Having spent a good amount of the last several weeks working on several self hosted things,I would have to agree. Simple projects shouldn’t take long… But some shit happens.

When something is done and working, it is satisfying.

As an old IT guy I empathize with the control of data. I have my array of self-hosted servers and love my CLI.

With that said, the older I get the less patience I have for hacking it together and supporting it. I still prefer privacy, and indeed Firecore Infuse is “Private by design” by their own statement. It’s not open source and I am not clear if it’s audited, but for as long as it lasts I’m happy friends and family less technically inclined have a simple easy familiar interface which I don’t have to support.

I will say I’m impressed A Pi4 works so well for jellyfin streaming. I guess it’s not transcoding, so it’s just a database and file share.

VLC is a great way to work with AppleTV, if you are willing to trade a few more clicks and less meta data for being free. It is by far the gold standard of being able to play anything.

The file format issue, plus the simple interface (especially for older less technically inclined) makes infuse worth the $100 lifetime cost (especially with family sharing).

What hardware are you using for your LibreELEC? Pi 3,4,5? With an external drive?

Self-hosted is not a way to make things free. Just lower cost than subscriptions overall. Using the full *Arr suite, with Usenet, your own hardware, and client boxes gives the users better control of the content they watch, but requires a nominal input of users time (plus some technical expertise), as well as an investment of some money both one time and annually.

Infuse’s lifetime time cost, when viewed in light of the total reduction of subscription cost (and an improved control of content) is worth it. I would definitely not pay a monthly amount to infuse, although it’s possible.

So far as Jellyfin’s app… As its free, I have low expectations. They fact that the developers have paid Apple for the SDK and put it as a free app on Apple TV and iOS is incredibly kind of them. They have a fair amount of code to look after and open source developers rarely get enough love or money.

I realize most will say kodi or android TV, but I have to say that Apple TV with Infuse (or Jellyfin) is really simple and reliable. I say that with the assumption that you mean a client, not the server. I would definitely put it on a NAS at minimum.