NearlyFreeSpeech.NET Blog

> Is this a win over HostGator, DreamHost, etc.? At one point, sure. Not since the "insurrection"- they went full TDS: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/#more… My other comment got flagged - ironic considering the topic of NFS. > When we cooperate with law enforcement, we do not do so blindly. We review their activities, both for abuse of power and to make sure proper processes are followed to protect our members’ rights. Such things are vanishingly rare, not (as they are sometimes depicted) the default. So if you’re expecting that we will automatically say, “Shove it, coppah!” anytime the police come calling about your site, we’re not the right service for you. They're going to capitulate to law enforcement without a court order if they don't like your politics... or if it's inconvenient for them.

May I also recommend Nearlyfreespeech.net, an excellent registrar and host with a good record of upholding free speech? One example of upholding free speech: http://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2012/10/06/official-uk-government-att…

I have used nfshost for hosting multiple sites for over a decade. They're a fantastic service that's simple, secure, and provides great, fast support. They recently published this blog post: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/ After reading this, I made the decision to move my hosting elsewhere. I have never hosted content that is even remotely political, and have no intention to do so. I had chosen to patron nearlyfreespeech based upon the belief that their conception of 'freedom of speech' matched my own. I believe 'freedom of speech' is not just a convenient vehicle for expressing my own political ideas, it is an important political idea in and of itself. I believe that the freedom for individuals to express their ideas without censorship is integral to a free and intelligent society. This post of theirs demonstrates that I had clearly misunderstood their beliefs. It's clear that 'freedom of speech' is a controversial notion in today's society. If they market their service based upon their respect for so-called freedom of speech (it's in their name), I don't know what kind of crowd they expect to come. I came not out of a need, but based upon my political views. I imagine I'm a minority. I'm not interested in a host that markets itself in such a way, and then demonstrates that what they _really_ meant was that they want an environment where you're free to agree with their views.

You should review the work NearlyFreeSpeech.NET recently did on customizable account recovery options. It's easy the best I've every seen. It works like this: 1) You decide how valuable the account is, the probability that you will lose access to the account, and the probability that the account will be attacked. 2) You selected the required number of recovery actions, from one recovery action to completely unrecoverable. Possible recovery actions include (copied from NFSN): * You provide a scanned copy of a government-issued photo ID. * You provide a scanned copy of a statement showing both the most recent deposit and a name and address matching one of your accounts. * You complete SMS verification. (SMS must be previously configured.) * You complete 2-factor verification. (2-factor auth must be previously configured.) * You correctly answer your security question. (Security question and answer must be previously configured, below.) * You use an ssh key to create a file with a specific name on one of your sites hosted here. (Must be previously configured, won’t work if account is empty.) * We try and fail to contact you via your currently configured email address. (This one may take a long time.) As far as I'm concerned, this is the way it should be done. The public details are on their blog: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2014/02/28/price-cuts-more-security-…

Actually they revealed a few months ago that if you aren't politically aligned with them at nearlyfreespeech.net, they treat you differently as a customer. https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/ They will "*not* lift one finger to help you [host your site here]" (emphasis theirs) If you are not politically to their taste, they will look for a reason to kick you off as opposed to their other customers, "we *will* kick you off the instant you give us a reason". In that same post, they revealed they will cooperate with police requests without any court documents or warrants being provided, putting them in the 'fragile' class of hosting providers.

You be the judge based on this blog post: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/ Imo, answer is no. Any site which uses terms like "sea of mayonnaise" to describe people while claiming to be against racism is giving lip service and lacks self awareness.

Wow they are hilarious! Never heard of them, thanks. https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/

They tried that at one point, and it didn't work out very well for them: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2013/12/27/member_support_points_out…

I've been a long time fan of nearlyfreespeech; if you're not actually overstepping laws they'll probably at least tolerate you. https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2021/01/19/free-speech-in-2021/

The setup process for other platforms is a bit more involved though. It's not as straightforward as PHP (which is just choosing an Apache site type) or MariaDB/MySQL (which can be setup in a couple of clicks on the site). There is a Django setup guide on the blog [1] that could be looked at for the process to setup things like Rails, PostgreSQL and a few other things. [1]: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2014/11/17/how-to-django-on-nearlyfr…

11/6 may have been a valid expiration date before November 2006, but not anymore. So a smart algorithm could tell that you meant 1/16 rather than 11/6. It even works if you put the year first. 16/1 is valid, and it's clear that 16 is the year. Meanwhile, 1/61 either contains an invalid month or is too far in the future to be a valid expiration date. NearlyFreeSpeech.net [1] does it right. It accepts anything between 3 and 6 digits (MYY, MMYY, MYYYY, MM YYYY, YYYY/MM, etc) and only throws an error if parsing it results in an impossible date. [1] https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2015/05/13/new-payment-features-meth…

To be fair, that level of customizability is fairly new; It was only announced about 8 months ago[1]. I don't know how strict the previous recovery procedure was, since I never had to make use of it. [1]: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2014/02/28/price-cuts-more-security-…

There's Dynadot: http://www.dynadot.com/domain/security.html Also NearlyFreeSpeech, though the domain selection is very limited, as it's primarily a hosting company: https://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2014/02/28/price-cuts-more-security-…

Seconded. NearlyFreeSpeech is dirt cheap for hosting PHP-based products. And they'll stand up to censorious governments: http://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2012/10/06/official-uk-government-att…

I've never found a more honest company. For example, they recently discovered a billing error that amounted to $56 over 5 years .. so they refunded everyone double, donated what they couldn't refund to charity, and apologized profusely. (http://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2011/04/07/a-small-billing-error-corr…