Jay West wrote:
Perhaps some DOLT leeching the entire site causes them
to be shut down
by their provider due to bandwidth. Perhaps some selfabsorbed arrogant
miscreant sucking down the entire site, costs this guy a sudden $200
bill that he wasn't expecting due to bandwidth. How RUDE not to respect
the site owners wishes.
1. If the person didn't want to share the files, then why are they up on
the 'net in the first place?
2. QoS has been around for over a decade, both software and hardware.
Put bandwidth controls on your stuff if you fear it will cost you money.
My FTP server limits to 16KB/s because I pay for my bandwidth.
3. Not everyone has to host their files on a plan that will cost them
crazy money if abused. There are $8/month plans with gigabytes of space
and bandwidth that will automatically throttle if abused (or shut off
temporarily if exhausted, then re-enable at the next billing cycle).
Let me give you a good analogy. Lets say I have a desk
in the basement
that's an antique. I want to give it to a good home. So I put it out in
the front lawn saying "Free to a good home".
You then take the desk. And all my lawn furniture. And the garden lights
from the planters. Your argument is "oh, you put it all outside your
house so of course I can take it all".
That analogy doesn't make any sense and isn't mappable to a file
archive/repository.
Sorry, touched a nerve.
Sorry, but you still haven't proven your point. See points #1-#3 above,
especially #2 (which I am surprised you are ignoring, especially given
that you run an ISP). QoS solves the cost problem, at which point there
aren't any problems left.
Offering files online for the good of the community, then putting
arbitrary limits on access, doesn't make sense. You either want to help
people, or you don't.
I administered a multi-gigabyte archive on
ftp.cdrom.com from 1994 to
1998, and a Tandy archive from 1998 to present, and I have never ever
once told people they couldn't mirror. What if I get hit by a bus
tomorrow and the archives disappear? All my work (gathering,
organizing, etc.) would have been for naught! Hasn't anyone learned
anything from the Don Maslin incident?
--
Jim Leonard (trixter at
oldskool.org)
http://www.oldskool.org/
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