> If the owner of the site doesn’t want to serve a very small and basically static text file in a way people expect...

I'm an old programmer and sysadmin. Programmers and sysadmins are definitely the "target audience" for this blog.

I expect that if I request a resource on the web, and I get back a 429 with a "Retry-After" then:

- I WILL NOT get a new version of that resource until after that time has elapsed

- I MAY get banned for an unknowable-by-me period of time if I continue to attempt to request that resource, despite getting a 429.

Unfortunately with stuff like this Hyrum’s Law happens at a distance and in aggregate. And 429’s are clearly not part of that living contract.

The reality is that it’s not much effort to serve a small bit of plaintext data, and nobody really cares that much to even notice.

It’s unclear if the effort is worth it, for anything other than what amounts to “well ackchully the spec says I can do it so I’ll do it” pedantry.

Wake me up when we throw a big wobbly about RSS readers not correctly handling 418 status codes.