Web Hosting News

As many of you now know, I was recently appointed Vice President of Marketing at HostMySite.com. It's always envigorating to join a new organization and observe the inner machinations of a class operation.

One of the more interesting and unusual things that I have been watching is the Official website of the Mike Huckabee Presidential campaign. The site is entitled, 'Mike Huckabee for President' and can be found at www.mikehuckabee.com.

It just so happens that a great developer client of HostMySite.com, GSL Solutions, specializes in political websites. GSL Solutions created the 'Mike Huckabee for President' website, and it is hosted at HostMySite.com.

The really interesting thing about the behind-the-scenes view of the website is the incredible amount of effort required to keep up with a site that has grown from almost zero traffic to an Alexa 10,000 site. This traffic increase has occured in just the last several weeks - as the campaign has heated up with all the Presidential Primary activity. Here is a graph of the Alexa traffic report for www.mikehuckabee.com

Inside the effort at HostMySite.com is a great communication network that observes the activities of the candidate - particularly television appearances such as 'Larry King Live' or a Presidential debate. The team also notes when major media outlets mention the site with a link, such as happened last week with the New York Times. Each of these media mentions is noted and the team briefed, in order to stand ready to scale up bandwidth or other server resources if needed. Thusfar, the site has been rock solid - and a crticial component to the Huckabee Presidential campaign.

Michael Gaines, President of GSL Solutions described the importance of the website, ''I spoke with the Governor after the debate about the website and he acknowledged how important the site has been to their ability to interact with supporters and sustain his campaign for President. The anticipation is that the growth of traffic and supporters will likely double leading up to the final primary votes. Our company has been working with HostMySite.com for the last 6 years and we have thoroughly enjoyed the relationship and support. This particular site and its momentum are unlike anything we've experienced. I know many of the HostMySite.com technical staff have been working hard to help keep this site up over the past few days.''

Needless to say, HostMySite.com realizes the importance of free and fair elections in a democracy - as well as the free distribution of the candidate's views and opinions - in order to help voters choose the next President. It has been a priveledge to assist in that process with the 'Mike Huckabee for President' website.

So, remember that the next time you plan on hosting the website of a major Presidential candidate, you watch the major media outlets - and have your finger on the bandwith trigger!

This content was written by Derek Vaughan, and is provided courtesy of the dedicated server hosting specialists at HostMySite.com.

I’ve come across a couple of news stories lately that cover an interesting turn of events for copyright owners.  Apparently, a number of vociferous members of the copyright police don’t believe in the saying “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.”  This article from the Washington Post essentially sums up the issue:  companies seem to have run out of “real people” for their ads, so they’re “borrowing” images from sources like Flickr and personal blogs.  Indeed, in Fox’s case, not only did they borrow the image, they altered it to fit their commercial needs.

Apparently companies like Fox, Virgin Mobile, Microsoft, and HBO think nothing of violating the express copyright statements on sites like Flicker in which users have reserved certain copyright rights, and prohibited commercial use of their images.  In the case of Fox, the use of the image directly contradicted an express statement of copyright ownership at the bottom of the owner’s blog.

So what do I make of this?  First, it reinforces my impression that the Internet Intellectual Property debate (if there still is such a thing) continues to favor Big Intellectual Property.  As evidence of this point, you really need go no further than the fact that spokesmen for Fox, Virgin Mobile and Microsoft were all “unavailable for comment.”  Hmm.  If any of those companies were truly remorseful, I suspect they may have made a spokesman available to the Post.  Clearly, when Fox steals an image from a blog, it’s not a big deal.  However when you download the new season of Fox’s 24, the FBI needs to be involved.

Let me make one thing clear:  I don’t believe that Intellectual property infringement is acceptable for any reason.  However, my day-to-day experience with this issue leads me to believe that Big IP feels that there are no limits to their power.  Not a week goes by when, in my capacity as DMCA agent for some of my clients, a DMCA notice is withdrawn because someone from Big IP shot first, and asked questions later.  Who is the victim in that case?  Certainly not the copyright owner.  It’s the site owner whose site goes down for a couple of days while they try to straighten the dispute out with the IP owner, or their representatives, who, in many cases, have zero interest in moving quickly.

What should be done?  When sending a DMCA take down notice, copyright owners should be required to make a good faith effort to ensure that their statements are accurate, and should be liable for the statements made by their representatives.  The DMCA should be clarified so that the “penalty of perjury statement” applies to both the “good faith” statement of illegality *and* the statement of authorization.  While many courts have held that this is the case, most copyright owners and their representatives assert that it only applies to the statement of authorization. 

Making these changes would go a long way to reinforcing for Big IP that their actions, both as copyright owners, and as users, have implications.

The January 2008 issue arrived at the WHIR office from the printers today (we sent the files over last week), and while I’m not explicitly, technically there, my understanding is that the new issues are looking good and ready to go.

They ought to be arriving in the mailboxes of subscribers shortly, and with this issue it’s particularly worth understanding in advance what to expect.

As you may already be aware, the January issue is the first of what we intend to be an annual exercise, the Hottest Hosts guide to Web hosting services. Of course the notion of gathering Web hosts or similar service providers is nothing new. I can think of at least one very relevant online example.

This particular directory is, to the best of my knowledge, unique to the printed medium, and an interesting extension of the hosting directory ecosystem into a new format.

We’ll be going to great lengths to put this issue in the hands of new users, particularly those who might be unfamiliar with theWHIR’s work. This will be our largest print run ever, and we’ll be distributing the issue at events and conferences throughout 2008.

