原始文献 / 论坛帖 / Re: Idea for file hosting and proxy services
Re: Idea for file hosting and proxy services
Bitcointalk · 2010-03-24 18:02:55 UTC
Mihalism Multi Host 是个流行的开源 PHP 文件托管服务器。
它偏向图片托管，但我觉得把文件大小限制调大、允许的文件扩展名放宽，它同样能做通用文件上传托管。它们设限制是为了作为免费服务能撑住，但如果接上 Bitcoin 支付机制，限制就可以放宽。
它没有一堆客户端脚本和反嵌入的幺蛾子要拆。生成的都是标准链接，正常可用。
这类免费托管站有个兴衰轮回。小站能提供免费图片托管，可一旦某家火起来，就会被蹭免费带宽的人挤爆。任何出了名的站都得变得更 aggressive 地催付费来覆盖带宽成本。这是教科书级的例子：需要的价格点卡在无人区——免费嫌贵了一点点，但又便宜到大多数用户懒得走传统支付。就卡在 0 到 19.95 之间。它们能做到的最好也就是指望 1000 个用户里有 1 个付 9.95，但代价是把另外 999 个当蹭网的对待。也做不了广告支撑，因为图片是嵌在别的站里的，下载根本不经过托管站。
一个跑这套软件的站的例子：
http://www.imagez.ws/
论坛：
http://www.mihalism.net/
下载：
http://code.google.com/p/mihalismmh/
你觉得怎么样？如果我给它做个 Bitcoin 支付集成，有人愿意跑吗？这可能是第一个能用 Bitcoin 购买的全自动服务。它相对免费服务的优势是：通用文件上传托管、大文件，不用让下载用户跑到上传站去跳各种坑。直接给文件的普通链接。
英文原文
Mihalism Multi Host is a popular open source PHP file hosting server.
It's geared toward image hosting, but I think by increasing the file size limit and liberalising the allowed file extensions, it could just as easily be used for general file upload hosting. They need the limits to keep it reasonable as a free service, but if we bolt on a Bitcoin payment mechanism, the limits could be relaxed.
It doesn't have a bunch of client side scripting or anti-embedding junk to rip out. It generates standard links that work normally.
There's a turnover churn in these free hosting sites. Small sites can give free image hosting, but once one starts getting popular, it gets too swamped with moochers using them for free bandwidth. Any site that gets well known has to become more aggressively pay-naggy to cover bandwidth costs. It's a perfect example of a service where the needed price point is in the no-man's-land between just a little too expensive to be free, but too cheap for most users to take the trouble of a conventional payment. It's in the gap between 0 and 19.95. The best they can do is try to maybe get 1 out of 1000 users to pay 9.95, but that has 999/1000 users treated like freeloaders. It can't really be advertising supported because the images are embedded in other sites and downloaded without going to the hosting site.
An example of a site running the software:
http://www.imagez.ws/
Forum:
http://www.mihalism.net/
Download:
http://code.google.com/p/mihalismmh/
What do you think? If I made a Bitcoin payment integration for this, would anyone be interested in running it? It might be the first fully automated service available to buy with Bitcoins. The advantage it could offer over the free services is general file upload hosting of large files without making downloading users go to the upload site and jump through hoops. It would give a normal link directly to the file.