We are currently the 3rd largest Lemmy instance in terms of monthly active users. This brings a financial burden and we would appreciate your help about it.
I only pin this post when we drop below $200. I know it’s annoying when the donation post is always at the top.
If you want to donate, here’s donation platforms we use:
- Throne.com: No registration needed, fiat only.
- Ethereum: 0x4e4af5dc2f86235ac496542c2a1c00f3c4de40c6
- Monero: 48VYVWPKk65KiDiBaLhvSggKSbDQ4vtdq6HHbDa2HxWLiBWVcZ65gTgMBu7UeSUcm4dasAMMaKHnJNJSgRKi7Q5R5HN9adg
- Trocador.app (multiple cryptocurrencies)
Donate to the team
@lemmyposter212 does heavy lifting by moderating the instance. Therefore, if you want to donate to them individually, you can use the ETH address below.
- 0xba69716dFa94685bE1302f0f875E8fAA8c180fC2
Financial status
Here is what we have and what we spent.
| date | description | USD | ETH | XMR |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-06-28 | + donation | 190 (+10) | 0.0145 | 0.9264 |
| 2025-06-27 | + donation | 180 (+10) | 0.0145 | 0.9264 |
| 2025-06-25 | + donation | 170 (+20) | 0.0145 | 0.9264 |
| 2025-06-25 | - load balance server | 150 | 0.0145 | 0.9264 (-0.0413) |
| 2025-06-14 | - main server and media storage | 150 (-95) | 0.0145 | 0.9677 |
| 2025-06-02 | - load balance server | 245 | 0.0145 | 0.9677 (-0.0370) |
| 2025-05-27 | + donation | 245 | 0.0145 | 1.0048 (+1) |
| 2025-05-26 | + donation | 245 (+5) | 0.0145 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-26 | + donation | 240 (+20) | 0.0145 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-25 | + donation | 220 (+50) | 0.0145 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-19 | + donation | 170 (+20) | 0.0145 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-16 | + donation | 150 | 0.0145 (+0.0055) | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-16 | + donation | 150 (+20) | 0.009 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-15 | - main server and media storage | 130 (-95) | 0.009 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-11 | - domain renewal | 225 (-17) | 0.009 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-04 | + thanks burger baron | 242 (+20) | 0.009 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-05-04 | + donation | 222 (+20) | 0.009 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-25 | - load balance server | 202 | 0.009 (-0.007) | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-18 | + donation | 202 (+10) | 0.0161 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-16 | + donation | 192 (+20) | 0.0161 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-16 | + donation | 172 (+5) | 0.0161 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-16 | + donation | 167 | 0.0161 (+0.0073) | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-15 | + donation | 167 (+5) | 0.0097 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-13 | + thank you radovic 🙏 | 162 (+30) | 0.0097 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-13 | + donation | 132 (+10) | 0.0097 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-04-12 | - main server and media storage | 122 (-95) | 0.0097 | 0.0048 |
| 2025-03-28 | - load balance server | 217 | 0.0097 | 0.0048 (-0.0541) |
| 2025-03-16 | - email credits | 217 (-50) | 0.0097 | 0.0590 |
| 2025-03-14 | - main server and media storage | 267 (-95) | 0.0097 | 0.0590 |
| 2025-03-12 | - media storage | 362 (-20) | 0.0097 | 0.0590 |
| 2025-02-23 | - load balance server | 382 | 0.0097 | 0.0590 (0.0505) |
| 2025-02-15 | - main server and media storage | 382 (-94) | 0.0097 | 0.1095 |
| 2025-01-26 | - load balance server | 476 | 0.0097 | 0.1095 (-0.0528) |
| 2025-01-20 | / XMR to USD | 476 (+355.6) | 0.0097 | 0.1624 (-1.8001) |
| 2025-01-15 | + donation | 120 (+50) | 0.0097 | 1.9625 |
| 2025-01-14 | - main server and media storage | 70 (-94) | 0.0097 | 1.9625 |
| 2025-01-03 | + donation | 164 (+50) | 0.0097 | 1.9625 |
| 2024-12-29 | - load balance server | 114 | 0.0097 | 1.9625 (-0.0598) |
| 2024-12-24 | + dec overall, 4 donations, thx 🙏 | 114 (+55) | 0.0097 | 2.0224 |
