Andy, believe me I know what you're going through--I deal with crisis sitautions on a daily basis, some of them involving some of the largest corporations in the world. I usually can't control the situation, either. But, I have to committ to a time/date for Corrective/Preventive Action.
A day without Smugmug..I'm breathing, my heart is beating, life is good.
SmugMug peeps work harder than you will ever know to bring you near perfect service.
If your life has been affected so much by this outage then it is you who needs to make some changes in how you conduct business.
These things happen and will continue to happen on all servers. I don't remember ever reading anything that stated the service will NEVER be interrupted.
I'd have to agree. In this tech kind of world we live in, these types of things happen. While it would be nice to upload some photos today, my life will still go on and there is always tomorrow. In my opinion the great service SM provides far outweighs a one day outage.
I am an organization effectiveness psychologist for the defense industry where there is much more at stake than photographs, i.e. national security. I can tell you, that as far as organizational effectiveness is concerned, Smug Mug is at the top of my list in customer service and excellence, not to mention integrity. This is not to minimize the fact that many of us have serious customer issues as a result of this major inconvenience, but I am absolutely appreciative of Smug Mug's dedication to excellence.
and thank you Andy for keeping us all up to speed on the latest developments
A day without Smugmug..I'm breathing, my heart is beating, life is good.
SmugMug peeps work harder than you will ever know to bring you near perfect service.
If your life has been affected so much by this outage then it is you who needs to make some changes in how you conduct business.
These things happen and will continue to happen on all servers. I don't remember ever reading anything that stated the service will NEVER be interrupted.
You have obviously misunderstood the point of many of the contributors here - the issue we are having is the failure of smugmug to answer questions.
How long will it be? - How long is a peice of string. I can accept downtime. i cannot accept lack of timescale on when the problem will be fixed.
I do know that our engineers are working as fast as superhumanely possible and we won't stop till things are back up.
I'm not going to say a time estimate only to have it be missed. There are thousands of people viewing this thread that would be very disappointed, you included, I imagine.
Let us get to it, I promise it'll be as fast as we can and not one second longer.
I wish I had a better, more precise answer for you.
I think he was asking for a estimate not a guarantee. Give an estimate and if it goes over come on here and give another and apologize for being wrong. If someone says "BUT YOU SAID!!!" then explain to them it was an estimate...<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p> not hard is it<o:p></o:p>
I need a new electric company....I lose my electricity on the average of at least 5 times every month....today alone it was out at 2 am and did not return until dang near noon and there were no storms or crashes into utility poles.....it just stops working and Westar Enrgy will not give a reason....infact you cannot talk to a real person except during the week and then it is almost an hour of runing thru different menus and every effing one starts off with for english press one.....the Last I counted 33 menus I had to work thru to get one that fnally said to speak top a customer service rep press 0....but then you ahd input your address, phone number and ?Westar account number.....and I had done all of that on the first 5 menus.....it is simply a ploy to make us the customer not want to talk to a person.......and they know they have you by the Kahunas ..................
At least SM talks to their customers and lets us know what is going on.....
A day without Smugmug..I'm breathing, my heart is beating, life is good.
SmugMug peeps work harder than you will ever know to bring you near perfect service.
If your life has been affected so much by this outage then it is you who needs to make some changes in how you conduct business.
These things happen and will continue to happen on all servers. I don't remember ever reading anything that stated the service will NEVER be interrupted.
For me, this has nothing to do with my life being so affected by this outage. This is a business issue, plain and simple. While having the system up 98.8% of the time may seem to be a very high success rate, an airline certainly couldn't live with that kind of success rate (figure the number of deaths per million flyers at a rate of 1.2%). The amount of uptime for a system like SM is an indication of the quality of the service and, at least in the manufacturing sector, 1.2% failures is unacceptable.
I think he was asking for a estimate not a guarantee. Give an estimate and if it goes over come on here and give another and apologize for being wrong. If someone says "BUT YOU SAID!!!" then explain to them it was an estimate...<o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p> not hard is it<o:p></o:p>
The issue is that for most of the outage, there was simply nothing we could do. We were twiddling our thumbs and waiting on Amazon. We had no way of knowing how fast they would fix the problem other than the updates on http://status.aws.amazon.com/.
We are right now in read-only mode and confirming that the Amazon stuff is indeed fixed and should shortly be resuming full service.
If your livelihood is that dependent on your web host, then you should have a redundancy plan of your own to cope with any outage. The internet is at best an "iffy" place and the IT world is a magic bubble where it works when it works and doesn't when it doesn't.
