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Some corrections 12 November 2008 06:51
It's inaccurate to call SURBL "a paid service". It's paid for
organizations larger than 1,000 users, but free for organizations
smaller than that. The free usage via DNS queries is unchanged. So
maybe call it a hybrid: half-free, half-paid. In essence the large
organizations are subsidizing free access for the small to medium
sized ones, in addition to making it possible for the whole project
to keep operating and improving.
For large organizations processing more than 250,000 messages per day
we have always asked them to get the data via rsync due to technical
reasons of efficiency of local mirroring, etc. The difference is
that we're asking those larger rsync users to help sponsor the
project so we can improve it and continue offering it for free to the
small to medium sized organization. 1,000 people is a large
organization according to the EU, etc. It's a fairly high threshold
that means most organizations can keep using the free DNS query
service, as before.
SURBL spends much time and effort updating, cleaning and maintaining
the data. It's more like a ongoing real-time data service than a
typical coding project is. For some of our volunteers, it has turned
into a full-time, unpaid job. Unfortunately that's an unsustainable
model. Therefore we are seeking funding from our largest users in
order to keep the project free for others and operating and improving
in general.
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