> And yet setting a full Matrix stack requires days of work and endless maintenance.
This is not true. People, don't let this FUD scare you.
My home server has been running for more than a year, was easy to setup (reading documentation took the most time) and takes little maintenance. Just apt update && apt upgrade.
Well you must have has a real bad experience. That's unfortunate indeed and I understand your frustration.
It is not representative though. You do need a server and a domain name, but that isn't out of place when hosting internet based services like a chat server.
This is not true. People, don't let this FUD scare you.
My home server has been running for more than a year, was easy to setup (reading documentation took the most time) and takes little maintenance. Just apt update && apt upgrade.
Edit: and even if reading the documentation takes you 'days of work', you can follow a video of the server being setup in 30 minutes, including a jitsi instance for video conferencing: https://matrix.org/blog/2020/04/06/running-your-own-secure-c...