What is the best way to utilise $10K worth of free servers for an year? - intrepidkarthi
======
chrisbennet
What if you _didn 't_ use it at all?

Suppose you won 1,000 gallons of gas but you had to use it in a year, would
you figure out ways to burn it by driving extra, etc?

With the gas scenario, the external "costs" (pollution) are obvious but
running a server isn't free (of external costs) either.

Just a thought.

~~~
lujim
What if you used the 1000 gallons of gas to run a free carpool with the
explicit goal of saving 6 people per day a drive to and from work and in the
process saved 6000 gallons.

You funded your project through a blog and social media campaign dedicated to
awareness of fossil fuel pollution and sold ads only to solar companies and
bike manufacturers.

In would later estimated that your 1000 gallon investment created enough good
will and awareness to save an estimated 10000 gallons per year and launched
you a new career as a pro green/solar consultant.

What then buddy?

------
nextweek2
This is almost a dupe from last year:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9546609](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9546609)

Really you need to create a start-up which offers value to someone, the fact
you have 1 year of hosting is nice but it should only be a small part of a
larger business plan. Look for ideas [1][2] but most importantly, look at what
you are good at.

Lastly, go as fast as you can. A year is a very short time.

[1]
[http://old.ycombinator.com/ideas.html](http://old.ycombinator.com/ideas.html)
[2]
[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+ideas&...](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+ideas&t=ffcm&ia=web)

------
stevefeinstein
The problem as I see it is you have a year to create a something that will
generate $10K in revenue annually or you will go quickly into the red and have
to shut it down.

I'm not sure what you can learn with $10,000 worth of servers that you can't
learn with $1,000 worth and an amazon AWS account. If it's just you, you won't
need to scale up for a while and AWS is super cheap.

Convert it to as much cash as you can, then spend it more economically on a
service with no time restrictions on the use of the resources.

------
intrepidkarthi
I have free server credits of $10000 which should be utilised with in a year
from a famous hosting provider. I can run machines with 64GB RAM and with
multiple cores for that prize. How can I utilise it in the best way? I am a
programmer myself. I am looking for suggestions and also collaborations.

~~~
AznHisoka
Not BitCoin (before someone posts this)

~~~
cocotino
Why not?

~~~
mastermojo
It's not very efficient compared to specialized mining hardware. I haven't
done the math but your return will probably be <<1% of the credits.

~~~
cocotino
Well, it's free servers, so whatever he can get out of them will be good.

~~~
popey456963
I believe (from rumours of friends) that most servers actually ban bitcoin
mining on their system anyway.

------
pesfandiar
Create a public VPN service for unfortunate people behind state-run firewalls.
Maybe only serve educational and news sites if you are worried about abuse.

This way you can do good while learning something (new technologies,
automating a possible whack-a-mole game with the censors, etc.)

------
alphydan
Offer free minecraft servers for coding teachers running this course:
[https://github.com/teachthenet/TeachCraft-
Challenges](https://github.com/teachthenet/TeachCraft-Challenges)

(cough, cough, ... I could use one)

------
mankash666
Sell the access credentials for, say $5K to someone who really wants it. Win-
win

~~~
intrepidkarthi
That will be the least possible decision. I would like to utilise and learn
out of it. Not much interested towards monetary benefits.

~~~
mankash666
Learning doesn't really require $10K of cloud credit.

However, maybe you can combine your intention to learn and help out someone
with a need for cloud computing by volunteering for their project. Many good
projects, some open source, need this kind of computing access.

------
runtoronthem
Run Tor!

[https://www.torproject.org/](https://www.torproject.org/)

~~~
intrepidkarthi
Interesting option. Will I learn anything or beneficial to me in anyway apart
from helping the TOR community?

~~~
runtoronthem
Participate and learn what ever you like...

[https://www.torproject.org/getinvolved/volunteer.html.en](https://www.torproject.org/getinvolved/volunteer.html.en)

~~~
intrepidkarthi
Thanks buddy. I will go through

------
_RPM
Also give me an SSH account...

------
mikexstudios
Mirror Sci-Hub

~~~
intrepidkarthi
is it legal?

~~~
summarite
Sadly not

------
maerF0x0
grow your business, optimize for growth vs efficiency.

~~~
intrepidkarthi
I already have a business that runs smoothly with existing servers. This came
across for free of cost. I am just thinking ways to utilise it properly.

~~~
maerF0x0
some options: New services, additional capacity, new ways of doing things that
make your existing business better for customers. Get them to pay for it so
you convert $1 server credit into $1 or more of money in your pocket.

~~~
intrepidkarthi
Yes, I will think about it.

------
revicon
Is bitcoin mining still practical these days?

