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Self-hosted Version

Is self-hosted version Free?#

VidCheck is open source and has a "free as in free speech" version of the platform for self-hosting with a very permissive MIT License like most of our other projects. In fact, all the features available in the self-hosted version are exactly the same as the managed service.

As mentioned in our philosophy, we strongly believe in developing open source software in the domain of journalism technology that adheres to the following four essential freedoms as outlined by the Free Software Foundation.

  • The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).
  • The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
  • The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others (freedom 2).
  • The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

Should you choose the self-hosted version?#

Self-hosted version of the platform might be a good option if you:

  • Have the technical resources/capabilities to deploy and manage a highly available platform.
  • Are not worried about deploying and maintaining a solution that can scale the platform to your organisation/audience.
  • Are not worried about performing upgrades manually risking downtime of the platform.
  • Do not want your content to be hosted in a cloud service provider.
  • Want to install the platform in-house. There are no licensing costs involved to do so.
  • Want to extend/customize certain features of the platform to your organisation's need that are not possible with the managed service. Reach out to us for any such features, we would love to hear from you.

What other options do you have?#

Like most of our other projects, we have a managed hosting service for VidCheck. It is the simplest way to get started with VidCheck and you don't have to worry about maintainence and upgrades going forward. You can read more about our managed hosting here.

If you are a WordPress user and would rather want to install VidCheck as a plugin instead of a stand-alone service, you could read about our WordPress plugin here.