The response from Netlify regarding this issue misses the mark
From the CEO It's currently our policy to not shut down free sites during traffic spikes that doesn't match attack patterns, but instead forgiving any bills from legitimate mistakes after the fact. This response, to a forum user asking how to Limit bandwidth to avoid high billing caused by DDoS?, was particularly frustrating to read.
The user's concern: If I get DDOSed and I have no limits on usage I'm going to have to pay alot I’m always afraid on “pay for usage” services that it has no limits. I think it's very rational and expected for "pay for usage" sites to have user set limits on the usage. Netlify employee's response "Don't worry it wont happen to you" while DDoS attacks to happen, they are generally not geared towards users on our starter tiers. "If it does its your fault" we would probably benefit from chatting with you about what kind of a site you are asking us to host for free if it is likely to attract that kind of attention. "If you are charged more than you expected that's good b/c people went to your site Now, if something you host goes viral - congrats! We’re assuming that is not necessarily a bad thing - right? "Not our problem, you should know if you're going to be DDOSed" So, in short, I want to answer by asking a.) is this a realistic thing that could happen to you? b.) you are super welcome to investigate options to mitigate the fallout from a DDoS attack or viral content on your own!
And my favorite: "Our job is to keep your site up, sorry you don't like that" Our priority is to keep your site up - that’s what our business is about. If that isn’t an approach that works for you and changes your decision to host with us, I understand.
It's a really simple request, let me set limits to never have to pay a dime more that I expected or agreed to. It seems this decision is based in a predatory business practice to get people to pay more rather than an difficult engineering problem the just can't solve.
Netlify service looks really good and is my first choice but I will not sign up for "Unlimited" charges. I also will not just "trust" that Netlify will forgive my bill if something does go wrong.
I just want to see Netlify do better. Simply let me set limits on usage and have better customer service.