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To provide services (such as incoming SMTP, SSH, etc.), one can rent a co-located box (or a User Mode Linux virtual colo) offsite, drive an outbound encrypted tunnel to that, and pass packets through the outbound connected pipe for all the ports and services blocked by Comcast. Linux servers can stay completely within the TOS. Dynamic IP addresses can change with no changes to the DNS tables. The best part of this is that if Comcast ever gets fiesty and NATs their users, there will be no interruption of service. Since you can choose whatever ports you want, an outbound tunnel will always work. At the user level, you can still use the web, download files, etc. without using bandwidth at the colo.

I am currently setting this up now with a local UML colo service, www.pdxcolo.net. $20/month, which is admittedly not free as in beer, but the cost is less painful than the enormous amount of Comcast zombie spam. And the colo can be shared, so real cheapskates can reduce the colo cost further.

I am glad Comcast is finally removing their heads from their posteriors about this. Maybe with some oxygen to their brains, they can make even more smart decisions. :-)

We at PDXcolo.net use User-mode Linux to provide virtual colocated hosting. We offer a range of plans from 64MB of RAM through 512MB, with disk space starting at 4GB and bandwidth starting at 30GB/month. Plans start at $20/mo, with additional bandwidth at $1.50/GB and disk at $1/GB.

We unlike some other providers have a very open TOS/AUP allowing you to do anything you would like that is legal and that doesn't include SPAM

Indeed, I'm co-owner of PDXcolo.net, using User-Mode Linux to do virtual hosting where you actually get root on the box. One of our customers has purchased the largest such system we offer, and proceeded to use it to run a chatnet.org site. Within days we were hit by 50+Mbps DDoS attacks, which actually took out our upstream provider's router at one point. He's still a customer, and we still have problems every once in a while, but we've been told by our upstream ISP that if something like this happens again, *we* are responsible for it. That's going to mean we get either disconnected (BAD) or fined (we can handle that), but it definitely means we won't be allowing that customer to run an IRC server anymore.

That said, other comments to the effect that if it isn't IRC it will be something else are entirely true. I've heard of DNS providers being DDoS'd out of existence because some pathetic 9 year old script kiddie decided to DDoS the *domain* of a site he doesn't like.

Personally, I wish backbone providers had a little more, um, backbone, when it comes to tracking bandwidth spikes through the net to actually catch the attackers. But no, they get paid for the bandwidth whether it's legitimate or not, so they couldn't care less.

Besides, I have two of them. And no, they can't have them back. ;-) They're the backbone of our startup company, PDXcolo.net. Sting and Narsil they're called.

A friend of mine and I are starting up a company called PDXcolo.net. We're using User-mode Linux to host virtual machines, where you get your own copy of the distro, your own RAM, etc., on a shared machine. You get full root access to the machine, and can (within reason) do anything you want with it. Our base packge (for $20/mo) includes ~64MHz of proc, 64MB of RAM, 2GB of disk (your distro is *not* part of that unless you make significant changes), and 10GB of transfer per month. Additional disk is only $1/GB/mo, and bandwidth is $1.50/GB. 'Machines' are available in power-of-two multiples of that basic config, so far up to 8 'slots', or 512/512/16/80. More can be arranged special-case.

If you're interested, email beta@pdxcolo.net and we'll get you set up soon (merchant account troubles are our main slowdown right now) on our initial machine. That box has 2x 200GB disks in a RAID-1 config. We're planning on doing something on the order of a 3x RAID-5 arrangement on all new hardware, and/or a significant SAN setup.

Our machines are located in a well-respected datacenter in downtown Portland (hence 'pdx', our airport code), and as we build up our infrastructure daily backups will be available over and above the RAID on the hosts. We've got one circuit so far that we've pushed to 25Mbps, an d will be adding more circuits as we get our first customers.

So, if what you're doing doesn't require mega processor or RAM usage, but lots of disk, you might consider using one of our virtual machines to host your app.

A friend of mine and I are starting up a company called PDXcolo.net. We're using User-mode Linux to host virtual machines, where you get your own copy of the distro, your own RAM, etc., on a shared machine. You get full root access to the machine, and can (within reason) do anything you want with it. Our base packge (for $20/mo) includes ~64MHz of proc, 64MB of RAM, 2GB of disk (your distro is *not* part of that unless you make significant changes), and 10GB of transfer per month. Additional disk is only $1/GB/mo, and bandwidth is $1.50/GB. 'Machines' are available in power-of-two multiples of that basic config, so far up to 8 'slots', or 512/512/16/80. More can be arranged special-case.

If you're interested, email beta@pdxcolo.net and we'll get you set up soon (merchant account troubles are our main slowdown right now) on our initial machine. That box has 2x 200GB disks in a RAID-1 config. We're planning on doing something on the order of a 3x RAID-5 arrangement on all new hardware, and/or a significant SAN setup.

Our machines are located in a well-respected datacenter in downtown Portland (hence 'pdx', our airport code), and as we build up our infrastructure daily backups will be available over and above the RAID on the hosts. We've got one circuit so far that we've pushed to 25Mbps, an d will be adding more circuits as we get our first customers.

So, if what you're doing doesn't require mega processor or RAM usage, but lots of disk, you might consider using one of our virtual machines to host your app.

We're starting up a company called pdxcolo.net, which will provide true virtual machine hosting in the form of User-mode Linux. We're currently building up our infrastructure, and are currently seeking beta testers.

For $20/mo (post-beta), you'll get:

• Roughly 64MHz worth of an Athlon XP (peaking to a full 2x00+ proc if no one else is using it that instant)
• 64MB of RAM
• 2GB of disk space (OS is not counted against that)
• 10GB of transfer per month
• Install anything you want, you have true root on the box
• Choice of Debain stable, testing, or unstable, soon RedHat 9.0, Gentoo and others

Beta testers (of which there will be a limited number) will get the first two months of service at half price, or in effect the initial 1-month beta period for free. If you're interested, email beta@pdxcolo.net and we'll take the first N (probably 30) people.

If you don't get in on the beta, we'll send you email when we go live and give you first crack at new hardware as we install it. You'll get your machine fully activated and ready for you to log into and configure usually within 30 seconds, and you can install whatever you need to from our local distribution mirrors.