• Big service providers can and have lost your data.
• Requiring an internet connection to turn on your light while you're home is asinine.
• Privacy, of course.

No! But it can be if you like.

My setup involves a $10/mo and $5/mo Linode VPS. One hosts my own Matrix (Synapse) server and an IRC bouncer and the other is other random small services like an always-online Syncthing peer.

Ben Whitley github.com/purplg Just someone who loves computers.

I have a tendency to move fast (sorry!), so please remind me to slow down if I go too fast.

Emacs is a Lisp engine that was turned into an editor. The core is written in C but most of it is written in Emacs Lisp. This enables you to change pretty much anything about it at runtime.