When I was you web hosting operator

[temi]

I started hosting my own website and registering my own domain names about 5 years or so ago because I was completely pissed off with my then hosting company UK2 . I cut a lot of corners then, like Maxseo I even considered hosting my servers from home.
Fighting non stop battle with hackers and crackers and never ending server updates which consume most of my time never mind the downtime make me to rethink my strategy. I hired a server management company.
That was the smarted decision I have ever made in my web hosting career. Just for a fixed sum per month they do all the battles with hackers (if the server is well hardened, regular patch added and updated as required there is not need to do battle with hackers as you will completely lock then out)

I stopped having downtimes, and I really do not need to worry about all the things that consumed my time in the past, I got so confident that I even started selling hosting space. Now I have several thousand happy hosting customers.

The reason for this post is to encourage some small hosting company operator in this forum who seem to still be doing battles with patching their server etc to consider outsourcing their server management, its very liberating experience and you can concentrate on growing your business .

Good luck:

[OldDarkstarAccount]

Great post!
Temi , did you ever considered writing the history of this forums and some other sites you manage ? I think that would be an interesting story , we can all learn from your experience ( plus that I love reading stories )

[temi]

Hey Darkstar,
Thanks for that. I love telling stories but not internet stories, I like myth like "harap alb" and other folk stories the type you can find at my storytelling site

[OldDarkstarAccount]

I like myth too , historical ones like "Vlad Tepes" as "Dracula". I do remember I tried a website design with that story. Anyway , internet stories are also interesting , I like to read how a big forum started , the problem with choosing the hosting , the problem with choosing the name , the first look of the forum ...
I`m curious how many have a story to tell about the born of their sites.

btw Temi great stories on your Storytelling Website

[temi]

Darkstar,
The way you put it now makes me agree with you that it will be interesting to find out how great websites are started. Maybe you and I should try Interviewing website owners and see if we can get them to tell stories about how they started.
Which website owner would you like to interview?

[OldDarkstarAccount]

We have many websites owners right here on the forums. Maybe we could start here. As about a specific person , I have nothing in mind now. Maybe anyone would like to share with us his story ?

I got my first hosting account around 2000 which was just for one domain. I then went on to a reseller account with Host Europe (now part of Pipex) and from there upgraded to a Sun server with them (that was overpriced and the control panel was awful). After that a dedicated server with One and One (Ensim Control Panel). Now I have a server with The Planet in Texas (Cpanel control) which I use to host my own sites and have about 10 hosting customers.

I have learnt a lot of things along the way, one of which is don't pay UK prices unless you have to. Many hosting companies I have seen that have separate UK and US sites charge the same amount in pounds as they do in dollars. I'm paying the same for my server now as I was for a reseller account years ago, but I guess you live and learn.

Another thing I've learnt is about domains, shop around for quality of service don't just go for the cheap price. My first few domains were with easyspace on the recommendation of someone i knew, man that was a mistake. They charge you £25 just to change the nameservers on a domain, and £50 to transfer the domain to another registrar. A couple of domains I paid the release fee just to get away from them. I now happily have all my domains with 123-reg who provide nameservers for free and as far as I can tell don't charge you for anything and give clear instructions about how to transfer out.

[temi]

Rob,
Your learning curve and mine are remarkably similar on the hosting front, on the domain name registration front, I actually joined Nominent so I buy my .uk domain names directly, I have account with openSRS for my .com/net/org etc.
Prior to joining Nominet I used to by .uk domain from UK2 which was a horrible experience, I then bough from easily, they are very nice but when I started doing large volumes of .uk domains joining Nominet was cheaper, had to pay £500 to join then and £100 membership fee every year but I have my own tag and I am in full control.