Hosting again

[Joel Bernstein]

On Tue, Oct 30, 2007 at 11:33:58PM +0000, Lyle - CosmicPerl.com wrote:
> paddy at panici.net wrote:
> >no worries, I appreciate the reply, thanks.
> >I wish you well with your project.  You are certainly getting some very
> >good advice on the list here.

> Thanks Paddy, the advise I've got here has been more than valuable. I'd 
> wish I'd been a bit more active on this list the last 3 years I've been 
> lurking...

You definitely have received a fine set of advice here. I hope you're
able to digest from it the topics you ought to be reading up on, at
least in terms of identifying holes in your knowledge. You seem
generally to have expressed a lot of resistance to some of the advice
you've received, particularly about using modern tech (cpan, for a
start) and sharing the work you can't do with people who can. 

> I've actually been down to FastHosts in gloucester and had a meeting 
> with them when they were looking at my software (although to be honest 
> it seemed they just wanted a copy of the source to rip it off). They'd 
> spent millions on a fancy new office and crap, WHY WEREN'T THEY SPENDING 
> THIS ON TECH STAFF AND STAFF TRAINING!!! To many salesmen, to little 
> techs (and techs that are totally bullshitting them).

I think you may be somewhat blinkered in your view - the more
professional hosting companies I've dealt with (from bare rackspace to
full-service facilities with remote hands and provided net connectivity,
where you rent by the 'cage') have generally exhibited fair clue in
their networking and 'professional services' (consultancy, rather than
whoring .. OK, not such a huge difference). They don't knock you on
quality at all, they just tend to charge quite a bit. 

If you deal with tinpot webhosts specialising in php/perl cgi support,
I'm not surprised you experience a low level of clue and support. You
get what you pay for. Have you considered taking on virtual servers or
real physical boxes, on which you have root and can do the admin
yourself? If the hosts' techs aren't up to it, surely it's a better plan
to do it yourself? 

/joel