Yeah that's a fair point. There is a line to be drawn somewhere, and most people don't run their own email server. Administering one on a rented server somewhere can be considered self-hosting your email (ahem, did I say server? I meant Cloud! Apologies)

Maybe what bothered me about the section I quoted, is that they're explicitly using the free tier and allegedly didn't give the hosting company (Oracle) any billing information. So they cannot possibly be paying for their use. It's sorta not really theirs but, instead, a charity from Oracle (there's three words I never thought I'd put together)

Those aren't apt analogies. "Self-hosted" means "on your own hardware". It isn't talking about your internet feed or power generation.

Can't agree more. And the article mentions that they use free tier. It is not their server for sure.

> "Self-hosted" means "on your own hardware".

Does it? This is not the definition I've come accustomed to.

Until recently, I've never heard it used to mean anything else. If you're running your stuff in the cloud, wouldn't that be "cloud-hosted"?

If "self-hosted" now includes cloud-hosted, then what should we call things that are actually self-hosted? The distinction matters. We should have a term.

I usually understand that as "you manage it".

Whenever I read about anything self-hosted, it's always about not being reliant on a single third party to provide the services you need. If you control the software and the data, you can easily move everything from one cloud provide to another or to your own hardware. Whether or not you own the hardware has no bearing on this.