Today, curiosity beat me.
I wanted to see what @snikket_im is like.
So I just rented that 0,5cent/hr VPS to test it.
Copy pasting 7 or 8 commands from @heurekus Docker tutorial,
copy pasting the docker-compose, snikket.conf and configuring 3 dns names.
I did not take the exact time, but Hetzner eMail says the VPS was ready at 19:39 and here i am, tooting about snikket is running, having 2 clients already connected...
WOW.. please continue this project!
so, to sum this up: for less than 4€ a month and ~30 minutes of work, you can run #xmpp for yourself, friends and family on a VPS and you can federated with many other xmpp-servers...
And for €40/year you can sign up five users onto your very own professionally maintained domain:
https://account.conversations.im/domain/
If you're privacy conscious chances are you're already paying for email hosting, and you're definitely paying for your phone + #SMS service, so why wouldn't you pay for instant messaging?
@0 Yeah. It requires some effort and only a little money to not use WhatsApp and use something open which can federate.
According to a recent survey, a third of users would pay 5€ a month for services like Whatsapp and even Google search, if it would be more privacy friendly.
https://www.golem.de/news/umfrage-jeder-zweite-wuerde-fuer-facebook-und-google-zahlen-2101-153522.html
And i'm not saying everyone should run their own server, its good enough when one does it for their circle.