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The 'lifetime' deal that outlived the company

General Discussion by herebungkus 8 replies 525 views
herebungkus

Member OP

🌏 SEA represent

#1

So I have this lifetime VPS from RackNerd, bought 2022 for 89$. Can you believe it is still running now? Thank you. The company website is gone since 2024, no ticket replies, no twitter posts, dead dead. But my debian container still here, reboots fine, IP same, everything working slow-slow but working wkwkwk.

I check my bank: still getting charged 0$ because I prepaid lifetime. But then I look closer... there is a stripe charge every month for 0.00$ from "RACKNERD LLC". Can you believe this? Thank you. The charge is zero but it is processing. To where? Stripe account still active? Who owns the servers now? Very mystery.

I scared to open ticket in case someone remembers and pulls the plug wkwkwk. But also curious. Has anyone else seen this? Ghost host still billing zero dollars? Thank you for any insight.

wrap it, ship it, pray it
olya

Member

Always Free

#2

Pro tip: this is more common than people think with Stripe.

1. Check if your VPS has any outbound network connectivity besides SSH
2. Run `traceroute` to see who owns the upstream ASN now
3. Look up the IP range in RIPE — it may have been sold or transferred

Heads up: some dead hosts get acquired by shell companies for tax loss harvesting. The servers keep running because shutting them down costs more effort than leaving them. Your "0.00$" charge is likely an automated subscription that failed to cancel properly in Stripe's system.

If you need a real free tier with actual support, Oracle Cloud free tier gives you 4 ARM cores forever. I wrote a guide in my signature.

licensing is a suggestion
btrfs

Member

snapshot obsessive

3 #3

1) your situation is fascinating
A) legally
I) who owns your data?
Ii) who is liable for breaches?
B) technically
I) 1) hardware failure with no replacement?
A) parts wear out
I) disks especially
2) my advice
A) 1) backup everything now
2) migrate to something with support
A) I) OVHcloud is decent
Ii) HostHatch for budget
3) emotions
A) I would feel
1) curious
2) anxious
3) both

harbourops

Member

#4
herebungkus said:
Stripe charge every month for 0.00$

Best practices for VPS continuity planning:

- Review provider financial disclosures where available
- Maintain offline backups with verified restore procedures
- Document all API keys and access credentials externally

This scenario illustrates why I moved my clients to Hetzner. Infrastructure without accountability is a liability regardless of price point.

I've been with them since 2019 and the server auction — https://www.hetzner.com/sb — still gets me better price to performance than anything else in Europe.

pieter_rtm

Member

12 #5

@herebungkus

To be honest: your VPS is running on autopilot. As said, probably a colo contract still paid through some holding company. Numbers:

- 89$ lifetime = ~3.70$/month over 2 years
- Actual cost to host: 5-15$/month
- Someone is eating 1.30-11.30$/month per customer

My guess: forgotten AWS/GCP credits, or original founder's personal card still active. Seen it before. Milk it until it dies, but dont trust it.

Specs if you migrate to us:
- 1 vCPU / 2GB / 20GB NVMe
- 10$/month, no lifetime scams

Containers before it was cool
tomhider

Member

Manchester

#6

The stripe thing is probbaly a failed webhook retry loop they never fixed. I had same wth a dead saas once. Chrged me 0.00$ for 8 months til I cancelled the card. Runs together sometimes you know. Never trust liftime deals tho. They all die. You just dont know when. He says I shoudl migrate but im too lzay. Wkkwkwk

JE

Member

#7

What Debian version and kernel are you running?

KE

Member

#8

I had the same stripe loop with a dead host

Prague

Member

#9

Shell company theory feels thin.

iron core, iron will

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