You might also enjoy a selection from Hark, a Vagrant.

You can get away without a database (and assuming you don’t need anything too complicated, I recommend not using one). I’ve had a good experience with GetSimple - it’s a content management system (like WordPress) but uses regular files instead of a database. Great for basic content, and still easy to set up and manage.

Self-hosting is a bit complicated if you’re not already comfortable running a Linux server. Not sure about privacy (though I’m not sure how privacy intersects a public-facing website), but there are lots of hosting providers out there. I use DreamHost and have had a great experience there.

Beans

Get your SpongeBob-ass casing outta here

Imagine this situation if a human replaced the AI.

Imagine a human who wants to write a book. They’ve read hundreds of other books already, and lots of other things besides books. Then they write a book. The final work probably contains an amalgamation of all the other things they’ve read–similar characters, themes, plot points, etc.–but it’s a unique combination, so it’s distinct from those other works. No copyright violation.

Now imagine that same human has only ever read one book. Over and over. They know only the one book. The human wants to write a new book. But they only have experience with the one they’ve read again and again. So the book they write is almost exactly the same as the one book they read. That’s a copyright violation.

Training an AI model is not a crime, any more than reading a book is a crime. You’re not making “copies” or profiting directly from that single work.