Our Service Provider Choices Explained

Now that we've looked at what makes good technology, let's take an honest look at our current providers. No provider is perfect, but we've chosen ones that align with our values while being practical for our needs.

Domain Registration: Namesilo

Your domain name is fundamental to digital independence - it's your persistent identity on the internet that stays with you even if you change other services. When you own freeyourtech.org, for example, you can switch hosting providers, email services, or any other infrastructure without disrupting how people find and connect with you.

Domain registration is one of those services you can't really self-host - it requires being an accredited registrar and maintaining complex infrastructure to interact with the domain name system. This is a pragmatic limitation we have to work with, so our focus shifts to finding a provider that respects our freedom while delivering reliable service.

Namesilo stands out by focusing on their core service: domain registration. While they do offer additional services like hosting or SSL certificates, these remain truly optional - they're not pushed through aggressive upselling or complicated interfaces.

What makes them a good choice:

• Consistent, transparent pricing without hidden renewal increases
• Free WHOIS privacy included by default to protect your personal information
• Standard domain management features that work with any hosting or email provider
• Straightforward transfer process that respects your freedom to switch providers

Looking at alternatives like GoDaddy, we often see practices that conflict with our values: introductory prices that jump significantly at renewal, privacy protection sold as an extra, and interfaces designed to push additional services. While these providers might offer more features, they often come at the cost of clarity and freedom of choice.

Namesilo makes their money by providing a reliable service at a fair price, not by complicating things or creating artificial dependencies. If at some point we need to switch to another registrar, we can easily transfer our domain.

Email: Purelymail

Email remains the most reliable way to maintain independent digital communications. Unlike proprietary messaging platforms, email is based on open standards that no single company controls. With your own email domain, you maintain control over your digital identity and can communicate with anyone, regardless of what email service they use.

Email is notoriously difficult to self-host well. Getting emails delivered to Gmail or Outlook requires maintaining perfect server configurations, staying off spam lists, and constantly adapting to new anti-spam requirements. It's a full-time job that even experienced sysadmins often outsource.

When choosing an email provider, we looked at several privacy-focused options:

• Migadu offers similar features with excellent privacy practices, but their pricing can increase significantly with usage
• Posteo provides strong privacy and fair pricing, but doesn't support custom domains - limiting your independence
• ProtonMail emphasizes security but relies heavily on their own ecosystem, making it harder to switch providers

Purelymail stands out by combining the best aspects of different approaches. They use standard protocols for everything (email, calendar, contacts), support custom domains, and work great with third party open source clients like Thunderbird - so we're never locked in. Their solid privacy policy and usage-based pricing without artificial tiers or limits gives us similar benefits to self-hosting without the hassle.

Though it's a small operation, we get direct responses to our issues and see new features and bugfixes implemented timely. There's also a real community on Discord where users offer help to each other. This transparent, community-focused approach aligns perfectly with our values. If at some point we need to transfer to another host, we can easily import our mail to the new provider and keep the same email addresses, as we can just point the domain to the new servers.

Financial Services

Banking: Wise

International banking shouldn't be complicated or expensive, yet traditional banks often make it both. They hide fees in their exchange rates and treat basic international services as premium features.

Wise takes a simpler approach. They use real market exchange rates, show their fees clearly, and provide proper multi-currency accounts. You get local bank details in different countries and can automate everything through their API.

We considered traditional banks and services like PayPal, but they all rely on hidden fees and poor exchange rates. Wise isn't perfect, but they're honest about their service and costs - which matches how we think about technology. If we ever need to transfer to a new bank, we just need to send the funds to the new accounts and make sure to update our bank account addresses in Open Collective and NemKonto.

Financial Management: Open Collective

Open Collective is built specifically for organizations like ours. It handles memberships, donations, expense tracking, and basic accounting. Members can easily submit expenses that get paid out automatically through Wise, and supporters can contribute through both card payments and bank transfers. Beyond the financial tools, it gives us a space to engage with our community. Members can discuss ideas in the forum-like conversations, and we can keep everyone updated through announcements.

It's a free and open-source tool developed by people who care about social economy and it is offered as a hosted service for free. On top of all that they are moving towards community ownership through exit to community. We could have used any combination of membership and accounting software, but Open Collective gives us a comprehensive toolset made by people who share our values.

If we need to switch to a new membership software at some point, we can at least easily export all the membership and payment data from Open Collective in a simple format.

Payments: Stripe

Card payments are essential for making membership accessible to everyone and lowering the administrative burdern. While bank transfers and automatic bill payments can work well locally, they are much harder to do internationally. Through Open Collective's integration with Stripe, we can accept both without maintaining complex payment infrastructure ourselves.

Stripe is the most "big tech" of our providers, but they've earned their position through offering a solid product and service. There are no solid FOSS alternatives to card payment processing and as the only integrated tool in Open Collective, we decided to use it. If Open Collective ever replaces Stripe with something different or adds a better option we will also make the switch.

Code Hosting: Codeberg

Our code needs to be hosted somewhere accessible, but we want to avoid the centralization of platforms like GitHub. Codeberg is a non-profit alternative that keeps our code accessible while supporting a more independent internet.

What works for us:

• Run by a non-profit focused on public good
• Uses standard Git protocols so we're not locked in
• Fully open source, including the infrastructure
• Clear about their funding and operations
• Integrates with common development tools

We could have used GitHub or GitLab, but they represent the kind of centralized control we're trying to move away from. Codeberg might be smaller and sometimes slower to add features, but they're building infrastructure that matches our vision of the internet. If one day Codeberg goes down, we can self-host the same solution ourselves and move the data, as it's just standard Git repositories.

Hosting: Hetzner

For hosting our infrastructure, we chose Hetzner. They provide reliable servers with full control at fair prices, without the complexity of cloud giants like AWS or Google Cloud.

Their approach is straightforward: good hardware, solid network connectivity, and no unnecessary frills. We get dedicated servers in data centers running on renewable energy, with the freedom to run our systems exactly how we want them.

The pricing is transparent and the support is professional. Being a European company, they operate under strong data protection regulations. Since we maintain full control over our server configurations, we can easily migrate to another provider if needed.

Why These Choices Matter

Our choices reflect both our vision and pragmatism. Each service solves a specific need:

• Namesilo gives us our internet domain name
• Purelymail provides email
• Wise takes care of international banking
• Open Collective handles memberships
• Stripe processes payments
• Codeberg hosts our code and enables collaboration
• Hetzner provides our server infrastructure

But more importantly, these providers show what we value in technology providers: open standards and protocols, transparent business models, respect of our freedom to leave, and focus on offering a solid service. We can't avoid all commercial services, but we can choose ones that respect our freedom and align with our values. When better alternatives emerge, we can switch easily because we've avoided lock-in. That's the importance of making conscious technology choices.