I feel like this should be public. I wonder what would be the repercussion of a gofundme to buy it once and make it publicly available. There aren't many downsides of updating every couple years.
https://postalpro.usps.com/ZCB_License would seem to prevent such a use/distribution of the data.
Not saying Id condone breaking the license here - but wouldnt it be nice to have it drop on Github somewhere.
The point of the USPS data is that it is official, correct, and up-to-date, getting it from some GitHub kind of defeats the entire point. If you want free data from unofficial sources you can already get that.
You can even get it from ... the government: https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/geography/guidance/g...
Host this in a jurisdiction that doesn't give a damn about some funny US license
There are plenty of 'good enough' options that are free; just ignore the USPS' offerings unless you ABSOLUTELY have to match them 1:1 for business reasons.
The USPS has a long history of protecting its data. I worked there 1999–2003, and the data was licensed separately from the code that processed it. It’s also seeded with fake addresses (look up DPV false positives). I don’t think the public availability part of this plan would work out.