Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

philwareham · 2012-08-17 13:10:41

Theoretically I could build a handful themes and sell through shopify at an official Textpattern store (i.e. shop.textpattern.com), with proceeds returning to the project. Others could do likewise with a slice of their earnings returning to the project (though in that instance I guess we would act as middleman, taking the payment and forwarding on funds). But…

themes are under GPL to a certain extent.
if lots of you create themes, who do users contact with any problems – not me.
many textpattern themes rely on plugins, so therefore the plugin authors have direct impact on whether your theme continues to work or not.
Textpattern doesn’t have a mechanism built in to handle theme installation.

I’d be in favour of some business model for Textpattern, within reason, but not sure themes are the answer. So that leaves…

hosting – we all know where that ended up last time.
merchandise store – probably not a big money maker.
advertising and partnership revenues – probably can be done with a little groundwork and out reaching. My new .com design allows for better placements of advertising (whilst not being intrusive) so that’s a start.

colak · 2012-08-17 13:19:38

Destry wrote:

CEO’s will say and do whatever the business agenda requires…

+1 on this one.

zero · 2012-08-17 15:55:47

philwareham wrote:

I’d be in favour of some business model for Textpattern, within reason, but not sure themes are the answer. So that leaves…

hosting – we all know where that ended up last time.
merchandise store – probably not a big money maker.
advertising and partnership revenues – probably can be done with a little groundwork and out reaching. My new .com design allows for better placements of advertising (whilst not being intrusive) so that’s a start.

———

There’s another business that might suit Textpattern — customizing txp to make it into desirable apps for markets with gaps in them. For example, I know where there is a gap in the market and txp would be ideal to fill that gap. The problems are as follows:

Devs would have extra work (but plugin devs could do it)
Once up and running, maintence and support may be time consuming
Sustainability, security, legality and piracy issues
Business and marketing expertise absolutely essential

If there were enough people who feel they could handle all those problems and work together for years to come, then there’s a possibility of 10,000 sales at £100 each gross income, and of course more if there was a really clever business plan, flair, creativity and lots of hardwork in marketing etc.

I don’t think it will happen, do you? Similar to merchandise store or advertising and partnership revenues, I don’t think there’s any stand out talent in the community for the business side of any Textpattern business model.

New host recommendations? I think there’s a great opportunity for someone to offer VPS packages to all the Textdrivers/Joyain’t people. Buy a couple of servers, colocate, work out the costs and split it between the first 100 to apply, free for Textpattern.com etc of course. Leave it at that, with the person who does it making a minimum wage for ongoing maintenance of a super-fast, reliable hosting package. Just my 2p.

springworks · 2012-08-17 17:44:43

Jason Hoffman on the Joyent forum just now

OK. I’m saying so.
If you’re a lifetime shared “Textdrive” customer you have two options
1) 5 years of a 512MB Smartmachine for per lifetime account. Not lifetime. 5 years. Because lifetime is not a “legal” or “financial” term. This is like getting your OWN shared hosting SERVER!
or
2) A complete refund of your payment per lifetime service offering.
And guys like textpattern.com, if you’re a non-profit et cetera, we’ll have a non-profit program where you continue getting things for free. If just needs to be an actual “program”.

Emphasis added.

So hopefully Textpattern’s future is assured for now and we can go back to worrying about our own personal hosting issues.

Destry · 2012-08-18 04:22:15

Well, that’s interesting. The public outrage has paid off. No pun intended.

I’m curious what “program” means for Textpattern now. Perhaps just the account structure. But it sounds like a pickle for any business interests. (One thing after another.)

For personal accounts, if I understand that right, if I paid for VC II, Mixed Grill, (and there might have been another one… Three-Martini Lunch?), Joyent is offering a refund on the combined value of those “lifetime” related investments and upgrades?

jstubbs · 2012-08-18 04:46:06

Destry, the Migration FAQ has been updated – 5 years or a full refund.

Lifetime customers can choose to receive either a credit for use on the Joyent Cloud or a full refund of their original payment for their lifetime service(s).

Lifetime Shared Hosting account (VC200, Lifetime Hosting Redux, VC2, VC3, VC4, Mixed Grill, and Three Martini Lunch) or Lifetime Small Accelerator customers are eligible for the dollar equivalent of a 512MB Smart Machine for 5 years at current prices. This credit will be offered as a $1,325 Service Credit in Joyent Cloud for each Lifetime Shared Hosting Account or Lifetime Small Accelerator.

