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It should be easy.
Call an ISP sales office and say you want to do a
commercial page.
Give them money.
They help you.
It should be.
Easy.
I sent e-mails. No reply.
I spoke on the phone.
One ISP couldn't handle pointers - for when you host
more than one domain name on a site - like I do. I have six names plus
the master. Cost me $15/month/name past the first.
http://www.FabioIFC.com
http://www.TroySutter.com
http://www.MantaRay-Photography.com
http://www.Donnamaie.com
http://www.JettisonSaga.com
http://www.White-Enterprises.org
and
http://www.eBooks-n-Stuff.com
Only one needs to be secure. The last one.
The rest can link to it.
Sounds simple.
Easy.
Merrill Lynch wanted to do the merchant account.
Banta will get the orders and do fulfillment - as
soon as I finalize that contract.
Why not stay with Best?
Because they were scooped up by Verio. Verio hosts
500,000 sites. Biggest ISP provider going. They tell me.
I'm still on a Best server.
Need to move.
Knew that was coming.
So, after fussing around, I called Verio.
The number on their website. For storefront services.
The number didn't work!
So I called the main one.
I got some dippidy-do in sales who immediately (immediately!)
transferred me to tech support before I had two words out of my mouth.
Tech support said - oh, we can't do that - here's
another Verio phone number.
Alright.
Back through voice mail selection - takes two levels.
Got a salesman.
He smelled commission.
He knew - after a few minutes of my babbling (this
is all new to me), what I was trying to get -just a simple storefront
that could send order requests to Banta and money to ML. Under 30 products.
Credit card only.
Simple.
But, nothing I do is simple.
I live under a black cloud.
First, I HAVE to use BankOne. For some strange reason.
(Another Bank - another statement for IRS files! I hate having this many
statements and forms!)
And pay them $25/month for the privelidge. Plus I
pay $0.25 per transaction.
MarketPlace is the package. ($125/month) For serious
eCommerce. Real-time credit card processing. Unlimited products (I may
have 30 within 18 months). 30+ e-mail accounts (WHY? What a hassle!) Gateways.
Shopping Cart. CyberCash. StoreFront.
But most important.
100MB+ disk space (more than I need at the moment)
6,000+ MB monthly bandwidth (I have no idea)
So I put eBooks-n-Stuff.com as that account.
Now if we can get the damn Guardian at NIC to transfer
the account - six emails so far to try this. Auto systems are a pain.
And I will move (eventually) all the rest over to
a new Virtual Private Server.
This gives me (at $150/month) unlimited email accounts
(Oh God!)
Multiple domain hosting (YEA!)
200+ MB disk space (I am using about 70 now)
No bandwidth charges - I pay a lot now.
Unlimited FTP users.
So I put Donnamaie.com as the lead account there.
Turns out white-enterprises.org is not a good account name - can't be
commercial. (white-entereprises.com is in Texas I believe).
It also turns out that my email will now be xxx@Donnamaie.com.
Because xxx@white-enterprises.org is a lot to type (No - xxx is NOT my
email - I haven't picked it yet.)
Not until we get the domain name transferred.
We haven't started those emails yet. (There has to
be an easier way!!!)
It will take up to 7 days to sort this. While I am
teaching Advanced Chip Synthesis Monday and Tuesday and attending it Wednesday.
I will get a book (and a voice on the phone to help)
so I can design a page. For $125/month I'd better get all my questions
answered quickly!
I get templates (Oh God! Not more templates! The
bane of my existence!)
I get to move the sites.
ebook-n-Stuff is 1 page - easy move.
Once I move it - I tell Best to turn it off of their
billing.
Ditto Donnamaie.com - 1 page and three-four graphics.
Easy.
Turn that one off.
Then comes the hard part. I downloaded the entire
site over the modem to the G4.
Took 28 hours.
56K.
HA!
They cannot move files (FTP) from one server to another
even though Verio BOUGHT Best.
I get to do that.
And to do that - I get to move five more domain names
off of Best.
Oh Lord have Mercy! Internic is not fun to deal with!
And Verio charges $10/month per name. (Better than
$15/month)
I'll keep the email on Best for 1 month afterward
- to catch the unwary.
Unfortunately, I haven't reformed the websites so
they will load in their crazy mixed-up way just as they are now and get
sorted afterward.
There may be a day or two of black screen (I hope
not) while they "move". [404!]
I have warned people.
In the meantime, I need to sign off on the matchprint
of the Jettison cover (cool!)
And read through and sign off the text proofs - I've
already had them too long.
Rock and Roll!
The Romantic Times ad is breaking.
And all h-double-l is breaking loose!
Never stand still.
They might catch you.
I know they are coming for me!
Right around that next twisting corner.
And soon I can sell my house for $500,000 - the one
I paid about half that to buy and repair - pay off the house in San Diego
and go home! To San Diego!
Of course I'll have to fight my younger son for the
master bedroom. He has his eye on it.
I amy do this once the stock market settles itself
and recovers from its panic attack. With every school sytem trying to
get PCs in the classroom and companies providing home PCs for their employees,
I don't see an end to this boom yet.
Why I am in the classroom again - we can't teach
new engineers fast enough!
Frankly, after dealing with an ISP - designing an
array is a snap!
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