Hi, I am new in OpenSource and have a Bludomain site, is everyone back up and running correctly. I am still running very slow, thumbnails not coming up for galleries etc.

You guys need to mellow out and start shooting more weddings! you obviously have too much time on your hands if you are attacking DJ for helping people out...

What up Mark!

My BluDomain site is working fine, never had a problem. From what I understand, they recently had some national attention that led to tons of new customers. Call it growing pains.

So, if anyone has a different opinion, they need to shoot more weddings?

You can sit on your popsicle, bud.

Hi Shane, do you mean like this? I'm sure it's totally different. Somehow.

-TM

"When people appear to be something other than good and decent, it is only because they are reacting to stress, pain, or the deprivation of basic human needs such as security, love, and self esteem"

Are you referring to the appear-er or the appear-ee?

-TM

Whoever came up with that silliness must not know human nature. Hahahah.

"The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually."
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?"

Is OSP turning into Sodom?

Hahah. No, it's still the same collection of misfits it always was. I just think that quote was the height of wishful thinking.

I was trying to figure out where Pol Pot fit in there. He was just misunderstood, you see....

-TM

Wow this is still fairly popular I see. DJ did an awesome thing by offering that. I still can't believe blu. Their JOB is to keep websites UP and RUNNING, how the firetruck do you ACCIDENTALLY delete websites (with no way to recover!!)?? You have one damn job, one job, do it and do it right. That sort of unprofessional mistake is appalling.

Now DJ could have taken the hard and honest line like that. But he didn't he really just offered to help people out who were/are in a bind, that is what osp is about and it's awesome of him to do so while breeding NO ill will towards Blu. None, he didn't trash talk them he didn't do anything but state a fact and offer to help out. That is freaking awesome of him.

So, you've never messed up at your JOB? Never accidentally deleted an image? Never missed an obvious shot? Never had a blurry portrait? Lighten up, man. I'm not a blu user, but no need to go over the top here. I agree it's a major mistake, and I don't understand how they don't have a backup either, but they're just people. The market will punish them enough, no need to get belligerent.

I work in IT. You don't run without backups, period end of story there's never any excuse for not having them, if you can't afford them then you can't afford to do your business. It's not like it was just bad luck. It's not like they had multiple catastrophic hardware failure or an entire data center burned to the ground.

This isn't like missing a shot or something out of focus it's like showing up at a wedding with one flash, one body, one memory card, then missing the kiss, first dance, and cake cutting because you had to dump that memory card or you had some equipment failure and had to drive out for an hour to fix it. Then someone offers to take photos and that person gets flack which ignores the orignal problem. Yeah, that sort of thing really "grinds my gears."

the market wont punish them. in the eyes of most people who drool over their templates, they can do no wrong.

I like you analogy -- but it seems it is more like shooting a wedding and getting home and realize you didn't even have a card in the camera.

I'm not trying to defend Blu's mistake. I'm just saying the self-righteous "It's their JOB. You have one damn job, one job, do it and do it right." nonsense contributes nothing helpful. Especially now, when their down, kicking them seems cheap. I'm sure they could use a hand and at the very least--no more gasoline on a well-lit 4-alarm.

And, yes, the market will punish them. Just like it does with any product or service that doesn't perform well. That's not to say everyone will leave (as many folks were unaffected and some who were are still loyal), but others will not sign up who may have been on the bubble, and there will be those who do defect. They are not a monopoly. There are many reasonable options the market has produced (including DJ's). Unless they change their ways or the government subsidizes them, the market will continue to shift from their service to ones who outperform them.

And Jim, I'm sure there have been photographers who have shot a wedding without a card in the camera... I'm also sure the market punished them as that bride, no doubt, mentioned the colossal failure; and folks didn't hire them. It may not have sent him/her out of business, but if they repeated the mistake, it no doubt would have. Same is true here...

Again, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it wasn't a big deal, I just don't think pissing on someone when they're bleeding is commendable.

As always, $.02

K

Hey -- that was Tami who was arguing about market punishing... I was just commenting on the analogy.... See Tami always gets me in trouble....

I knew who it was(n't). I was addressing your comment separately and tying it into the previous issue of the market.

WOW!!!

