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I've been involved with a number of DNS related companies and projects. Your biggest cost sink will be abuse. Some peddler of illicit images or terror group wi

by dsl 12y ago

I've been involved with a number of DNS related companies and projects. Your biggest cost sink will be abuse. Some peddler of illicit images or terror group will set up camp, Amazon will take down all of your records. You'll realize you need to run your own infrastructure. You setup a few boxes. Someone starts selling fake rolexes and your boxes get taken offline. You move them to a friendlier host. A HYIP gets setup under your domain and they don't pay someone, which results in a 150 Gbps DDoS attack. The FBI shows up. You get cynical dealing with the lowest scum of the internet on a regular basis. People are constantly asking for new features and unwilling to pay. You're funding the whole thing out of pocket. Eventually Dyn shows up and offers to take the whole thing off your hands. A year later they shut it down. Some guy on Hacker News announces some Dynamic DNS or free DNS hosting provider, and you smirk to yourself.

stormbrew 12y ago
Yep, this is basically what I meant. I mean, I applaud the good intentions and I sure would love for there to be a good and stable public dyndns solution, but history is not on side with that outcome unfortunately. :(
stevekemp 12y ago
You paint a scary picture. I did evaluate a couple of potentially negative outcomes, but they largely boiled down to Amazon dropping the domain, or having a sudden influx of faked traffic resulting in large bills. I will keep a more cautious eye out ..
- msisk6 12y ago
  I can't emphasis enough for you to pay attention to what the folks above have said. I also have some experience with a large DNS service and you just wouldn't believe the amount of time and resources that get allocated to dealing with abuse.
robalfonso 12y ago
This. Abuse causes a huge headache and will drain resources. If you are sincerely interested in offering this, provide a great value and feature set but charge enough to keep the garbage out..its a catch 22 in that having a higher price keeps the service profitable but having a higher price also means possibly never gaining traction. If you ever figure out how to solve that problem scrap this and open up a business selling that solution :)

by dsl 12y ago

stormbrew 12y ago

Yep, this is basically what I meant. I mean, I applaud the good intentions and I sure would love for there to be a good and stable public dyndns solution, but history is not on side with that outcome unfortunately. :(

stevekemp 12y ago

You paint a scary picture. I did evaluate a couple of potentially negative outcomes, but they largely boiled down to Amazon dropping the domain, or having a sudden influx of faked traffic resulting in large bills. I will keep a more cautious eye out ..

msisk6 12y ago
I can't emphasis enough for you to pay attention to what the folks above have said. I also have some experience with a large DNS service and you just wouldn't believe the amount of time and resources that get allocated to dealing with abuse.

robalfonso 12y ago

This. Abuse causes a huge headache and will drain resources. If you are sincerely interested in offering this, provide a great value and feature set but charge enough to keep the garbage out..its a catch 22 in that having a higher price keeps the service profitable but having a higher price also means possibly never gaining traction. If you ever figure out how to solve that problem scrap this and open up a business selling that solution :)