The greatest flaw in the system is the fragmentation and consequential cost - when things were consolidated under Netflix, things weren’t perfect but it can’t be said that they weren’t far better.

The true underlying flaw is capitalism, but isn’t it always?

Because the AI isn’t needed, and would be computationally expensive.

Extensions like ublock origin and sponsorblock work just fine.

No worries!

The upside of synology (and I say this without having used them) is simplicity, and low power usage at the cost of flexibility.

On unraid, I can toss in extra drives when I like (or remove them with slightly more hassle), and spin far more up, including VMs.

Feel free to check in whenever though.

Welcome to the fun!

If you need any guidance from this idiot, feel free to reach out.

The best general advice I can give is if you want something reasonably large and flexible is to start with Unraid from the outset - I mucked around with a good number of alternatives, with all the hassle that involves before finding this straightforward, super-flexible solution. Otherwise, maybe look at a synology-type appliance for something smaller-scale and less versatile.

TBH, it would depend on how many services I’m theoretically replacing, and whether you count the people I’ve shared my library with. Before I went down the rabbit hole, cost was the motivation, but I’m long past that.

Between the usenet subs, paid search engines, power for a 24 bay server running 24x7, and adding a new drive every few months, I can’t really defend it on a cost basis for my own use (though that’s not to say it can’t be done considerably cheaper).

Similarly, I’m giving my data to a handful of usenet search engines and 2 usenet providers my data (though I trust all of them more than the likes of Disney and Netflix)

With all that said, I’ve never looked back. It’s a hobby project for me, I have total control, can help out my friends and family, and use the server for other stuff like private cloud hosting, home automation, network ad-blocking, etc…

…and now I’m paying for power, usenet, search, hardware upgrades, and so on.

I regret nothing - I’m in control now.