You are misunderstanding the main idea behind the whole system. It is fork-able. So people can always change things they personally find they don't like about it. You can not have anything where everybody has to do. Because those who don't agree have all the technological and legal right to ignore you and do what they want instead. And this is the point with libre platforms ( or libre software in general ).

Whatever solution we find needs to take this fundamental thing into consideration.

[–] rglullis 1 points 4 hours ago

Sorry, I don't see how what you are talking about relates to my comment. At all.

I am not saying that people should be forced to pay, at least no that they need to pay to any specific admin. What I am saying is that we should stop to hand wave the total operational cost of an instance. Keeping the servers running, developing fixes and improvements to the software, dealing with moderation issues... these are all costs that need to be covered by someone.

Some people are willing to do all this work just to avoid "paying" someone else, but they end up paying with their own labor, their own server, their own time. If they are willing to do all of this, good for them. But for the majority of people who are simply looking for a social media alternative that is more ethical, it will be better for them (and everyone else) if they just go on to contribute with direct financial support and give a a few bucks every month.