And ... googling "does Cloudflare protect against DDOS" [deliberate denial of service] gets:
"Cloudflare offers free DDoS protection for websites and applications with all application services plans. Sign up now to protect against DDoS attacks." from the Google summary hit page. The link goes to
https://www.cloudflare.com/application-services/products/ddos-for-web/which says "Free DDoS for websites and so much more"
and thanks for asking. I learned from that site that I can get a free version of Cloudflare for my "hobby project" family history site, which I will look into as soon as I sort out one ggg grandfather's will and property and find another gg grandfather's parents, etc., etc.
Final (maybe) summary: So rootschat might have been experiencing a DDOS attack last weekend. The attacker's software would be spoofing very many IP addresses, possibly including those from legitimate users. So there would be no point in Cloudflare learning to trust your IP since it could be spoofed during the next attack anyway.
Assuming I understand this whole business correctly.
