I have a friend, cough ;)

Who signs up for those cheap unlimited $10/Year Hosts, and then proceeds to use it to host popular video and audio previews. Usually the host kicks him out after a few days, resource policy etc..
But in the meantime he has sapped out 50GB's or so. effectively reducing his BW costs to ~$0.20-0.30 per Gig.

He does this on a regular basis, using a php script to load balance across the however many cheap accounts he has running, and maintain the URl linking.

Is this morally wrong? Or is it a viable great way of getting cheap bandwidth for large files or download mirrors.

Would it definately be wrong if he, resigned up after a different name the day after, and repeated the process? :rolleyes:

Yeah, it is called fraud to submit bullsh*t info ;)

great idea!

im glad i dont offer unlimited packages :D

Using what you're sold (heh) is fine, using fake information to obtain those services is wrong.

Fair play to him - if people insist on offering unlimited services they have to pay the consequences when it is abused.

Im willing to bet that using shared accounts simply for file serving is against just about every TOS there is, which makes what he's doing a pretty shady thing to do.

-Brendan

Shady but a good way of teaching unlimited hosts a lesson :)

Originally posted by mbarron
Is this morally wrong? Or is it a viable great way of getting cheap bandwidth for large files or download mirrors.Or both?

Of course it's "morally wrong." Your friend is entering into a business agreement accepting certain terms, while intending to to violate that agreement to the largest extent possible; and doing so repeatedly. Kind of hard to defend the ethics of that.

Originally posted by mbarron
Who signs up for those cheap unlimited $10/Year Hosts

nothing wrong with it at all

I can't imagine there would be anything morally wrong with abusing a host and then moving to another. The Catholic Church has been using the method for decades.

If the host has sold your friend unlimited bandwidth, use it :-). Maybe he might even have a case in court if he can prove he signed up for a serivce they failed to provide.

Everytime we have an unlimited host here who swears by his "unlimited bandwidth" plans, maybe we can chip in together and 'hire' your friend :) (j/k)

Originally posted by UH-Matt
Shady but a good way of teaching unlimited hosts a lesson :)

Agreed :D:agree:

Morally wrong? Yeah, probably. However, a worthy cause which should indirectly teach unlimited hosts a lesson? Most definitely. Will it teach them that maybe they should record IP addresses on their signup pages? Without a doubt.

Should someone really want his webhosting account, he can find some open proxy servers to use to open them up. Or he could use a friends computer, aol dialup, etc, etc.

How else can you handle massive numbers of downloads?

I mean apart from getting a dedicated server, your up the creek without a paddle if your on a low income.

And don't start telling me about using banner ads for income etc, they just don't work. No one clicks on the damn things.

So they say its unlimited do they? Lets just see what the true meaning of unlimited really is.

BTW: Resigning up after a different name is perfectly legal if you use abbreviations of your own name. eg.
Tom Smith
T Smith
Tom S
Thomas Smith
etc... The fact that the signup script doesn't recognise this, is the hosts problem. IMHO

Originally posted by mbarron

BTW: Resigning up after a different name is perfectly legal if you use abbreviations of your own name. eg.
Tom Smith
T Smith
Tom S
Thomas Smith
etc... The fact that the signup script doesn't recognise this, is the hosts problem. IMHO

Thanks so much for the tip. I'll be sure to use it when it comes time for social security benefits.

I have a partial solution to your bandwidth problem. After much searching, I found this host that offers a volume discount for bw. Just 70 cents a gig. It's called mbarron.net.

wlandman: Obviously its not a fix-all solution but it'st basic steps that should be taken.

Originally posted by mbarron

Who signs up for those cheap unlimited $10/Year Hosts, and then proceeds to use it to host popular video and audio previews. Usually the host kicks him out after a few days, resource policy etc..
But in the meantime he has sapped out 50GB's or so. effectively reducing his BW costs to ~$0.20-0.30 per Gig.

He does this on a regular basis, using a php script to load balance across the however many cheap accounts he has running, and maintain the URl linking.

Is this morally wrong? Or is it a viable great way of getting cheap bandwidth for large files or download mirrors.

Would it definately be wrong if he, resigned up after a different name the day after, and repeated the process? :rolleyes:

OK it's wrong if he resigns up as a completely different person at the end of the day again, he's breaking a contract, but if like the other party said, a shortend version of the true name, then it's the host fault.

But I love what he's doing. as long as the files are legal.

since nobody likes to put up or shut up here is my offer for your friend, If the files are legal I would be happy to help him, in his cause. Please have your friend contact me to run his load balancing php script.

Mike

If those hosts offer him unlimited bandwidth it's their own fault. They shouldn't promise something which they can't keep - and noone can keep that promise. But on his part it is abuse and he shouldn't be doing this.

John