Post

Great read on what it means to run different kinds of ATProto services, that along the way does a good job of explaining that we don’t run instances here.

unfoldingdiagrams.leaflet.pubHow small can ATproto get, really? - Unfolding DiagramsDoes an independent Bluesky stack really cost thousands?

Blaine

@blaine.bsky.social

27 Jan

Roundabout runs a full, independent atproto stack for each community in the $10s of dollars per community per month. Getting below that is easily possible, either by combining the community infrastructure and/or by making latency tradeoffs.

fry69

@fry69.dev

Are those communities with the full atproto stack connected to the "Atmosphere", e.g. do they get the full atproto firehose? Or are they separate "islands"? Basically a cluster of (or even just one) PDS with a combined AppView+relay, only serving and seeing community accounts/participants?

27/1/26, 4:02 pm0 reposts0 likes

Blaine

@blaine.bsky.social

27 Jan

Right now they're islands, with fully independent PLC, PDS, etc. We could turn on the firehose, but we need to figure out what that means from a UX perspective, first. Taking things step by step. 😊

fry69

@fry69.dev

27 Jan

Then it is more like hosting a phpBB or Discourse community IMHO, which can easily be done for $10/mo. Consuming the full, global atproto firehose and hydrating events in an AppView is a different beast and probably not doable for $10/mo. Except maybe with tricks/clever filtering?

Blaine

@blaine.bsky.social

27 Jan

Yeah, exactly. These communities don't/won't need to follow the full feed, and backfill is super easy where bits are missing. Lots of options to set that up from an architectural perspective, and they all work out very low-cost on a per-community basis.