Platforms like Mastodon and Lemmy have none of the problems associated with commercial ones because they don’t aim to monetize the users of the platform.
This also means the developers or those running an instance might run into money problems and be cheaper for someone to buy to sell their data.
That’s true, but that still requires making deal with each instance operator on case by case basis. With a centralized platform you get access to the whole network all at once. I do think that it would be good to have some sort of a crowd funding model for ensuring that instance operators are able to operate without needing to resort to something like selling user data. At the end of the day it’s a question of creating the right incentives.
This also means the developers or those running an instance might run into money problems and be cheaper for someone to buy to sell their data.
That’s true, but that still requires making deal with each instance operator on case by case basis. With a centralized platform you get access to the whole network all at once. I do think that it would be good to have some sort of a crowd funding model for ensuring that instance operators are able to operate without needing to resort to something like selling user data. At the end of the day it’s a question of creating the right incentives.