> CF serves a customers need

CF serves something it convinced customers they need.

Static blogs hiding behind bot protection (in some cases blocking legit users from GrapheneOS because it's difficult to fingerprint them) because someone convinced them they'll be DDoSed by bots otherwise is a loss to the Internet.

A lot of self-hosters running CF tunnels because they don't know better also contributes.

> It's more healthy to start the conversation of _why_ CF services are valuable.

Begging the question. It's what TFA is about - telling people they need CF.

▲ majke an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> A lot of self-hosters running CF tunnels because they don't know better also contributes.

Are you saying CF documentation is better than Computer Science / Networking education resources? Why don't people know better? I thought the tunnels are mostly used to bypass NAT's.

> Static blogs hiding behind bot protection

I'm not sure what is the proportion of the static vs dynamic sites, but I would argue that for wordpress CF is adding real value.

	▲	dwedge an hour ago \| parent [-]
		> I thought the tunnels are mostly used to bypass NAT's. While not free, you can do with with TCP HAProxy streams on a cheap VPS. A lot of people using them to bypass NAT don't realise that Cloudflare decrypt the traffic on the way - that's what I meant about them not knowing better.

▲ NetOpWibby an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

   A lot of self-hosters running CF tunnels because they don't know better also contributes.

If you know better, you should contribute.

▲ rs_rs_rs_rs_rs an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

>A lot of self-hosters running CF tunnels because they don't know better also contributes.

Of course, everyone else is incompetent except you...

	▲	dwedge an hour ago \| parent [-]
		It's not about being incompetent. Quite often in selfhosted subreddits and forums you will see people surprised that Cloudflare can see their traffic in plaintext. Of course, they probably don't, but the fact that they can and that their policies now influence XX% of internet traffic is bad for the open internet.