There's a community run by levels.io which does something like this

Working on an actual social network for close friends.

No clout-chasing ragebait news or doomscrolling. See updates from your friends and that's it.

site link: https://intimost.com/login/

demo creds:

test@example.com

Demo123!

More context: (show HN) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45721134

Managed DB costs a lot.

Is there a simple safe setup that we can run on an Ubuntu server?

We self-host the Postgres db with frequent backups to s3 but just in case the site takes off, we need an affordable reliable solution.

Does anyone here run their own db servers? Any advise?

Backups, security, upgrades etc

I love the argument that Managed DBs cost a lot, but they're supposedly safer. Meanwhile people can't figure out the IAM permission models so they give the entire world access with root:root.

If you're running k8s cluster. Check out cloudnative pg. That thing is a beast.

We have hosted on everything on a tiny Hetzner. The site barely has any users apart from our friends:) :(

Info noted

Worth checking out the different server hosts. You can get a cheap OVH server with 64GB of RAM, 4-6cores with 2TB of disk space from OVH for $30, better servers for $70 with 1gbps - 2gbps bandwidth.

Setting up a DB isn't hard, using an LLM to ask questions will guide you to the right places. I'm always talking with Gemini because I switched from Ubuntu to Fedora 42 server and things are slightly different here and there.

But, different server hosts offer DB-ready OS's so all you have to do is load the OS on the server and you'll be ready to go.

The joy of Linux is getting everything _just right_ and so much _just right_ that you can launch a second server and set it up that way _just right_ within minutes.

Maybe look at R2 or Wasabi instead of S3. That would cut your storage bill by 3x and take your cloud network bill to zero. IMO self-managing DBs always sucks no matter what you do.

> Equinix Metal got the closest, but bare metal on-demand still carried a 25-30% premium over our CapEx plan. Their global footprint is tempting; we may still use them for short-lived expansion.

> The Equinix Metal service will be sunset on June 30, 2026.

https://docs.equinix.com/metal/

We are building a private text-only no-clout social network with chronological feed for close friends.

(It was supposed to be completed months ago but got stuck in other issues)

Here's the waitlist and proposal: https://waitlist-tx.pages.dev

Private comments and no likes looks great, something I’ve been wishing more social media had (but won’t for obvious reasons). Best of luck!

Thank you!

-Many say they want to stop doomscrolling and clout-chasing but I don't know how many are actually willing to do so

-Individuals may move here but their friends won't. So the feed will be initially empty by design. Introducing any kind of reward is against our ethos so we are clueless about how to convince existing friend circles to move.

This may work in your favour - it's one of the reasons I enjoy Mastodon so much - friction is/was a little higher which kept my network small but focussed

A domain name would be a good start :)

Also maybe a problem statement at the top (eg rampant AI slop, clout pressure, security).

Now it is live at https://intimost.com

Is that friend Josh Kopelman?

I switch to vs code from cursor many times a day just to use their python refactoring feature. The pylance server that comes with cursor doesn't support refactoring.

> I'm paranoid that some squatter can tell which domains i'm searching

Don't search on GoDaddy. I read somewhere GoDaddy raises the prices of high value domains by choosing them from searches

I have had a single cheapest ec2 server at 5$ per month and hosted both db and server in it. Sqlite for db so easy to back up. It didn't contain any important data though.

I ran many projects in it

> I won’t buy the domain name until I get a prototype ready.

Me too. I learnt it after 6 expired domains

I learned after 600. Or did I? :)

I worked with a guy like you. He had a seemingly pathological need to one-up someone even when it was just a blatant lie.

I worked with a guy like that too, but even worse, you wouldn’t understand

I worked with a guy like that... oh wait, that guy is me