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Why do we keep recommending dead hosts?

General Discussion by minh1987 16 replies 1.3K views
minh1987

Member OP

#1

Sticky thread in general section still lists OVHcloud. OVHcloud closed in my country last year. DNS points to parking page. Three other stickies have same issue.

What is maintenance burden here? Are mods active? In my country we rotate stickies quarterly. Seems better system.

Also saw Vultr recommended in networking FAQ. I've seen enough of these companies get rolled up by private equity that I don't trust the brand to stay independent, and the free tier vanished. New users still sign up expecting 5 USD VPS — https://www.vultr.com/pricing/ hasn't shown that for a while.

Who updates these? Can we automate dead link checking?

phở at 3AM, deploy at 4
mediaaustin

Member

Deliverability Nerd

#2

Dead host recommendations are deliverability problem too.

For what it's worth, I checked three sticky threads. SPF records still point to ovhcloud.com. Domain expired but DNS MX lingers. New user copies config, email bounces, thinks their setup broken. Wasted support threads.

DMARC report shows zero alignment because domain does not resolve. This is not user error. This is stale documentation causing reputation damage elsewhere.

Sticky maintenance should include mail infrastructure check, not just HTTP availability.

SPF, DKIM, DMARC — holy trinity ✉️
ME

Member

#3

What you want from volunteer

Sticky made 3 years ago, mod busy, what you want

I check contabo.com last week, still alive but prices changed, old sticky has wrong plan

In my country we say "who does not work, does not eat" )))) you want fix, you fix

DA

Member

#4
MeowNail said:
You want fix, you fix

This is how documentation rots. "Volunteer" does not mean "abandoned." In Barcelona we have same problem with city tech meetups, old venue closed 2022, new people still go to wrong address.

I think automation is possible. Simple cron job, HEAD request to listed domains, flag 404 or NXDOMAIN. Not heavy work.

marcus_qc

Member

#5
mediaaustin said:
DMARC report shows zero alignment

Same pain in Montreal. Client copied SPF from sticky, used OVHcloud relay for transactional mail. Bounced for three weeks before they asked me why Shopify receipts hit spam.

I do not blame mods directly. I blame system where sticky has no owner. Wiki model better: last editor visible, timestamp automatic. Shame works.

42U and still growing
mediaaustin

Member

Deliverability Nerd

#6
marcus_qc said:
Wiki model better

Wikimedia has "dated references" bot. Runs monthly, flags dead links. We could do lighter version.

But real problem is deeper. Sticky recommends OVHcloud for cheap dedicated. OVHcloud still sells dedicated, but price range moved. Old sticky says 4 EUR, actual entry now higher in EUR zone because energy adjustment. New user signs up, invoice shock, comes back angry at forum not at OVHcloud.

Price drift is harder to auto-check than dead domain. Needs API or scraping.

SPF, DKIM, DMARC — holy trinity ✉️
Berlin1

Member

8 #7

I run check against contabo.com just now. Sticky lists "4 EUR VPS with 8GB RAM." Current site shows 4.99 EUR, 4GB RAM, 300GB SSD. Same product name, different specs. This is not dead host. This is zombie host. Looks alive, brains wrong.

Automation for price is possible. Contabo has no API for retail plans. But HTML structure stable, simple xpath could work. I will not write it, I have job.

https://contabo.com/en/vps/

minh1987

Member OP

#8
Berlin1 said:
Zombie host

Exactly. In VN we have many zombie hosts. Company bought by bigger company, brand stays, support gone, latency worse. User thinks same product.

My original point about Vultr: free tier gone, 5 USD plan gone. Now 3 USD plan exists but is IPv6 only and 10GB disk. Sticky says "5 USD VPS" like it is recommendation. New user from Philippines or Indonesia sees 5 USD, signs up, gets surprise. Not trust building.

phở at 3AM, deploy at 4
RE

Member

#9

Vultr Singapore POP still good for me. Latency to local eyeball ISPs under 5ms. But I agree sticky is wrong about pricing. I pay 6 USD for plan with IPv4 now. 3 USD plan useless for most, no BGP, no reverse DNS.

I do not care about independence or private equity. I care POP stays open. Singapore not on every map. Vultr has it. OVHcloud does not. That is my filter.

SE

Member

#10

Following. I maintain small wiki for ARM board projects and dead links are constant pain. If someone builds tool I will use it.

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