| 2024-12-14 | - main server | 59 (-75) | 0.0097 | 2.0224 |
| 2024-12-12 | - media storage | 134 (-18) | 0.0097 | 2.0224 |
| 2024-12-11 | + donation | 152 | 0.0097 | 2.0224 (+0.0106) |
| 2024-11-28 | + donation | 152 (+20) | 0.0097 | 2.0118 |
| 2024-11-26 | + donation | 132 (+5) | 0.0097 | 2.0118 |
| 2024-11-25 | + donation | 127 (+20) | 0.0097 | 2.0118 |
| 2024-11-24 | - load balance server | 107 | 0.0097 | 2.0118 (-0.0707) |
| 2024-11-16 | + donation (from 11-15) | 107 | 0.0097 | 2.0825 (+0.0569) |
| 2024-11-16 | + donation (from 11-07) | 107 | 0.0097 | 2.0256 (+1 🙏) |
| 2024-11-14 | - main server | 107 (-75) | 0.0097 | 1.0256 |
| 2024-11-12 | + donation | 182 (+20) | 0.0097 | 1.0256 |
| 2024-11-12 | - media storage | 162 (-18) | 0.0097 | 1.0256 |
| 2024-11-08 | + donation | 180 (+10) | 0.0097 | 1.0256 |
| 2024-11-01 | + donation | 170 (+10) | 0.0097 | 1.0256 |
| 2024-10-25 | - load balance server | 160 | 0.0097 | 1.0256 (-0.0770) |
| 2024-10-17 | + donation | 160 (+10) | 0.0097 | 1.1026 |
| 2024-10-15 | + donation | 150 | 0.0097 (+0.0073) | 1.1026 |
| 2024-10-14 | - main server | 150 (-75) | 0.002 | 1.1026 |
| 2024-10-12 | - media storage | 225 (-18) | 0.002 | 1.1026 |
| 2024-09-24 | - load balance servers | 243 | 0.002 | 1.1026 (-0.1270) |
| 2024-09-14 | - main server | 243 (-75) | 0.002 | 1.2296 |
| 2024-09-12 | - media storage | 318 (-17) | 0.002 | 1.2296 |
| 2024-08-30 | + donation | 335 | 0.002 | 1.2296 (+0.0318) |
| 2024-08-26 | - load balance server | 335 | 0.002 | 1.1577 (-0.1153) |
| 2024-08-16 | + donations (one from July 29) | 335 (+20) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-08-14 | - main server | 315 (-75) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-08-12 | - media storage | 390 (-15) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-07-26 | + donation | 405 (+5) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-07-26 | + donation | 400 (+20) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-07-26 | + donation | 380 (+50) | 0.002 | 1.2731 |
| 2024-07-25 | - load balance server | 330 | 0.002 | 1.2731 (-0.0729) |
| 2024-07-14 | - main server | 330 (-75) | 0.002 | 1.3460 |
| 2024-07-12 | - media storage | 405 (-25) | 0.002 | 1.3460 |
| 2024-06-24 | - load balance server | 430 | 0.002 | 1.3460 (-0.0731) |
| 2024-06-14 | - main server | 430 (-75) | 0.002 | 1.4192 |
| 2024-06-13 | + donation | 505 (+20) | 0.002 | 1.4192 |
| 2024-06-12 | - media storage | 485 (-25) | 0.002 | 1.4192 |
| 2024-06-06 | + donation | 510 (+20) | 0.002 | 1.4192 |
| 2024-06-04 | / ETH to USD | 490 (+473) | 0.002 (-0.125) | 1.4192 |
| 2024-05-22 | - load balance server | 17 | 0.1276 | 1.4192 (-0.0861) |
| 2024-05-22 | + donation | 17 | 0.1276 | 1.5050 (+0.1442) |
| 2024-05-21 | + donation | 17 | 0.1276 | 1.3611 (+1) |
| 2024-05-17 | + donation | 17 | 0.1276 | 0.3611 (+042069 🚬) |
| 2024-05-17 | + donation | 17 (+20) | 0.1276 | 0.3190 |
| 2024-05-15 | - main server | -3 (-75) | 0.1276 | 0.3190 |
| 2024-05-13 | - media storage | 72 (-24) | 0.1276 | 0.3190 |
| 2024-04-28 | + donation | 96 (+50) | 0.1276 | 0.3190 |
| 2024-04-26 | + donation | 46 (+20) | 0.1276 | 0.3190 |
| 2024-04-24 | - load balance server | 26 | 0.1276 | 0.3190 (-0.0993) |
| 2024-04-21 | + donation | 26 (+50) | 0.1276 | 0.4184 |
| 2024-04-15 | - main server | -24 (-65) | 0.1276 | 0.4184 |
| 2024-04-10 | - media storage | 41 (-19) | 0.1276 | 0.4184 |
| 2024-04-09 | + donation | 60 | 0.1276 (+0.06969 🙃) | 0.4184 |
| 2024-04-01 | + donations | 60 (+25) | 0.0579 | 0.4184 (+0.1827) |
| 2024-03-30 | - load balance server | 35 | 0.0579 | 0.2357 (-0.0890) |
| 2024-03-04 | + donation | 35 | 0.0579 | 0.3247 (+0.0420) |
| 2024-03-02 | - main server | 35 (-65) | 0.0579 | 0.2827 |
| 2024-02-28 | + donation | 100 | 0.0579 (+0.0073) | 0.2827 |
| 2024-02-27 | - load balance server | 100 | 0.0506 | 0.2827 (-0.1516) |
| 2024-02-01 | - new server and email provider | 100 (-75) | 0.0506 | 0.3738 |
| 2024-02-01 | / approximate initial value | 175 | 0.0506 | 0.3738 |
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I would like to clean up the old comments and give a summary here.