Demanding that SmugMug have alternate storage or a mirror site does not count as your redundancy plan neither does complaining.
You are in control of your own destiny...have a backup site and reroute your URL.
When I was a child, I used to live across the road from a poultry farm. The farmer's name was Hank. He had a saying that's done me a lot of good over the years. Hank used to say:
Andy, what's done is done, and can't be undone. I think the expectation is a good explanation of what happened, why it happened and what can be done to prevent it from happening in the future. I don't do business using SM, so the outage doesn't affect me (much).
But for those who are doing business using SM, how SM addresses the outage will be critical.
Good hosts do provide guarantees, something like 99.9% uptime or you get a full or partial refund.
So go and find the sob at Amazon who flipped the wrong switch that did such an injustice to you and your business.
I had 10 plus emails today from people wondering what was wrong with my gallery. I told them it was a glitch, trust that the pictures will return and that you'll be able to make purchases as soon as humanly possible. People are more understanding than you seem to trust, explain it's not your fault, blame the people who caused the problem if that makes you feel better, but believe me, if you show distrust in who you do business with, your clients are going to pick up on it and consider if you are not satisfied, then why should I feel safe and secure with my purchase, and perhaps move on to someone/something else.
I understand your frustration, believe me, and when I first joined SM and didn't understand or know how fully I should trust them, I panicked when I encountered the first outage, I was upset and wanted someone to be accountable and it turns out that they were. If you want the guarantee of no outages or technical glitches or errors then you'd better haul all your stuff offline and start travelling door to door. Trust me, this is not worth getting your shorts in a knot over.
If your livelihood is that dependent on your web host, then you should have a redundancy plan of your own to cope with any outage. The internet is at best and "iffy" place and the IT world is a magic bubble where it works when it works and doesn't when it doesn't.
Couldn't have said it better. I have another site that hosts Coppermine software, and my Smuggy site is more or less reflected in the other site (same photos, same categories, just no commerce ability). A few mouse clicks and my Coppermine-based site and Smuggy site have the same images. If one goes down, I can steer traffic to the other.
(Actually, the Coppermine site pre-dates my Smuggy site, and I spent a couple of years trying to smoothly work commerce off it. Didn't work. Then along came Smuggy and I'm much happier now).
The internet isn't perfect. Between ISP's being down and hosts being down and a plethora of other potential problems, a "Plan B" is always essential (and Plans C-J couldn't hurt).
Thanks for getting us back so soon on a weekend, SmugTeam!
The issue is that for most of the outage, there was simply nothing we could do. We were twiddling our thumbs and waiting on Amazon. We had no way of knowing how fast they would fix the problem other than the updates on http://status.aws.amazon.com/.
We are right now in read-only mode and confirming that the Amazon stuff is indeed fixed and should shortly be resuming full service.
I know it was never your fault. But you still could have given an estimate.
Even if you said right now
"Full service should be up in 2 hours, this is only an estimate."
Then I could go water the grass and not sit here reading your post. I come back in 2 hours and if it's not up I ask again what your ESTIMATE is.
Comments
My life was changed forever on 09/11/01.
A day without Smugmug..I'm breathing, my heart is beating, life is good.
SmugMug peeps work harder than you will ever know to bring you near perfect service.
If your life has been affected so much by this outage then it is you who needs to make some changes in how you conduct business.
These things happen and will continue to happen on all servers. I don't remember ever reading anything that stated the service will NEVER be interrupted.
I suspect many will, and it won't be beneficial to SmugMug.
Business is business.
I am an organization effectiveness psychologist for the defense industry where there is much more at stake than photographs, i.e. national security. I can tell you, that as far as organizational effectiveness is concerned, Smug Mug is at the top of my list in customer service and excellence, not to mention integrity. This is not to minimize the fact that many of us have serious customer issues as a result of this major inconvenience, but I am absolutely appreciative of Smug Mug's dedication to excellence.
and thank you Andy for keeping us all up to speed on the latest developments
http://danielplumer.com/
Facebook Fan Page
Yep, in read only. Thanks Andy. I know it's been a long day for you and your folks. And it's probably not over.
Member SportsShooter.com
My Galleries
Yup. I'm back too!
8:25 p.m. ET
The Railroad Photographer
www.railroadphotographer.com
http://www.smugmug.com/
We'll be checking things out, giving the site a physical exam and we'll restore full service as soon as possible.
Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
You have obviously misunderstood the point of many of the contributors here - the issue we are having is the failure of smugmug to answer questions.
How long will it be? - How long is a peice of string. I can accept downtime. i cannot accept lack of timescale on when the problem will be fixed.
I think he was asking for a estimate not a guarantee. Give an estimate and if it goes over come on here and give another and apologize for being wrong. If someone says "BUT YOU SAID!!!" then explain to them it was an estimate...<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
not hard is it<o:p></o:p>
is that an estimate or a guarantee?
At least SM talks to their customers and lets us know what is going on.....
**Image hosted by Flickr** :eek1
_______________________________________________
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Canon 300mm f/2.8 IS
I'm back, read only.
For me, this has nothing to do with my life being so affected by this outage. This is a business issue, plain and simple. While having the system up 98.8% of the time may seem to be a very high success rate, an airline certainly couldn't live with that kind of success rate (figure the number of deaths per million flyers at a rate of 1.2%). The amount of uptime for a system like SM is an indication of the quality of the service and, at least in the manufacturing sector, 1.2% failures is unacceptable.
The issue is that for most of the outage, there was simply nothing we could do. We were twiddling our thumbs and waiting on Amazon. We had no way of knowing how fast they would fix the problem other than the updates on http://status.aws.amazon.com/.
We are right now in read-only mode and confirming that the Amazon stuff is indeed fixed and should shortly be resuming full service.
I really am sorry I couldn't be more precise, and I know it's really important to you as you've posted a few times.
I'm really, really, sorry
Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
I have misunderstood nothing.
It was minutes, after Amazon restored their service. Thank you all.
Folks we're back to full service.
Portfolio • Workshops • Facebook • Twitter
Good hosts do provide guarantees, something like 99.9% uptime or you get a full or partial refund.
borealphoto.smugmug.com
Demanding that SmugMug have alternate storage or a mirror site does not count as your redundancy plan neither does complaining.
You are in control of your own destiny...have a backup site and reroute your URL.
www.sunglophoto.com
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
Thanks Smug
Never doubted for a mintue you wouldn't follow this thru for all of us on smugmug.
www.Dogdotsphotography.com
It's nice to be back!
Thanks for all your hard work smugmug!
When I was a child, I used to live across the road from a poultry farm. The farmer's name was Hank. He had a saying that's done me a lot of good over the years. Hank used to say:
'Don't let the turkeys get'cha down..."
But for those who are doing business using SM, how SM addresses the outage will be critical.
So go and find the sob at Amazon who flipped the wrong switch that did such an injustice to you and your business.
I had 10 plus emails today from people wondering what was wrong with my gallery. I told them it was a glitch, trust that the pictures will return and that you'll be able to make purchases as soon as humanly possible. People are more understanding than you seem to trust, explain it's not your fault, blame the people who caused the problem if that makes you feel better, but believe me, if you show distrust in who you do business with, your clients are going to pick up on it and consider if you are not satisfied, then why should I feel safe and secure with my purchase, and perhaps move on to someone/something else.
I understand your frustration, believe me, and when I first joined SM and didn't understand or know how fully I should trust them, I panicked when I encountered the first outage, I was upset and wanted someone to be accountable and it turns out that they were. If you want the guarantee of no outages or technical glitches or errors then you'd better haul all your stuff offline and start travelling door to door. Trust me, this is not worth getting your shorts in a knot over.
Couldn't have said it better. I have another site that hosts Coppermine software, and my Smuggy site is more or less reflected in the other site (same photos, same categories, just no commerce ability). A few mouse clicks and my Coppermine-based site and Smuggy site have the same images. If one goes down, I can steer traffic to the other.
(Actually, the Coppermine site pre-dates my Smuggy site, and I spent a couple of years trying to smoothly work commerce off it. Didn't work. Then along came Smuggy and I'm much happier now).
The internet isn't perfect. Between ISP's being down and hosts being down and a plethora of other potential problems, a "Plan B" is always essential (and Plans C-J couldn't hurt).
Thanks for getting us back so soon on a weekend, SmugTeam!
The Railroad Photographer
www.railroadphotographer.com
I know it was never your fault. But you still could have given an estimate.
Even if you said right now
"Full service should be up in 2 hours, this is only an estimate."
Then I could go water the grass and not sit here reading your post. I come back in 2 hours and if it's not up I ask again what your ESTIMATE is.
This has nothing to do with a guarantee.