>>>if it was the latter then Mike's ISP should eat the bandwidth.

Because?

I've never read it but I would be willing to bet that if you pulled up the agreement (that thing where everyone clicks "I Agree" without really reading it) that is says that the site owner is responsible for the bandwidth usage.

Isn't this similar to failing to monitor cell phone usage and then complaining about a significant overage charge?

I sincerely hope he can get the charges removed but it does point out that folks need to be aware that such potential pitfalls do exist.

I'll bet a lot of folks have checked their own accounts as a result of this...