Donations via Open Collective
Unfortunately, we cannot use Open Collective because there is no fiscal host that accepts NSFW instances.
Donations via Liberapay or Patreon
Similar scenario to Open Collective. Payment processors (PayPal and Stripe) can ban adult sites at any time.
Donations with alt coins
It is complicated to support so many different coins. Therefore, we only support ETH, XMR as the main ones. You can still donate with dozens of different coins via Trocador. All donations you make there will be merged into our XMR wallet.
Instance size
As of April 10th 25, we have 54.3GB of database and 1.48TB of media storage.
Should I host my media somewhere else to reduce costs?
No you don’t need to. The media cost is not as high as one might think. At least it is at a level that we can sustain as long as we can receive donations.
Distributed setup (Kubernetes)
Although I believe it will increase performance and reliability, I don’t think horizontal scaling (with multiple servers) makes sense for an instance that receives very few donations relative to the number of users. Therefore, I personally prefer vertical scaling for now.
Server location
We currently host the instance in the Netherlands (at least part of it).
Tf happened here
wut 🤷♂️
“deleted by moderator”
they’re all back 👍
Oh that! There were so many out of date comments asking for same thing. So I removed most of them and summarized all questions into one comment.
I think they just cleared out the old/historical comments.
Hello, team at LemmyNSFW,
I’m delighted to see your instance growing and I completely support the idea of donating to ensure the longevity and quality of this platform. Your hard work in maintaining and developing this instance is very much appreciated.
However, I’d like to bring up the idea of financial transparency within our community. Have you considered using a platform like Open Collective for your donation system? It has been adopted by other instances, including Lemmy.world. You can see an example of how they use it here: https://opencollective.com/mastodonworld
In my opinion, Lemmy.world is a shining example of how a Lemmy instance should operate financially. They provide transparency about their finances, which has greatly contributed to building trust with their users and the platform as a whole.
Considering we’re part of an open-source, decentralized platform, I believe this level of transparency is paramount. It not only helps in building trust but also encourages more users to donate, knowing exactly how their contributions will be utilized.
Moreover, seeing big instances openly donating back to the source code developers could set a wonderful precedent. This act of giving back to those who helped create the foundation of our platform would be a tremendous demonstration of gratitude and community spirit.
Again, I am wholeheartedly in support of donating to this community, and I hope my suggestion will be taken into consideration. Keep up the fantastic work!
Going to have to agree that something like this would be good. Lets people see all in one place where we stand and what is needed.
Yes. And I’m genuinely ok with big staff spends. Spend it on hookers and cocaine for all I care. All is like to see is that some percentage is committed and shown to be given back to the source code developers.
Agreed, there’s nothing wrong with making a living. 👍
I’d love to see if we could get enough donations going to distribute to content creators? Maybe this is a more mainstream instance/general purpose NSFW, but it would be very cool to see an instance giving ownership to its content creators.
Depending on the jurisdictions involved (where the server is hosted and where the admins live), I can imagine there may be very different laws and regulations governing a forum of user-submitted content and a business acting as a publisher and producer of porn content. A great idea, but not as simple as just having the money to do it.
Spend it on hookers …
Use the money to generate more content… smart.
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Open collective (of which I have zero affiliation) is working on taking cryptocurrency payments. Last I checked it was in beta.
You can give evidence where you feel it would be beneficial. But yeh. You could always find work arounds.
If it’s something you genuinely want to explore, I’m happy to volunteer some of my time to help you with implementing and managing that.
The key thing I’d like to see in all instances, not just yours, is transparency in income, plus some sort of transparency as to how much that may be given back to the community and the source code development.
Honestly. What’s done with the rest, I care very little.
Can you contact me from Matrix? my address is @xaeg:matrix.org
How big a proportion of potential supporters do you think would prefer to pay in crypto?
I’m in column A, but not column B. Just for “statistical purposes”.