Lifetime Medium Accelerator customers are eligible for the dollar equivalent of a 1GB Smart Machine for 5 years at current prices. This credit will be offered as a $3,725 Service Credit in Joyent Cloud for each Lifetime Medium Accelerator account.

Customers who may have multiple lifetime accounts will receive a single credit that contains the summed value of the above promotions.

This promotion is valid for the total dollar amount offered or 5 years, which ever occurs first. If in the future you cancel your Joyent Cloud account, you will forgo any remaining value on this credit.

Textpattern is going to have to decide what to do next because as you say, its not in the interest of a business to be unsure of what is around the corner. Jason has stated that Txp is going to stay and become part of a program supporting non-profits or apps, but that would have to be in writing to inspire confidence for an open-source project.

Right now I’m calculating cost for new hosts (WebFaction, A Small Orange, Gandi, Dreamhost) and trying to figure out the best way forward.

Last edited by jstubbs (2012-08-18 04:46:26)

colak · 2012-08-18 05:34:57

Jason wrote “ textpattern.com et al will still be completely supported by us.”

Jason wrote “Huh? We’re not going to stop supporting all the textpattern stuff. Never said that.”

Destry · 2012-08-18 05:42:29

Thanks, Jonathan!

jstubbs wrote:

Right now I’m calculating cost for new hosts (WebFaction, A Small Orange, Gandi, Dreamhost) and trying to figure out the best way forward.

Exactly what I’m doing. I’ll take my refund and try new land. I’m happy with the refund. I think it’s fair. And I’ll be happy to be rid of all the silly tech talk from Joyent — Accelerator this, SmartMachine that… — always changed, etc. Always something new and buzzy being pitched with fervor…

I noticed this from a poster in the J-forum earlier. I think this is exactly what I paid for too, but I’m hoping Joyent kept track, because I didn’t… You know, I didn’t think I had to. :)

In my case, a refund of my original ~ (USD$400 VCII -> USD$200 MxG crossgrade

A table grid of these hosts with their relevant offers/costs could be useful.

I haven’t decided yet. Just looking at Gandi, it’s Simple Hosting + Paas sounds like the best situation if you just need a main account and a few virtual hosts. And a 50% off the first year if you already have a domain name registered with them (I do). They are the #1 host provider in France, and 6th in Europe (according to About page). I wonder what the other five are… I’m not crazy about their website; it’s very hard to navigate around and find information. I didn’t even know they had a Twitter (@gandibar) or Facebook account because it’s not indicated anywhere on their site (though just found it on the blog only). Little things like that make me skeptical of the greater service.

Last edited by Destry (2012-08-18 05:54:21)

Destry · 2012-08-18 05:57:56

colak wrote:

Jason wrote “Huh? We’re not going to stop supporting all the textpattern stuff. Never said that.”

Well, Robert apparently go the email, but it could have been sent by mistake… an automated mistake. Two adrenaline rushes in one month… first the domain name renewal, now this… eh, Robert?

Destry · 2012-08-18 06:11:00

Ah, here we go. Very useful! All the TextDrive lifetime plans/costs.

wet · 2012-08-18 06:12:56

Destry wrote:

Well, Robert apparently go the email, but it could have been sent by mistake… an automated mistake.

Not a mistake but a necessity as we are in fact hosted on a product which reached EOL so we have to consider our options.

Two adrenaline rushes in one month… first the domain name renewal, now this… eh, Robert?

This. And my main laptop died this week out of the blue, while I was busy fixing an issue with my server going belly up. Life’s a bitch…

wet · 2012-08-18 06:16:45

jstubbs wrote:

Jason has stated that Txp is going to stay and become part of a program supporting non-profits or apps, but that would have to be in writing to inspire confidence for an open-source project.

No. I’d rather rely on gentlemanliness than a cross-border law suit between a multi-million-dollar corp and us.

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#37 2012-08-17 13:10:41

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#38 2012-08-17 13:19:38

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#39 2012-08-17 15:55:47

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#40 2012-08-17 17:44:43

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#41 2012-08-18 04:22:15

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#42 2012-08-18 04:46:06

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#43 2012-08-18 05:34:57

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#44 2012-08-18 05:42:29

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#45 2012-08-18 05:57:56

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#46 2012-08-18 06:11:00

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#47 2012-08-18 06:12:56

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

#48 2012-08-18 06:16:45

Re: Joyent cancels lifetime hosting in October. New host recommendations?

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