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Comment by worldofmatthew | Hacker News Reader

Does not matter. Hetzner say Unlimited and Guaranteed traffic at 1Gbit/s with no fair use policy mentioned for that port speed.

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Although I agree, when you look around, and especially when you look at AWS, Hetzner's offer is still excellent in terms of value for money.

cloud traffic pricing is a massive ripoff, especially in europe where bandwidth is cheap

True, but Hetzner has no obligation to serve every customer. I would say this customer has gotten more than their money's worth and Hetzner is well within their rights to no longer provide service.

Relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1499/

But they also have a responsibility not to lie in their marketing, don't they?

Did or did Hertzner not offer this person an unthrottled 1 GBit/s every month they were an user.

have you ever used a "free refill", or an "all you can eat" buffet?

You cannot fill up your car's tank with soda at a "free refills" place, neither can you camp and eat 24/7 inside an "all-you-can-eat" buffet.

I don't think it's unreasonable to still call those services "unlimited" and let the restaurant/internet provider decide when to drop a customer that they don't want in their premises/on their infrastructure...

I suppose the difference is that it would be understandably unreasonable for someone to start filling extra containers at an unlimited soda refill, they would probably understand that they are pushing their luck.

If the restaurant sold 'Unlimited Soda, 2 liters per minute, £50/month' I would expect them to deliver on the very specific quantities they promised at the price they offered. If they tell me I'm over-dispensing, I think I'd be rightfully annoyed that they have over-promised.

Exactly. Hetzner doesn't sell you "850mbit/s for 24/7, 50€ a month". If they did, I agree with you that the OP should be rightfully annoyed about this letter.

Instead, Hetzner sells "unlimited bandwidth" the same way McDonalds sells "free refills". It's also understandably unreasonable for someone to start pushing data at the max rate for months non-stop, the same way it is unreasonable for people to fill 50 large cups with soda.

If people have accepted the "...within reason" argument for free refills and all-you-can-eat buffets, why not also accept it for data usage?

You are wrong. The product he had was for unlimited traffic on a guaranteed 1Gbit/s port. There are no limits listed, just a provider who offered something too cheaply and wants out.

False Advertising. Simple as.

That still doesn't explain why this seems to be tolerated with "free refills" but not with "unlimited bandwidth".

And even if you were right, even if it's just a case of false advertising and the provider wanting to get out, there is nothing wrong (neither morally nor legally) for them to unilaterally terminate the contract, which they could have well done instead of writing that notification letter. They explicitly state this in their TOS. Most companies can still (luckily) decide which customers they serve and which they don't

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