Hey --- don't pull me into Tami's stuff.. I get in enough trouble on my own.

your such a girl.....

D.J. is in a position to provide relief for those affected and from all accounts he is the sort of guy who would and has done things like this altruistically. It is a leeeetle coy to sidestep the fact that a portion of the motivation of doing so is to bolster his own product profile potentially at Blu's expense. On the other hand, when it comes down to it, it's Blu's fault for even being in this position. Blu's criticism of David isn't going to fix any problems they've made for themselves and it will only hurt their image and drive more customers into Showit Sites.

This is an opportunity for D.J. and Showit Sites. Blu-domain has made a series of serious mistakes in their provision of services and DJ has been working on his product for months prior to their gaffe. D.J. would be a fool not to capitalize on Blu's lapses and can do so with a sense of altruism and commitment to the affected community.

However, given how much so many of us look up to David for his general business models, it surprises me a little that he hasn't at least acknowledged how the intention of post might be misperceived as it apparently has been by more than a few people.

But don't be surprised to see Bludomain hit back and people lose some faith in the ideal they've created as "David Jay". David has opened up a front he may regret if anything significant goes wrong with his launch of Showit sites.

D.J., I hope you don't take what I've written personally. I have an enormous amount of respect for you and your products and plan on using Showit Sites once you launch. Your very public presence here and in the wedding photography community at large has been an enormous benefit to everyone you've touched. It would be foolish for people to let this circumstance question your integrity, but maybe some people here have a point which can help you focus your future efforts when situations come up so it's not a zero sum game? Can you see how people might be confused and how your post might be understood as cynical?

Thanks for the nice post Ryan and I definitely agree with you. I knew it would upset some people but I also knew that I had the opportunity to help others and so I tried to focus on that and not let things get focused on the negative.

I really did focus on the positive here and offered to help people but I have no problem being the whistle blower on bad companies (whether or not I have a competing product/service) ....as I've done many times.

The trouble in our industry is that companies with bad services can hide pretty easily b/c most people are so turned off by conflict that if it can even be implied that somebody is pointing out something bad some people will go nuts and my approach has always been that if a company is doing harm to other people then it should be out in the open for everyone to talk about.

Rock on!
DJ

Thanks D.J.,
Might companies like Blu Domain and their less than stellar business model be the reason why you designed Showit Sites in the first place? I think it goes to show that the reasonably priced options available in this market niche are riddled with poor customer service and there is an opening for a similar product that have the notably consistent and impressive David Jay promise of quality behind it. Hmm...Livebooks or Showit Sites? Guess where I am going?

Ryan

Rock on Ryan!

Personally I wanted Showit Sites b/c I was frustrated that I couldn't update my own website and I knew how vital it was for my business to have a unique website. It was sad to see how photographers were becoming commodities I knew they needed to have a way to differentiate themselves on the web instead of standardize themselves on the web and that was when I started asking my friends to develop this program and it's just now coming alive.

I'm stoked that you've been happy with the quality we've put out in the past and that was with a three person team and now we're at 11 so we expect the quality and service to keep going up!

Sweet!
DJ

I have to agree with DJ here on the service levels that we accept within our industry. I think artists in general are less confrontational than others and are willing to put up with inferior levels of service.

Sean

Sean (and others) I have no problem firing vendors.

Hey DJ,

I have some thoughts on this I'd like to add ... only if you don't mind, though.

Erik Dungan
BIG Folio

The day that my website malfunctioned and I received an email from blu to say their entire tech support team was at WPPI partying -- it was clearly time to get out. By the time they recovered from their hangover my website had moved to a new host - it did not require them to look up from their martini!

You can get banned for name calling like that!!!

nope. i have my anti-ban glasses on.

oh and one thing i want to add. why does everyone think that hosting elsewhere is such a good idea? do you honestly think that nothing will ever go wrong wtih godaddy or the others? business go into bankruptcy all the time, some of them overnight practically. businesses pack up and go and disappear on a regular basis.

for everyone who thinks they are 100% protected by hosting elsewhere, guess again.

This could be interesting...

Tami,

I think the difference is the history that blu has. Simply google their name and tons of sites come up with complaints. They are simply unresponsive to many of their customers.

