Andy Dills wrote:
I just can't parse the logic; the seperation between those who should pay
and those who shouldn't is based on volume, yet if those who generate too
much volume wish to eliminate the traffic entirely...they must pay for the
traffic of those who do not hit the arbitrary cutoff?
Query volume = server load and bandwidth = increased costs for the URIBL
operators. What's so hard to parse about that logic?
It's basically saying "we're willing to give away up to x mbytes of
bandwith and x cpu hours per day for free, beyond that, you need to pay
for the service.
At least MAPS was
logical in charging those who are for-profit, providing free to those who
are non-profit.
Well, AFAIK you're not a non-profit, you're a commercial ISP, so that
point isn't directly relevant to your situation. Still, I don't see
anywhere that says URIBL requires nonprofits to pay, or at least offer
them steep discounts on data feeds (SpamHaus does the latter.). They
don't exactly have their pricing on their website. AFAIK you've only
seen their "for profit mid sized ISP with heavy query load" pricing.
Or take Vernon's DCC project, he provides a value added
service to those who pay, not available free to anybody.
Well, not really true. DCC is free for those who contribute back to DCC.
Your queries to DCC double as volume report data, which is what makes
DCC work in the first place. So, here by using DCC you're directly
giving back. DCC is *NOT* free if you try to run a private server that
doesn't report its statistics back to the public DCC network.
What would make
sense would be if an RBL charged people who generate more than 500k
queries IF THEY DID NOT obtain a data feed and wanted to still query at at
high volume, perhaps the RBL would provide a special low latency server
only queryable by paying customers, which perhaps get the latest updates
faster than the public servers.
That doesn't really seem sensible to me. Who wants a "special server"
for a high volume site? It's a waste of your own bandwidth as well as
the RBLs.. You really want rsync at that point.
These arrangements are appropriate and
valid from an ethical and logical point of view and charge the appropriate
parties a cost-based fee.
That much makes sense, and the same makes
Vern is charging for his additional time, MAPS
charges those who in theory profit (directly or indirectly) from the
filtering, and in the last case the RBL would be charging for the traffic
and exclusive access.
Vern doesn't run maps anymore by the way.. so it's Vern
Perhaps I'm simply tired and unable to escape my Max Weber-esque Iron Cage
and grasp this seemingly inconsistent paradigm of charging those who wish
to reduce the bandwidth costs of an organization openly begging for
donations! They even charge non-profits for a barely reduced fee for the
data feed!
They do? Where is that price list?
How does that make sense unless profit is the motivation?
Gotta pay for the infrastructure somehow. The operators personal
finances aren't a long-lasting viable arrangement.
They
take an organization who has no profit motive and charge them for reducing
uribl's bandwidth, all in the name of a common desire to reduce mail
abuse? The website seems to have a motto of "because spam sucks." That
certainly serves as no explanation or motive for charging those whose
primary desire would be to both reduce spam AS WELL AS the expenses of a
donation requesting, swag peddling, ad profiting organization! (are google
ads a mild yet socially accepted form of spam? I would say no, some might
say yes)
I must be stupid, I'm not able to invent an explanation that doesn't
involve a profit motive.
Perhaps they're just trying to cover their operating cost, as opposed to
operating at a loss?
Personally, I think you're jumping to conclusions for no good reason.
