciate the support! :)

Done. Good luck.
- Thanks so much – really appreciate it! :)

Submitted.
I am in finance/accounting/consulting and I run one self hosted small server at home to manage my home machines remotely and use it with combo of proton to do most things.
While I am in the process of de-googleing I haven't self hosted photo or email yet as proton has been working okay for the time being. One step at a time I guess for me... I am not in IT so it requires time for me to read up on things and set them up (rtfm indeed)....(yes we all know what proton CEO said.... )...let's see how it pans out.and this has been quite a journey for me. I am still having issues with family and friends not wanting to use jitsi (that I am using for calls or contact me on signal). I have basically thrown WhatsApp and anything I don't care about within beeper under a work profile (android) I.e. in a sandbox / appimage (laptop).
Personally if next cloud allowed self hosting with self email hosting (whatever the technical terminology is) that would have been (chef's kiss) muah....I would have jumped on it first hand...
Sorry I am not in IT so my jargon usage might be sub par.
- Honestly, email is the one thing I wouldn't self host, it's just so much hastle getting it set up right and can be incredibly difficult to have emails you send not end up in spam. Just not worth the hastle imo.
- Thanks, much appreciated!

Done! Happy to help!

Done, good luck!
- Thank you so much, really appreciate it!

Ad a German, I was confused by the second education question and what I should fill out.
(mapping Grundschule / Hauptschule / Realschule / Gymnasium / Studium)
- Thank you for your feedback!
  We understand that the question about education levels may have been confusing, especially when trying to map the German school system to the categories provided.
  The answer options in our survey are based on ISCED 2011 – the International Standard Classification of Education, developed by UNESCO. This is a globally recognized framework used to ensure that education levels can be compared across countries, despite differences in national education systems.
  To help clarify, here is how the German terms you mentioned generally correspond to ISCED categories:
  Grundschule → Primary Education
  Hauptschule / Realschule → Lower Secondary Education
  Gymnasium (until Abitur) → Upper Secondary Education
  Studium (university studies) → depending on the degree (Bachelor’s degree or equivalent tertiary education level / Master’s degree or equivalent tertiary education level Doctoral degree or equivalent tertiary education level)
  
  Thank you, that is helpful.
- I'll never understand social media. Maybe it's me (might as well be as neurodivergent, but then again might say something about tolerance and inclusion... anyhow) but I'd love to understand the downvotes.
  The difference in education systems is not a choice of any of the conversations attendees and the differences in education system are fact.
  Maybe a downvote for Germany? For not knowing by heart? Or maybe because I stated the issue. Of course, research helps but in details sometimes creates even more confusion so it's best to ask.
  Communication as a way to be helpful. As I want to be to this research because I think it's a good statement as research to be done.
  (Last but not least - I don't emotionally care about downvotes. I love understanding though.)

- Well, they say they're studying at a university in Slovenia, which gives it a pretty good chance that English isn't their native language. Those questions still get across what they're asking, so unless you're some kind of grammatical god, I don't think you can really complain too much