
Why are DNS services so expensive? - AxisOfEval
There were days when ZoneEdit would let you host up to five domains completely free of cost. And reasonably so, AFAIK a DNS reply rarely crosses 520 bytes unless you are doing something exotic.<p>ZoneEdit now charges $12 per domain per year. Others seem to have joined the bandwagon. Why so expensive? Most importantly, are there any "full-featured" free providers of repute remaining?
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jauer
DNS is one of those things that is easy to do yet hard to do right.

On the low end someone could run nsd/bind/powerdns on a vm from linode and one
from prgmr and be 80% of the way there. That extra 20% involves getting your
own IP space for anycast, proper instrumentation, BGP, probably colocation
around the world, and making that all work together. If someone is going to go
to all that trouble they darn well better be charging for it if you want to be
able to depend on it.

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AxisOfEval
Hmmm... Thanks. That clears it :o).

But at the same time, I have rarely seen players who charge (and some of them
quite a lot) advertise or talk about their anycast capabilities.

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jauer
They could be charging for convenience, a pretty UI, etc.

To name a few of the more popular ones that charge that I'm aware of:

Amazon Route53: <http://aws.amazon.com/route53/faqs/#Route_53_anycast>

Dyn (right below the price) <http://dyn.com/dns/dynect-managed-dns-lite/>

DNS Made Easy: <http://www.dnsmadeeasy.com/technology/ip-anycast/>

EasyDNS: <https://web.easydns.com/dns_management/?icode=dnshosting>

