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Tips for a VPN service
Hey everyone 
I have around 30 VPSs idling or being underutilized, so I think I should make a little money from them, perhaps?
I have a couple of questions for the community (who have a lot of experience) first:
1) Are there too many VPN services already?
2) Legal implications (I know you can be held liable in some cases etc.)?
3) What do people look for (special features?) with VPN services?
4) Torrenting: Block it wholesale or allow it in certain locations?
Notes:
This will be a paid service, no free rides allowed
Lots of exotic locations.
Comments
If you have 30 VPS idling you should probably cancel some
(unless it is a Query Foundry VPS then you should renew it for a few extra years just to be safe)
@Spirit @Mpkossen I cannot edit the title of the post. I get:
What if I said they were all from QF >:D
Well you need to contact the providers first for the vps's you have to see if they even allow a public proxy/vpn service.
I would be happy for that and concerned about the possibility of the abuse reports.
It really depends. There are a bunch of VPS providers out there, and they offer quality services. Whilst you would have to maintain a focus on your service quality as a VPN provider, this isn't the point that's going to make a difference. You should appeal to a certain niche, which is, I feel, the only way to succeed in a business where lots of different and solid providers are already established.
On the other hand, though, there are hardly any niches that you could appeal to in the VPN world. Those who value security will already have set up their own VPS, those who value privacy will already have chosen some company based in a country with strong privacy laws, and so forth. As a result, unless you make a truly miraculous business move that can set your VPN service apart, there's no real way to profit from this service. If there is, you won't magically get profit as soon as you launch it - it will take time and dedication.
Then finally, the issue that arises with time and dedication is that you would have to spend most of your time working on your service (moreso during the first few months, or years) - during this time can easily come legal trouble, as all VPN providers are known to face. Unless you start a company and thus become a registered legal entity with solid lawyers, then there is a long, rocky road ahead of you and your VPN service.
Meanwhile, note that your company would necessarily have to own its hardware, or at the very least lease it from a major entity (i.e. not an OVH sub-sub-reseller). The idea of running a whole public VPN service on VPS is one of its kind, but as @Ian_ remarked, it is unlikely that your VPS providers accept that in the first place.
My argument could be applied to a lot of other businesses and industries too. It might be a generic one, but it applies very well to the vast amount of people who want to start in the IT industry - and, as a matter of fact, you know it's true.
However, there's still the option of doing what I've suggested - register as a company, run a full-blown, proper service, etc -. You pointed out that an interesting feature could be exotic locations; why not, as long as you are ready to lease from datacenters there, and that the network uplinks are acceptable and give a decent connectivity to your end-users.
Though, let me be realistic and get back to your initial plan: no, running a VPN service on VPS is hardly feasible if at all, and there are enough VPN providers around.
From my experience I'd say that exotic locations don't have that much of an impact, and (especially initially) wouldn't be worth the initial costs on your part.
I'd recommend getting setup with only a very small number of locations initially and make sure that you can maintain things without issue before growing out to your other locations.
Most VPS providers do not allow public VPNs, but you might be able to get away if you only put a few users on each VPS and made sure you monitored the traffic for suspicious traffic.
Are there too many shared hosting providers? Are there too many VPS providers?
That's part of doing business on the Internet.
>
What I look for are the locations or actually a specific location.
I "need" a Swedish connection while I'm on the road. I don't need a, lets say Romanian VPN but probably someone else will. If you can offer many locations more potential customers will be interested since you meet their requirements.
Depending on your personal stand on torrenting. It is your company. You should consider the pros and cons of allowing it but the decision is yours only.