While Hurricane Sandy has been downgraded to a severe storm that still is impacting parts of the Northeast U.S. with wind, rain, and flooding, the initial, direct storm impact on our regional datacenter in New York has passed without any impact to service or performance.

Our facility remained running–fully on utility power–at all times, with no disruptions to service. All fiber optic network connections, including our dark fiber build, remain at 100% operational status, and all backup network and power systems also remain at 100% operational status. All Internet carrier connection points report full operational status, with no outages reported in the last 24 hours. At this time we have completed our Emergency Preparedness Stage II Plan, which has been in effect since Sunday – returning to normal operational status as of 12:01 PM EST today, October 30th, 2012.

We are happy to report that all employees and their families are safe and sound, and have either reported for duty or checked in to confirm their status. Many clients who have contacted us from within the impacted regions also report they are safe – which we are very grateful to hear.

Some severe flooding in parts of New York continue at this time. For instance, you may see on the news that the stock exchange has been closed for a 2nd day. Major power outages and other effects of Hurricane Sandy are impacting millions of people,but our New York datacenter facility remains over 2,000 feet above sea level and far removed from the impacted flood zone. We do not anticipate any issues related to the flooding in these regions of New York, but will continue to monitor the situation.

Thank you all for the well wishes that were sent to TurnKey Internet and our staff in the last 24 hours. Our thoughts and best wishes are with those who remain in the regions experiencing the after effects of Hurricane Sandy, and we hope for a speedy recovery for all who have been impacted.

EDIT: View our live Hurricane Sandy camera to watch as the storm reaches New York at http://sandycam.turnkeyinternet.net/

Hurricane Sandy is currently hitting the Northeast U.S. with hurricane-force winds and monsoon rains. It is expected to hit New York and Upstate New York today (Monday, October 29th, 2012).  The NY Stock Exchange has shut down, as have many businesses and schools throughout the North East.  At TurnKey Internet, we have already activated our Emergency Preparedness Stage II Plan as of Sunday October 28th – and we have already completed extensive on-site generator stress tests. We topped off our diesel tanks so we can run independent of utility power for several days, and have increased staff intervals to staggered shifts to ensure that on-site engineering staff and customer service coverage remains uninterrupted both during and after the storm.  We have additional staff on hand in case you wish to call in for a status update (518-618-0999), or you can view live status updates on our Twitter feed. There will be links to photos as the hurricane passes through the region, today and tomorrow, Tuesday, October 30th.

TurnKey Internet’s new, multi-million dollar data-center located in the heart of New York’s Tech Valley Region already has multiple redundant systems in place to remain online in the event of power loss, fiber network outage, or natural disaster.  The facility is a former government building, built with concrete walls that are over a foot thick, on a self contained secure lot, over 2,000 feet above sea level.  There is no risk for flooding, and the facility is built to withstand hurricane-level winds, as well as tornado-level winds. Rest assured our role is to ensure uninterrupted and continuous 100% operation for all cloud services we provide to our clients, and the activation of our Preparedness Stage II Plan ensures exactly that.  For businesses and clients with data located at their offices, homes, etc. – we strongly urge you to copy and back-up your data to a secure data-center such as TurnKey’s immediately, so you will have access to your data in the event your business loses local power due to Hurricane Sandy.  TurnKey Internet’s facility and cloud services will remain at full operation status, with additional staff on standby to assist you.

Our best wishes go out for the safety and health of our clients, staff, friends, and family.

We have enabled a new feature for clients using our hosting packages (reseller hosting, SEO hosting, standard web hosting, e-commerce hosting, and website builder hosting), which will allow you to unblock your IP if you should be temporarily blocked or banned by our hosting server firewalls.

TurnKey utilizes highly secure servers, software, and firewall monitoring systems, which block remote access to IPs that appear to be repeatedly doing things they shouldn’t (like trying to login using the wrong password hundreds of times in a few minute period).  Unfortunately, from time to time, this can impact you, or the web sites you host for friends or clients, when someone has a misconfigured password somewhere.  In cases like this, it’s easier for you to be able to remove the block on your IP (and to see why it was blocked) and to do it instantly via the new web-based interface we have provided for you.

To access this system, go to https://secure.turnkeyinternet.net, click the link on the right-hand tool bar that says UNBLOCK IPS FROM FIREWALL, and you will have full and instant access.

Clients with VPS, cloud, dedicated, or colocated servers who think a firewall has blocked them, will need to open a support ticket for additional help – this feature is only for those on our hosting platforms as noted above.

