@Stewart

Pros & Cons table please, annotated, on a single A4 sheet 

I’m have been leary of joining an instance that is run by someone who might just get tired of it / run out of time / run out of money / die 

But if you’re up for it, why not?

I would love to set up an instance in the cloud – inexpensive and no technical support overheads – but I know I will run foul of at least one of those items in only a couple of years 🤷‍♂️

@AenesidemusOZ It definitely seems like the kind of thing that would work best if you had a group of like-minded people who could run it together. The type of group would dictate the type of audience and accepted sign-ups:

- group of friends (social, small)
- group of people into the same hobby
- group of people in the same sporting club or league
- group of people who live in the same geography

On balance probably not the kind of thing I should do by myself, unless it's a private instance.

@Stewart During the hunt for a new home, I used a federation map to have a look-see for low-ping instances, meaning (for me) in Australia. There are around 60 here, nearly all of them single or dual user.

I suspect that’s what they’re doing – running a private instance that lets them federate but remain their own thing.