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Self-hosting web services (email, www etc) as an alternative reminder

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Just a quick reminder to those looking for web services alternatives based in EU - there's a quite an easy way of self-hosting it all by yourself and remain fairly independent of any 3rd party decisions to monetize, move or shut down services, or use your private data:

  • The cheapest EU & Co based Virtual Private Server (VPS). Could cost you up to 5 bob/month.
  • Linux OS of your choice (I'd personally recommend Debian since CentOS is now gone and its alternatives for servers are not well established yet). Free.
  • ISPConfig hosting control panel. Free and somewhere EU based as I understand it. I've been using it on and off for about 15 years.
  • Your own domain name. Try to avoid .zip one for your email server... Let's say that will set you back by up to 20 bob/year.
  • A step by step tutorial on how to set it all up. Encryption, spam filter, antivirus, email fetching and webmail all come free!
  • (Optional) You probably will need to ask your VPS provider to open certain email ports for you.

That's it - you have your own little hosting set up, which you can use for your websites as well! And whatever else more advanced you may want to try in the future! Add a couple of your friends and relatives with their own domain names into it - and you may even be in profit!

9 comments

  • It's worth noting that hosting your own email server is more difficult than it might seem. The server aspects aren't too difficult, but due to the proliferation of spam, there are a ton of other things you need to set up in order for your emails to not be constantly filtered or rejected by other mail servers. If you're curious, feel free to mess around, but I wouldn't switch to using it for critical stuff until you've tested it very thoroughly.

    • I totally agree. Setting up an email server is pretty trivial, but setting up a good email server with long lifespan and managing it is another matter. I absolutely recommend doing that, that's the one front we can take back from the giants if enough people decide to go that route, but it's not something you should just spin up by following a random youtube tutorial and leave it be.

      I do host my own emails, but I've been doing that commercially too for a decade or so and make my living as system administrator, so I've cut my teeth on this quite a while ago. You need to understand quite a few things, set up backups, clear your IP from various blocklists every now and then, manage the ever growing spam problem, make sure that no malicious actors can access your systems and so on.

      It is very much doable and at least I personally enjoy the freedom I have for not relying on anyone else on my communications. Go for it, but be prepared to jump in to the deep end without floats.

      • Yeah, I tried it when I was hosting from home with a dynamic IP. Block lists were a nightmare. I still do plenty of www self hosting, but I find paying for email hosting to be worth it.

        Still a great challenge for anyone interested in sys admin stuff, even if just to appreciate a well-run service.

  • You can use tools like Stallwart and Mailcow qnd even Mail-in-a-box to make mail hosting a LOT easier. One does not simply configure ClamAV as a milter and chaining DKIM validation too late I the process is a great recipe for random spam status issues.

    You just have to accept that nobody using Google's or Microsoft's email servers will receive your email in their inbox ever again. All of your outgoing email will be marked as spam, unless you slowly trickle non-spam emails at rates of dozens to hundreds a day to various email servers to build up IP + domain reputation. If you're not a marketing company, that will probably not happen. That includes almost every company, big or small, local or international, using their own domain names. Customer service will likely ignore you and email that doesn't get delivered will be considered your fault. Of course you can fight against the system by still using an independent email server (like I do) but know that you're a tiny drop in an ocean of The Big Three email servers.

    Also, reserve four to eight hours a month for maintenance and dealing with problems. Easy to do as a student, challenging as a parent.

    Futhermore, for your domain name, make sure to check the requirements. You may lose the rights to your domain when you emigrate, or when your country ceases to exist (unlikely) or leaves the economic union controlling the domain (like the British people with .eu domains). You may find the Taliban in control of your domain one day (because you chose the funny .af ccTLD). Also pick a TLD that's not full of spam already, like .biz or the ones that used to be free (.tk).

9 comments