Aldryic C'boas
The Pony
Had an interesting chat with some kid on IRC today. Apparently his 'buddy' told him that we're some sort of charity, just giving away free service and DDoS Filtering. Transcript at http://cboas.ru/strawman.txt and below:
17:28:56 -!- Irssi: Starting query in Frantech with Strawman
17:29:11 <Aldryic> What can I do for you?
17:29:28 <Strawman> I'm [REDACTED] from [REDACTED]. I would like to know if buyvm would like to kindly sponsor
a server for the IRC network.
17:29:43 <Strawman> I heard from a friend of mine that you guys do sponsorships
17:29:50 <Strawman> So he told me to connect to your IRC and ask
17:29:59 <Strawman> (nicely)
17:30:23 <Aldryic> Hmm.. sorry to say, but I think your friend mislead you. We've sponsored our *own* projects,
but even those are budgeted. We don't really do external sponsorships.
17:31:10 <Strawman> I can put buyvm info in the motd, etc if you want
17:31:24 <Strawman> A minimum spec 128mb vps is all that's required
17:31:56 <Strawman> Don't mind openvz either, as long as the clocks are kept up to date every few weeks or so.
17:32:02 <Aldryic> Apologies, but not something we really do. We already run our own IRCd, which has been around
for over a decade. That, and our 128s are only 15$/yr. Not really bank breakers.
17:32:29 <Strawman> Oh well. I wonder why companies don't like sponsorships.
17:32:53 <Aldryic> Liability, primarily. Fairness to their clients, as well.
17:33:05 <Strawman> What's the liability issue
17:33:07 <Aldryic> If I gave away one free service, I would have no right to tell the next person 'no' when
they wanted the same opportunity.
17:33:13 <Aldryic> Quite soon, we would be running a charity, not a business.
17:33:33 <Strawman> I mean, it is a sponsorship so it's not like you aren't getting something out of it
17:34:34 <Aldryic> Actually, history has shown that sponsorships either net us a) little to no income, or
B) unsavoury income.
17:34:50 <Aldryic> Even if we were a charity, there's astrong chance we wouldn't sponsor IRCds.
17:34:56 <Aldryic> That's just asking to load a network with DDoS.
17:35:14 <Strawman> Yeah, you're right about the ddos part
17:35:23 <Strawman> I thought you guys could handle that stuff though
17:36:22 <Aldryic> There's a difference between 'can', and 'asking for it'.
17:36:39 <Aldryic> Surely you weren't expecting to get free DDoS mitigation out of us?
17:36:53 <Strawman> As far as I know I haven't gotten any ddos attacks
17:37:02 <Strawman> My network is not really that big
17:37:29 <Aldryic> Well, now you're just undermining your "advertise in the motd" arguement.
17:37:36 <Aldryic> But that still loops back to the earlier point.
17:37:47 <Strawman> I'm planning to expand the network
17:37:47 <Aldryic> If we gave you a free ircd, we'd have to do the same for others.
17:37:54 <Aldryic> Which is not something we're interested in.
17:37:56 <Strawman> I currently fund two servers on the network
17:38:00 <Strawman> a hub and a leaf
17:38:50 <Aldryic> And now you're stuck in a circular problem. A larger network has a higher chance of
attracting DDoS.
17:39:23 <Strawman> Yes, it does. All depends on how staff, etc handle problems.
17:40:40 <Aldryic> Which does nothing to alleviate the attacks themselves. And still loops back around
to the earlier question of, 'Surely you weren't expecting to get free DDoS mitigation
out of us?'.
17:40:56 <Strawman> I don't know how buyvm handles DDoS attacks
17:41:13 <Strawman> My friend says that you guys handle it okay but of course you guys don't like it at all
17:41:33 <Strawman> Also, what is your method of DDoS mitigation?
17:42:14 <Aldryic> How we handle it is irrelevant - it's not a service we give out for free. Nor are any
of our other packages.
17:43:41 <Strawman> Does a buyvm package come with ddos mitigation?
17:43:53 <Aldryic> No, the Filtered IPs are extra.
17:44:04 <Strawman> In that case I was talking about a normal package
17:44:14 <Strawman> So I guess you guys nullroute if you guys get a ddos from a normal host?
17:44:55 <Aldryic> That's correct.
17:45:05 <Strawman> That generally sounds fine to me.
17:45:22 <Strawman> Every host does that (I believe) unless you're blacklotus
17:47:50 <Aldryic> Most hosts will nullroute an attacked IP. Few hosts will forgive multiple hits on their
network.
17:48:34 <Strawman> Do you guys forgive multiple hits on your network?
17:48:42 <Strawman> Or do you demand the client order ddos filtered IPs
17:49:32 <Aldryic> When a client receives attacks that affect other clients, we inform them that the IP will
remain nulled until a Filtered IP is purchased. Repeated attacks larger than what we're
willing to mitigate on Filtered IPs are asked to leave.
17:50:03 <Strawman> Then what do they do? What if they relied on you
17:51:05 <Aldryic> We remind them that we're not willing to tank ridiculous floods for 3$/mo, and suggest
they invest in large-scale mitigation such as Staminus if they insist on hosting items
that get frequently targetted.
17:53:22 <Strawman> This is why large IRC networks can't use buyvm
17:53:34 <Strawman> They have to rely on ~server sponsorships~ to pay for the servers
17:54:11 <Aldryic> Large IRC networks cannot use us because we do not provide the high-level mitigation
necessary against the attacks they face.
17:54:16 <Aldryic> It has nothing to do with sponsorship.
17:54:35 <Strawman> Well I know IRC networks are fairly cheap and can't afford servers usually if they have
too many users.
17:54:46 <Strawman> So they rely on super huge hosts to support the servers.
17:55:10 <Strawman> An example of this would be freenode. Although a few hosts pulled out after a huge episode
of attacks they got for like a week or more
17:55:27 <Aldryic> I fail to see how semi-accurate trivia is relevant to the issue at hand.
17:56:16 <Strawman> I guess you guys don't do sponsorships because of ddos risks, users exposed to the sponsor
info, and financials?
17:56:33 <Aldryic> We don't do sponsorships because we are a business, and not a charity.
17:57:02 <Strawman> Just because you sponsor a server does not make you charity
17:57:10 <Strawman> Say, are you staff of buyvm?
17:57:29 <Aldryic> Yes. I run billing, support, and policy enforcement.
17:57:36 <Aldryic> tl;dr - the buck stops here.
17:57:39 <Strawman> If you can, give me a range of your profit margin and your net income.
17:57:45 <Aldryic> ...are you insane?
17:58:03 <Strawman> No, just wanting to see how good of a business buyvm is
17:58:12 <Aldryic> I believe we're done here. Unless you are simply THAT determined to make me repeat
myself a third time.
17:59:44 <Strawman> Okay. Thank you good sir, for informing me on how cruel buyvm is. I'll make sure to
tell all of my friends to never buy from you again, or discontinue their plans and
move to a much cheaper and better host. Btw -- my friend said you guys were really
shit. He told me to ask you guys about this just to confirm that you guys were dicks.
Turns out, he was right.
17:59:45 <Strawman> Bye