As I see it, there are several distinct groups of people for whom the issue is of particular value:

Hosting customers or potential hosting customers:

Web hosting consumers will find a long list of hosting providers, arranged into a broad set of categories that make finding the solution to a specific need a simple process.

Hosting providers, or similar service providers:

For hosting providers, the guide provides the obvious vehicle for reaching those readers through their listings. But it puts them on the other side of that transaction, listing many categories of vendor services for Web hosting providers. And it inherently provides a thorough, if not completely exhaustive, portrait of the competition in some of the key areas of the hosting business.

Vendors serving Web hosts:

They have similar access to a venue for reaching customers in the hosting space, as well as a lengthy listing of possible partners.

Companies looking to partner with Web hosts:

People seeking to develop business relationships with providers in the hosting space can look to this guide for cues on where and how to contact important providers in the business.

While on the one hand, we hope the guide will help introduce some new readers to theWHIR, we hope our existing users will find it a useful tool as well.

It's the first month of 2008 and you know what that means. Instead of naming off goals to lose weight, stop smoking, eat organic, and run every morning at 6:30 A.M. what about our tech resolutions? Here's my list for you.

10.  Organize: If you never clean out old directories and files from your servers, what better time than now to get started? Go through your website error logs to clean up files which no longer exist but are still requested, change graphics that may have old dates or other inaccuracies, give your web presence an overall spot check and you will be amazed at how inspired you'll become during the process. As you go along you'll get new ideas of what new features should be added to your site. Do a spot check and brainstorm each month this year and you'll have the most organized and easy to use website ever for your customers. (And how about cleaning up your own desktop? Sheesh… look at all of those icons.)

9.  Apologize: Let's admit that we made mistakes last year. Did you not announce a few things that happened with your company? Did you postpone a feature for too long? If your hosting company has a blog, why not make a post that simply says you are sorry for the downfalls of the previous year and you are committed to setting everything right in 2008. 

8.  Ask: Through polls, blogs, forums and newsletters, ask your customers more questions. Get to know them and see what they think is missing from your services. In this process you will see what they do value the most already and you can work on completing the picture this year. 

7. Give: You do not have to give an iPod away with each dedicated server order, but give back to your customers more this year and show them that you appreciate them. Have contests and giveaways to connect your customers and reward them at the same time. 

6.  Focus: As the day goes by, it's easy to lose track of your ideas, especially when issues pop up with servers or customer situations. Even though we proclaim to be the geekiest of the geeks, it is not a bad idea to keep a notebook or organizer around and actually use a pen sometimes! I have personally found that writing down notes on paper and crossing them off is better than a text file. It's easy for a little text file to get lost behind thirty other windows (which seem to get all of the attention). The paper is always there by your mousepad and you will constantly be reminded it's there.

5.  Listen: This goes along with "Ask" but sometimes you have to focus more on hearing what people have to say instead of injecting your own comments. You may miss something important if you are too immediately concerned with what you think about it. Let's say a customer is upset and has sent you a long ticket which makes you feel terrible, do not think of the ways they may be wrong, think of the ways in which they are truly right. Act upon it patiently and in the future, proactively.

4. Progress: Take a look at the features you offer. What have you changed or added in the past two years? In the past year? If you cannot make a list of at least 10 major changes/additions, then it is time to rethink your offerings and create excitement this year.

3. Help: Do you ever find yourself sending a customer a link to a blog post or tutorials site for help with a question? Sure that's the great part about the wealth of information the Internet makes available to us, but you should also create a massive amount of resources on your own site. Not only would this help your customers in-house,  it can also improve your own search engine rankings.

2. Lead: Your customers largely depend on you so this year become your own tech warrior. Be on the lookout for the next big thing, the next best applications, and your customers will benefit like never before. And they'll appreciate your hard work and dedication for bringing them the best new services and features.

1. Relax: It is hard to pull ourselves away from the computer (or stop carrying the laptop everywhere) but if you do not take the time to sit and read a book, take a walk in the park, all to have some quiet time in your mind, you may miss a revolutionary thought. You know, they can pop up at the strangest times! Let all of your experience quietly guide the way into something wonderful for your company in 2008. 

Hello everyone! After a well deserved break, I'm back and blogging once again. Ok, so it wasn't a break so much as it was a whole heck of a lot of work squeezed between three holidays, but you get the point.

Unfortunately, this post comes in the wake of a tragedy of sorts. It is with great sadness that I pass along a piece of news that will make many a seasoned Web developer weep. Last week, Tom Drapeau, a former principal software engineer and now the director of Propeller Social News for AOL, Announced the end of life for Netscape Navigator in his blog.

(Read his blog post here.)

Think what you will of Netscape Navigator. Lord knows it's had its ups and downs. It's been highly regarded as a vehicle for Web innovation, And more than a few Web designers have cursed its existence over the years too (NS4.x, your memories haunt me to this day). But Netscape is an institution, and its passing comes with much sorrow.

That being said, I know I'm not the only one who has a less-than-favorable opinion of AOL (I have personal reasons), and one could argue AOL's purchase of Netscape eight years ago is really when the browser began to die. Honestly, it's been a long time since I've cared about Netscape and its browser, but that doens't mean it doesn't have a place in my heart. Sure, Netscape has been dead for years, but its name has always lived on as a symbol of the Internet in its infancy through today. Sadly, not through tomorrow.

R.I.P. Netscape. You'll be glad to know your legacy is thriving in Firefox. You will be missed.

###

==========[ MORE ABOUT PAUL ]==========
PaulHirsch.com . International Web Developers Network . Web Hosting Talk . Equentity Host