Mastodawn

We are currently not fully funded, but as always, please only chip in if you really can and feel good about it.

The goal of this ko-fi campaign is to fund the running costs, and everything above whats needed for the current cycle (October-September) will go 100% into the next cycle.

I post a transparency report in October, and also whenever something changes (like now).

The Mammoth Mar 6

Hey everyone, as mentioned in https://plushies.social/@mammoth/116098129345726086 I recently had to upgrade this instance to the next bigger plan as we were running out of resources. This means that the calculation of the expected costs for hosting has changed compared to my last estimate (https://plushies.social/@mammoth/115440175635004121).

For 10/2025-09/2026 the expected costs are now:
- 56€ domain
- 5 x 35€/month, 7 x 45€/month, 9€ upgrade = 499€ for hosting

So 555€ in total

I've adjusted the goal on https://ko-fi.com/plushies_social accordingly

The Mammoth (@[email protected])

FYI, I just received an automated warning from our hoster that this instance was over the plan volume (media was over, database was very close to go over). As I didn't want to start deleting remote history which was the only other option I saw to clear up some space, I upgraded to the next plan. So this instance now costs USD39+taxes/month (plus yearly domain costs). I'm currently down with a cold, but once in back on my feet I'll update the ko-fi page (https://ko-fi.com/plushies_social) accordingly.

plushies.social

The Mammoth Feb 19

FYI, I just received an automated warning from our hoster that this instance was over the plan volume (media was over, database was very close to go over).

As I didn't want to start deleting remote history which was the only other option I saw to clear up some space, I upgraded to the next plan.

So this instance now costs USD39+taxes/month (plus yearly domain costs).

I'm currently down with a cold, but once in back on my feet I'll update the ko-fi page (https://ko-fi.com/plushies_social) accordingly.

Support plushies.social

Ko-fi

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The Mammoth Oct 26

From 10/2025 until 10/2026 the expected costs are:
- 56€ for the domain
- 12 months at 35€/month = 420€ for hosting

for a total of 476€

I've created a corresponding new goal on the ko-fi campaign page and set the start at the 319€ from the past cycle so all is tracked correctly.

2/2

The Mammoth Oct 26

A quick transparency report on the running costs of plushies.social

Since the launch of https://ko-fi.com/plushies_social in 2023 a total of 1137€ were received.

342€ were used for paying for the instance from 10/2023 until 10/2024.

From 10/2024 until 10/2025 the running costs were:
- 56€ for the domain
- 12 months at 35€/month = 420€ for hosting

Total: €476

So all running costs for 10/2024-10/2025 were covered (thanks!) & there are 319€ left for the next 12 months

Support plushies.social

Ko-fi

The Mammoth Oct 23

PSA, @mastohost , this instance's hoster, is currently experiencing a DDoS attack. Things might be slower while this is getting mitigated.

More details here: https://mastodon.social/@mastohost/115422619048254541

The Mammoth Oct 23

Masto.host Oct 23

One hour ago, the DDoS protection on Masto.host was activated.

This occasionally happens for a few minutes and rarely has an impact. But today it looks like there is a significant DDoS attempt, and it's causing response times to be slow or to timeout.

Really sorry about that. I will continue to monitor and provide more information.

The Mammoth Sep 17, 2025

FYI, I have just preventively defederated this instance from a.gup.pe. That used to be a service for creating topic groups on the Fediverse, but earlier this month the domain was lost and thus can no longer be trusted not to start spamming people.

Fedi.Tips (@[email protected])

Okay, some really bad news but also a suggestion for a way forward. The Guppe groups domain name was sold by their registrar before they could renew it. This means all Guppe groups are broken, and their web addresses point to a spam blog 😞 However, there is another group provider called FediGroups, you can find out more on their site: ➡️ https://about.fedigroups.social/home FediGroups has features that Guppe never had, including private groups. (More info about #Guppe situation: https://github.com/immers-space/guppe/issues/118 )

social.growyourown.services

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The Mammoth Oct 14, 2024

From 10/2024 until 10/2025 the expected costs are:
- 48.79€ incl. VAT/year for the domain*
- 12 months at 29€ + VAT/month for hosting**

for a total of 462.91€

I've created a corresponding new goal on the ko-fi campaign page and set the start at the (rounded) 325€ from the past cycle so all is tracked correctly.

* the registration prices for .social domains increased
** for performance reasons I had to switch from a bare Star plan on masto.host to one with one unit of extra resources

2/2

The Mammoth Oct 14, 2024

A quick transparency report on the running costs of plushies.social

Since the launch of https://ko-fi.com/plushies_social a total of 667€ were received.

From 10/2023 until 10/2024 the running costs were:
- 39€ + VAT/year for the domain (I originally misread that the 39€ included the VAT)
- 10 months at 19€ + VAT/month for hosting
- 2 months at 29€ + VAT/month for hosting

Total: 341.53€

So all running costs for 10/2023-10/2024 were covered (thanks!) & there are 324.47€ left for the next 12 months

Support plushies.social

Ko-fi