Hey I’m not really a tech-savvy person yet but I was wondering if it’s better for server load to upload an image to Imgur or another image/video-hosting site first and then place the link in a post instead of directly uploading to Lemmy?
I want to contribute content-wise but I also want servers to stay up and not be overloaded. What would be best you think?
In terms of server load (CPU) Lemmy uses a separate service for uploading / storing images (pictrs). It runs on the same server but in the grand scheme of things it’s never a bottleneck. Typically static image uploads are cached so it’s not much effort for the server.
However uploading images direct to Lemmy does have a storage impact. I know my home instance (lemm.ee) has a 100kb size limit for uploads, others may do that too.
If you’re concerned about that aspect, you can use a separate image hosting service too. As long as the link in your post points directly to an image, it’ll embed fine.
That would be nice but it also comes with the same issues that the Fediverse is trying to avoid. Hosting all images in a central server means that only one group is in control of that and it anything happens like that server going down, it would mean we won’t be able to see images until that gets fixed. It’s safer to have every instance just rely on itself.
Pixelfed?
So you’re saying just put it on… Another instance that we need to worry about overloading… Just not a Lemmy instance?
Pixelfed aligns with the fediverse mentality that reduces the risk of losing all the content because one server went down.
I wasn’t addressing compute, but on that topic, the work has to be done somewhere. Why not spread it out?
https://catbox.moe would be a alternative, although it is centralized…
I think most new instances will start as a VPS, some already upgraded to dedicated servers. But storage is, even in these days, costly when it’s actively used storage. How hotter the storage tier, the more it will cost the server owner.
Communities like which share memes and stuff often have an enormous amount of posts, which are viewed frequently. Many small images consume a lot of storage in the end, especially since the content will not be deleted.
If you make your instance open, like most, then people can create communities as much as they want, with content that they want. So you don’t have much influence on how many content is being stored on your instance.