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I definitely understand where you’re coming from, I was just attempting to debate cost/value.
Almost half of the supporters donating from crypto, so I don’t think its unnecessary.
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I’d probably prefer pay in crypto. Also receive in crypto TBH. Just for anonymity’s sake.
I mean since you brought up crypto I accept that as a given.
Just think that most people aren’t into crypto as much as those who are into crypto like to think.
Oh no. I agree. I brought it up because the instance is already taking crypto payments.
You can text me on telegram if you need an experience trader to handle your finances and trade.look at the bitcoin rate currently
Out of curiosity how much storage are you using either total or on average with this instance? I feel like with the amount of media being uploaded it’s likely slightly larger than others.
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Could consider utilising storage buckets for this - Backblaze B2 is $0.005 per GB/month and has partnerships with Cloudflare etc. Should reduce your costs pretty well.
Have you checked IONOS?
This was a year ago, how much is it now?
We have 1.34TB data for only media storage now :)
I support you my friend both monetarily and conceptually.
You’re one of the people I’ve seen from the very beginning. Thank you for your support!
An instance run so good that it caused me to start using my porn account as main account deserves some love and support. Bought a sponsor package on throne.
Thank you for your support buddy 🙏
I set up a Patreon subscription. I am a DevOps Engineer. If you ever need to move to a more distributed setup let me know.
Thank you for your support! But to keep costs low, we had to keep for one server for now. But you’re in my mind if needed :)
I don’t know if you already run on docker, but you could run on docker in order to simulate a distributed setup and be able to move the various pieces in and out as needed, also portainer and traefik are very nice for this, if you create a common network for all containers with a bit of docker compose magic you have a plug and play kind of setup
If u need it I have a HomeLab where I can host an instance of it
Same. I’m happy to answer any questions or assist with the infra. This is basically what us idiots DevOps/SRE do on a daily basis: cut costs while improving performance and reliability.
I joined this instance for the NSFW, but at the moment it is the best performing instance I am on, so I am subscribing to all my tech communities through here as well. In other words, my NSFW account is now my main account. LOL. Going to Patreon for sure.
EDIT: I signed up for $5/month. Keep up the good work!
PS: Would you mind sharing your docker-compose file? I want to deploy a lemmy instance on GCP to help strengthen the network.
Thank you for your support! But I really didn’t changed the compose file. I just used default ansible setup for simplicity.
I suggest you to use XRP, TRX and LTC for cheap transaction fees and speed, and check out a VPS provider called IONOS.
Edit: I suggest you BTW to open an OnlyFans and Fansly account for the instance and try to carry creators to the platform maybe you can make a special community for them and get some extra donations.
Do you have a particular coin for this in mind? I don’t want to seperate this much.
XRP
Just a headsup if you’re trying to get on Open Collective, it looks like that might be another patreon scenario:
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🫡 good idea.
Thank you so much for hosting this instance. I appreciate it and will help with a small contribution of a few dollars per month from now own. ❤️
Thank you! Every dollar is important and you can be sure that we will use every single dollar for this instance.
I would gladly send Monero [XMR] if you had the option.
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Check the post again, they added a monero option
Maybe I’ve already did? I have plausible deniability ;) The Monero blockchain is not transparent.
But for the sake of transparency, if the admins want to, they can post a monthly summary of XMR donations.
Of course. I’ll check what I can do.
Of course, I just wanted to let you know in case you didn’t see it. A monthly summary would be appreciated
Would it be possible to set up Liberapay as a payment method? I don’t know their policy on NSFW-related projects, but I really enjoy it as a payment option since they don’t take anything off what’s donated, give many different donation options, and is run by a non-profit that made the site’s code open-source.
Unfortunately I can’t create account there since I can’t use PayPal nor Stripe.
Why can’t you use pp?
I live where it’s banned :/
Also PayPal hates anything related to human sexuality
It is done. Via github if that is okay.
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Currently Ukraine. May change in the future.
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I can’t say that for a while. I don’t want to doxx myself.
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Yeah it doesn’t but its a shield in front of host itself. We’re not doing anything illegal here but still.
I mean, it would be trivial to find for anyone who cares to run a ping and do a Google search for the IP it resolves. You’re definitely not shielding yourself from any government agencies by keeping it secret.
The reason they won’t reveal is because Pornography is flat out banned in Ukraine, if we revealed this someone might report us and get the host taken away again, similar to what happened when the server used Hetzner.
Probably a really stupid and ignorant question, but how are you hosting in Ukraine when they are at war?
They need money now more than before. Why would they stop exporting stuff?
People still live, work and study over there. The country is big and the front is away from many people lives.