If you have any questions, or continue to have issues, feel free to open a support ticket.

Recently, there has been quite a stir over the EU’s response to Google’s most recent privacy policy…

From PARIS (Reuters): “Google has four months to make its privacy policy comply with requests from European Union data protection watchdogs or start facing the possibility of disciplinary action at a national level.”

France’s Commission Nationale de l’Informatique, working on behalf of the EU’s 27 national data regulators, said on Tuesday it had found legal flaws with a new approach to user data that Google adopted in March.

Among CNIL’s concerns was the way the U.S. group combines anonymous data from users’ browsing histories across its services to better target advertising.

From theguardian:  “Google’s latest privacy policy means that users get a simpler experience when signing up for a new Google-owned service. But it also means that Google can build up a more comprehensive picture of the user for advertising – for example, monitoring a person’s use of YouTube to help better target adverts within Gmail.”

I find it interesting that the EU’s various sanctioning bodies have an issue with this.  What do they think Google is going to do with the information?  Seriously!?  Google is in business to make money.  They make money by helping advertisers get in front of people who are most likely to purchase their products and services.  Let me give a perfect example – Let’s say that a feminine hygiene advertisement is placed in front of male audience members. I dare say, that is a waste of the advertisers’ money because odds are probably REALLY good that there isn’t a single purchaser in the group.

Another example: I watch YouTube all the time.  99.8% of my YouTube views are music.  Actually, I can’t imagine life without YouTube – but that’s another blog.  In the past year alone, I’ve probably watched in the neighborhood of 2,500 music videos – and once, ONCE, was an advertisement placed in front of me that I was interested in.  I actually sat there and watched the advertisement because it was something I was interested in.  That means the other 2499 times that ads were placed in front of me were a total waste.  From both efficiency and user-experience standpoints, wouldn’t it be better if YouTube, Google, or whoever is displaying the content, knew something about the viewer’s likes, dislikes, sites visited, etc.?  It irks me a little bit that I have to wait the 5 seconds before I can click on the “Skip Ad” button.  I’d much rather see an advertisement that actually interests me.

In other words, by being able to target your viewer, as Google is allegedly doing, it serves both the advertiser as well as the viewer.  My question is: Why does the EU want to make it harder on advertisers (businesses within the European Union) and the citizens of the European Union?  Ah, government regulatory bodies at their finest, once again. Apparently the EU wants advertisers to pay for ads that get displayed in front of randomly selected people who might not have any interest at all in the product or service being touted, rather than be able to target their ads to those who have shown some type of behavior that identifies them as a potential buyer.  Also, why should anyone have to sit through an ad that they have no interest in?

Now, I do agree that people should have the ability to opt out of certain things like email, but isn’t what Google is doing beneficial for everyone?

If I were an advertiser and it was costing me X dollars each time my ad was presented, I would want to be darn sure that my ad was being placed in front of people who are most likely to take advantage of what I’m offering.

I’d be interested in hearing other views on whether Google, who is allegedly doing what the regulatory bodies claim, is right or wrong.  Perhaps you are indifferent? How do you feel about the use of this alleged data?

A few weeks ago, Jeremy wrote an excellent article concerning Black Friday and why it’s important to consider all the cloud has to offer for managing such a busy holiday. Remember that? If not, you can (and should!) give yourself a little refresher course, here. Now, to establish the obvious, Black Friday is a high-traffic “holiday”. The same thing goes for Cyber Monday. However, these days, this might be little more than the result of heavy marketing campaigns and layers upon layers of hype that have accumulated around it over the years. We recently stumbled over some intriguing statistics that The Wall Street Journal dug up. For those of you hardcore deal-seekers who may be tuning in–you should probably consider sitting down for this.

Did you know that Black Friday may not always be your best bet for finding the absolute lowest price or steepest discount? It was hard for us to believe, too! There’s always such a craze leading up to and—of course—on Black Friday; from the lines wrapping around entire city blocks, to the blinking, coffee-slugging early-birds maniacally refreshing retail sites. However, according to the aforementioned study conducted by The Wall Street Journal and Decide, Inc., all of this effort (and, well, misery) might not be monetarily worth it in the end.