Sure, some people they treat great, but others not so much. Of course though companies go bankrupt or have servers crash or other problems, this is just natural. It's the systems that the companies have in place to handle the bad times that counts. I'm sure GoDaddy has backups and redundancy and stuff (though I'd have to look - don't make me). I'm also pretty sure blu didn't.

E

eric, my point was, any company can go bankrupt and disappear over night. there are hundreds of businesses that are in business one day and poof, gone the next day.

Of course businesses go bankrupt, but doing business with a company that would make a numb scull decision to take ALL it's tech support to WPPI - er hello?
So - I did the research, read the reviews and now have 24/7 live support with a company that backs up it's servers. If you prefer the 'We'll get back to you after we finish our partying at WPPI' approach to your hosting - great - enjoy!

dont worry - i blew my top over that one. i needed support as well - i did end up getting it, but the email message i received 'we're partying our asses of at wppi' made me want to throw up....

Yeah, but MY point was good companies, ones that plan for the future, don't.

This. Is the greatest post. Ever.

Mr. T. Yes.

Is Blu having "site-issues" again?

I've tried getting into three websites that are Blu and nothing, nada......

One of the sites I'm trying to get to is:
http://www.swissmisscards.com

yah... right.... not fallin for that one again......

LOL Tami.......
I swear, swear, swear it's a real link and I tried it again this morning but it's still down. I got the link from Skye somewhere on OSP.......I want to take a look but can't get into the site.

**~~**Besides I don't want to be on guard when my doorbell rings anymore!!**~~**

http://www.swissmisscards.com
Swiss Miss Cards: Creative Card Templates for Photographers

Dont worry its a real link, shes telling the truth and its still down.

Here's a follow-up (I also put this on another OSP Thread this morning)....of course this isn't the only business I'm searching for products but it's now become a mission of mine to see if & when SwissMissCards comes back up. I've heard great things about them <sigh>........

I've been trying for a few days and as of this morning I still can't get past that "spinning wheel." Here's what I found....contact info is here:http://whois.domaintools.com/swissmisscards.com
After you click the above link and scroll down to "Server Data"..........then click on the "W" box to the right http://whois.domaintools.com/66.7.202.107 and you get this:

IP Information for 66.7.202.107

IP Location: United States Orlando Hostdime.com Inc
Resolve Host: bludomain9.bludomain9.com
IP Address: 66.7.202.107
Reverse IP: 382 other sites hosted on this server.
Blacklist Status: Clear

Whois Record
OrgName: HostDime.com, Inc.
OrgID: DIMEN-6
Address: 189 South Orange Avenue
Address: Suite 1500S
City: Orlando
StateProv: FL
PostalCode: 32801
Country: US

ReferralServer: rwhois://rwhois.dimenoc.com:4321

NetRange: 66.7.192.0 - 66.7.223.255
CIDR: 66.7.192.0/19
NetName: DIMECNET
NetHandle: NET-66-7-192-0-1
Parent: NET-66-0-0-0-0
NetType: Direct Allocation
NameServer: PTR1.DIMENOC.COM
NameServer: PTR2.DIMENOC.COM
Comment:
RegDate: 2006-05-18
Updated: 2007-07-24

My blu site is completely gone today too. They are having issues again.

My site works, I don't host with them.....Everywho hosts with blu should move to a new host.

Mine's back up again. It was down at least for a good part of today.
Yikes, that was a bit scary and unsettling. Although there still seems to be some glitches in the email and such.

I got an email from a bride saying that she tried to access my site late last night and it wasn't working...but it's working now that's for sure. I think she emailed about 1:30AM so maybe mine went down the middle of last night?

hi friends!!
ok, so our site AND email was down as well...i sent blu a 911 email this morning...and i got back that they were "aware of the issue" and were working on fixing it. thats all i got from them, so still don't know what the "issue" was!!

Does anyone know anything new on this? My site went down last week and I was sort of accused by a blu employee that I went on the server and deleted my own site.... hmmm...
no site, no blog... my blog was on their server... no database...
waiting to hear back from them. the last email said we were back to where we started and the site was ready to be worked on- meaning, go ahead and start over building it, because its gone and there is nothing we are gonna do about it.
any news? any idea what i can do? dont really have the time to rebuild anything right now.. busy season and all.