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submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

(Sorry if this is too off-topic:) ISPs seem designed to funnel people to capitalist cloud services, or at least I feel like that. And it endlessly frustrates me.

The reason is even though IPv6 addresses are widely available (unlike IPv4), most ISPs won't allow consumers to request a static rather than a dynamic IPv6 prefix along with a couple of IPv6 reverse DNS entries.

Instead, this functionality is gatekept behind expensive premium or even business contracts, in many cases even requiring legal paperwork proving you have a registered business, so that the common user is completely unable to self-host e.g. a fully functional IPv6-only mail server with reverse DNS, even if they wanted to.

The common workaround is to suck up to the cloud, and rent a VPS, or some other foreign controlled machine that can be easily intercepted and messed with, and where the service can be surveilled better by big money.

I'm posting this since I hope more people will realize that this is going on, and both complain to their ISPs, but most notably to regulatory bodies and to generally spread the word. If we want true digital autonomy to be more common, I feel like this needs to be fixed for consumer landline contracts.

Or did I miss something that makes this make sense outside of a big money capitalist angle?

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[-] [email protected] 7 points 5 days ago

This is a huge problem. We need to start our own ISPS. Municipal owned or alongside a microgrid co-op are good options

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Use hostnames and dynamic prefixes or addresses don't really matter. Haven't had an issue in years and my last isp changed prefixes multiple times a week. I mean technically it would not be available for five minutes when IP changes but never noticed.

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago

If you only care about having a static IPv6 address take a look at TunnelBroker by Hurricane Electric. They give you free /48 IPv6 blocks tunnelled through their network. Words of warning though: 1) some ISPs block using this service (prevent the tunnel from working), 2) in my experience I’ve seen high latency due to weird routing, 3) those IPs ending up on blocklists due to abuse and 4) the tunnel is unencrypted so traffic between you and Hurricane Electric is trivially intercepted, though if that was a problem in the first place then you wouldn’t be hosting from your home network anyway so this is mostly moot.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago

Capitalist institutions push capitalism? What kind of world is this!

[-] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago

My dynamic IPv6 prefix hasn't changed in a couple of years. It only changed because I reset the router config and that changed my DUID. That's good enough for everything I host. I don't even bother with dynamic DNS anymore.

I wouldn't bother with trying to host an email server from a residential connection though. Even if you can get your ISP to open port 25 for you, many email servers won't accept mail from residential IP addresses.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I wonder how often the assigned prefix changes with most of the regular ISPs. I'd have to look someone else's router since I'm still stuck on an old contract. But I believe what I saw with some of the regular consumer contracts: the prefixes stay the same for a long time. You could just slap a free DynDNS service on top and be done with it.

But yes, I think this used to be the promise... We'd all get IPv6 and a lot of gadgets like NAS systems, video cameras and a wifi kettle and they'd be accessible from outside. Instead of that we use big capitalist cloud services and all the data from the internet of things devices has some stopover in the China cloud.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

My ISP seems to use just normal DHCP for assigning addresses and honors re-use requests. The only times my IP addresses have changed has been I've changed the MAC or UUID that connects. I've been off-line for a week, come back, and been given the same address. Both IPv4 and v6.

If one really wants their home systems to be publicly accessible, it's easy enough to get a cheap vanity domain and point it at whatever address. rDNS won't work, which would probably interfere with email, but most services don't really need it. It's a bit more complicated to detect when your IP changes and script a DNS update, but certainly do-able, if (like OP) one is hell bent on avoiding any off-site hardware.

[-] [email protected] 0 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

IPv6 costs money to implement so it doesn't happen without good reason.

For ISPs you need many options so that one company can't take all the business. In my area competition is steep so fiber is cheap. In rural areas I'm personally interested in community or small ISPs. Surely some people could get together and make something better.

[-] [email protected] 0 points 4 days ago

rural ISPs still need a connection to the greater internet, what options are there when the closest non-shitty option is hundreds of miles away?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago

Community run ISPs

Get some people together and start an ISP

[-] [email protected] 0 points 5 days ago

Starlink gives me an ipv6 its not static as such but a dynamic DNS can solve that issue. My ISP issue is that my mobile provider doesn't give me an ipv6 at all so I can't route to my home server without a gateway to proxy.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 5 days ago

Starlink is worse that many other options. I would avoid it if you can.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Except I'm in rural Australia. Star link is objectively the best option.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

It sucks that rural Australia’s part of the NBN got kneecapped down to Skymuster. I’ve played with Starlink quite a while ago and unless it’s really heavy rain it works really well up to the point of being able to stream games on GeForce NOW. Obviously a fast wired connection is preferable but as you say Starlink really is the only good option for a lot of people.

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this post was submitted on 29 May 2025
248 points (90.5% liked)

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