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oldcynic

I set it up, once, it gets automatically renewed indefinitely.

Haven't had to change a CC number, or trip over any of the usual selection of billing and renewal gotchas.

Fits my definition of free, even after valuing my time as non-zero!

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Again, HTTP had no ongoing cost, HTTPS has an ongoing cost

What ongoing cost? This is absurd. It’s $0, the automation is free, and the config is free. Stop spreading FUD.

So I can stop paying those bills the web-hosting company keeps bugging me about?

Yes, you can host your own server and use your home internet connection. This is the whole issue really - the web was designed as a decentralized, anarchistic, read/write thing, and it's subsequently become a thing where it's increasingly difficult to participate unless you're doing so on a professional basis or relying on somebody else's professional services. Maybe this is just how it has to be, but for people who can remember a couple of decades back it's pretty depressing.

(btw I've used LE both in my day jobs and for some personal stuff, and I very much appreciate its existence).

so I can stop paying those home internet connection bills that keep stacking up every month?

If you personally don't want to have an internet connection then I'm afraid it's going to be hard for you to run a webserver for free. I think this would be unusual though.

the point is that http isn't free of ongoing costs.

Are you paying for http on top of your internet connection costs?

I'd probably get a more expensive plan that had good upload speeds.

Or I might get free access from my library and they don't permit me to run a web-server.

> HTTP had no ongoing cost

If you consider constant warnings from most browsers that annoy your users and coming up with new excuses as to why you haven't moved to HTTPS as not being a cost…

That's an artificially induced cost, though. You are correct that I'm going to have to letsencrypt my blog if I want to people to be able to read it (I might just take it down). But I don't think the people are correct who are saying that a) there's any good inherent reason for me to do that and b) this will cost me no time or effort. I've done the LE thing before and, at least in my case, it's not a zero-effort thing.

In this thread alone you've already expended more energy than it would have taken to just do the right thing with your blog.

This is incorrect - I won't go into details as I'm busy fixing my server and need to go out in a couple of hours.

HTTP has an enormous ongoing cost in the form of loss of security and privacy.

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