

That article is overblown. People need to configure their websites to be more robust against traffic spikes, news at 11.
Disrespecting robots.txt is bad netiquette, but honestly this sort of gentleman’s agreement is always prone to cheating. At the end of the day, when you put something on the net for people to access, you have to assume anyone (or anything) can try to access it.
This headline has the structure of the famous Simpsons joke.
Cyan (Myst, Riven)
Homer: that’s good.
to lay off
Homer: that’s bad.
12 people
Homer: that’s good.
“roughly half of team”
Homer: ??
Narrator: that’s bad.