Interestingly, it seems that major retailers are pumping up marketing campaigns surrounding their more extreme deals, while inflating the price of other items to avoid a diminution of profits. Therefore, let’s say you want a specific TV, and see that it’s absurdly marked down at a specific store. Go for it! You wait in those lines, hurdle those human beings, and get that TV by any means necessary! However, if you’re shopping in general or looking for something that has a significantly reduced demand post-holidays, you might want to just hang out for a week or so. Or, you know what? Be a go-getter! Create your own shopping holiday and have a “Super Saturday” a few weeks early, or something.

Before you give yourself a head-slap for time spent in the calamity of Black Fridays past, rest assured that Black Friday does offer some outrageous deals and you absolutely will and have saved yourself a good chunk of cash. Our point is, a lot of expert deal-hunters might be looking for bargains on days that aren’t Black Friday, and you’ll see high traffic spikes then, too. So, although you definitely need to consider Jeremy’s advice for Black Friday because of the less-informed masses who will virtually stampede through your virtual doors, you might ALSO want to do some research and apply it here and there at other times throughout the year. That way, you won’t be unprepared for the hordes of shoppers who have really done their homework.

Take a look at this graphic we pulled from Decide, Inc., and mull it over. Happy Autumn (and happy shopping!) from TurnKey Internet.

Howdy-do, TurnKey Lovers?

A couple of weeks ago, my co-worker, Joe Schoonbeck, came up with a brilliant idea for a post. He suggested we write up a quick “How-To” on some of the essentials you need to begin a hosting business. What a simple, yet profound idea. If I had a dime every time we received questions about how to set up hosting, I would be able to buy a triple with cheese and a large fry from Wendy’s. Enough of this talk about food; let’s get down to business.

Now, this list of ideas is by no means set in stone. These are just a few steps that I believe will give you a good foundation to build your business upon.

 
Step 1 – Decide and Buy

This may seem like a no-brainer, but it is important to determine which type of reseller account suits your needs. Unlike spandex, one size does not fit all. You see, at TurnKey Internet, we sell different types of reseller accounts: alpha, master, and WHM (web host manager).

Each reseller account has its pros and cons, but we’ll leave that for another article. For this entry into the TurnKey diary, let’s just keep it very high-level. Alpha accounts can resell Master accounts and WHM accounts, while Master accounts can only resell WHM accounts. Then, the poor, old WHM accounts can only resell cPanel accounts. This allows you to resell multiple accounts on your website.

Once you decide which account is best for you, purchase it.

Step 2 – Create

I had an intense, internal debate about step 2. Initially, I was thinking about skipping right to Step 3 (configuring your DNS), but it didn’t make sense to me to get into that if you have no site to share with the world.

You can take multiple steps in setting up your website, so I will be brief. You can use TurnKey’s website builder that is included in our reseller packages. Or, maybe you have a developer who creates fantastic websites in his/her sleep. The choices are limitless on this step.

Step 3 – Setup (Part I: Your DNS)

For the sake of this article, I’m going to assume you do not know what DNS is. I’m going to instead share how I teach what DNS (domain name system) is to our newbie engineers. You see, I compare DNS to a post office system. You have your streets and your addresses, which allow people to find your place of residence. That’s what DNS is, in a nut shell.

You have your website, and in order for others to see your masterpiece, you must first tell them where it is. You do this with your DNS. You have your DNS record, which contains your website’s IP address and your nameservers. Your IP address is essentially like the number on your mailbox. Your nameserver(s) would be the street(s) on which your house resides. You have to setup your DNS in order for others to visit your site.

Step 4 – Configure

Now that you have your site online and users purchasing hosting from you, they will inevitably need support. This could be with anything, from support for setting up your clients’ websites, to adding space to their account.

You will need some point of communication that you can use to speak with your clients. Our TurnKey reseller accounts each come with free helpdesk software included, which you can white label in your company’s name. This allows you to have a way for your customers to easily and efficiently submit tickets.

Step 5 – Setup (Part II: Extras)

When I say “setup extras”, these are items that can add increased functionality to your hosting company. While this step can be rather large, we will just stick to a few of the basics.

If you’re selling anything on your site, you will need to install an SSL certificate. This basically encrypts your users’ connections when they submit orders to your company. I would say this is just as important as your website. If you don’t happen to have an SSL certificate lying around, you can request a FREE SSL with your TurnKey reseller account. If you’re going to be accepting orders, you may need a billing system that can help keep those orders in line. Enter—one of our most popular free extras—a free WHMCS license.

 
Now, there are no exact steps, but these can give you a good foundation for beginning your hosting account career.

Until next time, Turnkey Lovers!