We’re Growing Fast!
February 1st, 2008 by heathenxWow! Because of you our popularity is skyrocketing. That’s a good thing, I think. I was just notified by my web hosting provider that I was dangerously close to having my domain suspended unless I upgrade to the next higher package. That was a no-brainer. I just upgraded. I don’t want any outages. Especially if the “Inkscapers “ want their videos for ‘nothing (and chicks for free 
).
My hosting provider is Aplus.net and my package is the ePro. I have nothing but good things to say about these people. They have been my provider for a few years now. Their service is what I like the best. These guys are right on the ball when I have an issue. Plus I love the customer service via online chat. There is plenty that I don’t understand and having that chat service is nice. No waiting for an email reply. Just straight talking one-on-one until my issue is resolved.
What scares me a little is all of this popularity that Richard and I seem to be getting. Remember, we’re just average Joe’s with average looks. Richard is a little less average in that department, though. He has an ear lobe at least 2 inches lower than the other. 
Kidding. Still, we’re trying to stay humble about things. It seems like we double our traffic each and every month. That’s is extremely exciting but there are consequences because of it. What happens when we can no longer afford to keep the Screencasters going at out-of-pocket costs? That’s far from being an issue at the moment but we would be fools not to think about that possibility. I’m not that poor that I can’t afford a dedicated server but is that the right thing to do?
So Richard and I are looking for advice. Perhaps you can help us. Are there better hosting providers out there? Is there a better way to distribute our videos. What’s this Cachefly thing? Should we seek advertising? Should we try to grab a sponsor? Is Screencasters’ content even that good to have a sponsor? We think the videos serve a purpose but it’s far from “professional” content. Should we eliminate our Flash content and just offer our download version? Will the Trix Rabbit finally get to eat that damn cereal? Will the Coyote finally catch the Roadrunner? What do you think? We have lots of questions. Please help us.
February 1st, 2008 at 5:10 pm
Mmm… nice one. I asume that the cheaper way would be to get a hosting with big transfer bandwidth. Im using servage.net witch give me 510 GB of disk space and 5010 GB Transfer per month.
If you wanna keep your hosting provider just buy this just for the videos and your done. 6.45$ per month sounds cheap, but maybe that just me
If you really need bandwidth and space i would gladly spare some with out effort and provide you an ftp access. I have learned a lot! with your videos, so it would be like some sort of payback since im starting my own series on inkscape and gimp.
BTW… any steampunk video coming soon?
February 1st, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Hey Pablito,
Thanks for the information and thanks for the offer. That was really kind of you. Actually, though, if we were really hurting for space and bandwidth then we could always throw some stuff over on Richard’s domain for the time being. We have an emergency plan if we need it.
Hey, what are your thoughts regarding Host Gator? They offer unlimited bandwidth, 1TB of disk storage, unlimited ftp, unlimited email, audio/video streaming, and much more. It looks like they come highly rated.
http://www.hostgator.com/shared.shtml
Choosing the right hosting provider is like shopping for a car.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:54 pm
Congratulations for growing, that’s really great!
I definitely think your material is good enough for both a sponsor and advertising. I would prefer a sponsor. Not really sure why but it feels better.
Regarding the Flash content. Can’t you look at some statistics and see which is more popular. I personally prefer the download.
Regarding bandwidth. Some of the other podcasts I listen to have their data on libsyn (http://www.libsyn.com/). Not sure what’s the pros and cons about that. It would be great if there were an easy Bittorrent solution for sharing lots of data for free. I have seen that dnrTV have torrents available for download but I’m not sure if people are seeding the content.
Hope you find a good solution!
February 2nd, 2008 at 4:32 am
@Ola,
Flash content is somewhat popular for us. It’s no where near what our downloaded avi’s are, maybe 25-50%. I don’t want to eliminate a format that folks are using. If everyone replied and said that the flash videos are worthless then it’s something Richard and I can think about eliminating. If we do eliminate flash then perhaps we could offer another download format. At this point I thought that I would ask just to kick things around a bit.
libsyn is the first thing that Richard suggested to me. We have looked at it but it does have it’s limitation. Apparently there is a an upload limit.
Right now, as I write this, I think our best bet is to go with Host Gator. I have some more questions for them. They seem to offer exactly everything that I want at the same cost or cheaper than Aplus. Unlimited bandwidth is a hard thing not to take seriously.
February 3rd, 2008 at 11:13 pm
Congratz on the growth. Your content and streams are excellent and I have learned a tremendous amount about inkscape from them.
Host Gator does look like a very nice package. Compared to your current package it is a better deal by far.
Another company you may want to check out is SiteGround (http://www.siteground.com/). They do cost less and have a great service. I have been using them for two years now and plan on renewing my contract with them. I have had no troubles with the service i have received and there support crew is excellent.
I know that sounds like a plug, but it is just a very honest opinion from a consumer.
February 4th, 2008 at 4:01 am
Thanks for the tip Jacob.
I think we have already committed to Host Gator for the time being. We may have to switch hosts again in the future since it might be hard to continue doing what we’re doing with hared hosting. I’ll keep siteground on my list of hosters to watch out for.
The area in which I live is laying down a fiber network. I won’t be switching to that anytime soon but it has the potential for me to run my own web server instead. Not sure if I’ll be ready for that but it’s always a possibility.
Some things you just have to wing.