Self-hosting is the practice of running and maintaining a website or service using a private web server, instead of using a service outside of someone's own control. For example, someone wishing to write a
blog
A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in Reverse ...
could use
''hosted'' blog services. Alternatively, they could install
content management system
A content management system (CMS) is computer software used to manage the creation and modification of digital content ( content management).''Managing Enterprise Content: A Unified Content Strategy''. Ann Rockley, Pamela Kostur, Steve Manning. New ...
software on their own server to ''self-host'' their blog.
Motivation to do so could be as simple as saving costs by combining several services on a single machine or VPS instance, or in most cases the privacy benefits of being more in control -- or in complete control -- one's data and computing infrastructure. However, it could also be a hobby to people well-versed in technology.
Accordingly, there's also a sizeable hobbyist community around self-hosting, made up of hobbyists, technology professionals and privacy conscious individuals.
See also
*
On-premises software
References
Internet hosting
Web hosting
{{Internet-stub