Thread

1. hyperhello · 1791074194 · focus · HN ↗

   These shouldn't even exist without a negotiated contract.

   I can subscribe to your service for a specific fee on a monthly basis ($20/month say), and take the risk of losing that month's fee if your service or I make mistakes, or I can choose to drop another $20 mid-month, or anything for convenience.

   Saying that the computer will "control" the billing and can run haywire tells me that I don't want to be anywhere near your pile of bad incentives.

   1. Retric · 1791078681 · focus · HN ↗

      Monthly electricity bills are based on usage, and it works well but there’s a limit to how surprising a bill can be. The difference is the relative orders of magnitude you can be charged for these services you can go from 20$/month to 200k/month without warning.

      1. handoflixue · 1791079807 · focus · HN ↗

         There is also a hard physical limit on how much electricity you can use before you blow out the fuse box

         1. firecall · 1791080129 · focus · HN ↗

            Also, people don't casually swing by my house and start using my electricity.

            So my powerbills are predictable.

            Whereas traffic spikes to websites are not.

            This age of abusive AI crawlers and the non-revenue generating traffic has been a very real problem for me!

            1. ninalanyon · 1791103678 · focus · HN ↗

               > Whereas traffic spikes to websites are not.

               But it would be trivial for the platform to rate limit traffic.

               1. IsTom · 1791104272 · focus · HN ↗

                  You need to be aware of all ways outside people can rack up your bill. If you've got experience it's okay, but getting hit with a huge bill because you left an S3 bucket out in the open is something that has happened too many times to people starting out.

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