Hi @robz@toot.robzazueta.com! (Thanks @beaware@social.beaware.live for bringing this to my attention)
You're right, our website is more about our self-service hosting option, and that's because that's what pays our day-to-day bills. It's an unfortunate reality of the open-source development model.
The project itself is licensed under GPLv3 and has always been this way. Your concerns over Automattic are well-founded and they also worry me.
That said, NodeBB is free and open-source, and you are encouraged to self-host it. That has been our mantra from day one, and still remains that way today.
R
