SmugMug Reliability

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Archive 2009 · SmugMug Reliability

nathanlake
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p.1 #1 · SmugMug Reliability

Am I the only one using SmugMug who has concerns about their reliability? During the month of September they had 7 episodes of either upload problems or complete site outages. So far in October (only 8 days) they have had two major problems. Today, they have been completely down for nearly 2 hours.

I for one can't afford the lost business resulting from an unreliable website. When they go down, I look bad to my customers. The customer does not know who SmugMug is, and that is as it should be. They only know that MY site is down.

AS OF 9:43AM PDT my site is back up..in "read only" mode. Customers can see the site, but can't order.

Edited on Oct 08, 2009 at 04:43 PM · View previous versions

Oct 08, 2009 at 04:21 PM

mdude85
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p.1 #2 · SmugMug Reliability

Oct 08, 2009 at 04:33 PM

nathanlake
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p.1 #3 · SmugMug Reliability

mdude85 wrote:
You might be able to create a script that forwards a user from the outage landing page to a page you specify, for instance, your portfolio -- or, a page that explains the outage and invites the customer to glance at a bank of your other images.

I could do that...but I won't. This is a business, not a toy. If SmugMug can't meet my needs, I will have to go somewhere else. The whole idea of having my site hosted by someone else it so I can shoot pictures, not spend my time working on a website.

HEY SMUGMUG...are you listening?

Oct 08, 2009 at 04:38 PM

nathanlake
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p.1 #4 · SmugMug Reliability

The SmugMug maintenance log... http://smugmug.wordpress.com/

Oct 08, 2009 at 04:49 PM

Jeff Napier
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p.1 #5 · SmugMug Reliability

You might be able to create a script that forwards a user from the outage landing page to a page you specify, for instance, your portfolio -- or, a page that explains the outage and invites the customer to glance at a bank of your other images

I could do that...but I won't.

And why should you have to?

HEY SMUGMUG...are you listening?

Yeah my renewal date is in about two weeks and I feel the same way. Seriously contemplating a change myself. A few unkept promises as well as far as marketabilty or purcashing options for clients, I guess is a better word.

Jeff

Oct 08, 2009 at 04:57 PM

John--G
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p.1 #6 · SmugMug Reliability

Huh? What? I thought it was only PBase that had availability isues?

Oct 08, 2009 at 05:20 PM

mdude85
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p.1 #7 · SmugMug Reliability

nathanlake wrote:
mdude85 wrote:
You might be able to create a script that forwards a user from the outage landing page to a page you specify, for instance, your portfolio -- or, a page that explains the outage and invites the customer to glance at a bank of your other images.

I could do that...but I won't. This is a business, not a toy. If SmugMug can't meet my needs, I will have to go somewhere else. The whole idea of having my site hosted by someone else it so I can shoot pictures, not spend my time working on a website.

HEY SMUGMUG...are you listening?

Good luck finding a dedicated photo hosting service that is up 100% of the time.

Oct 08, 2009 at 05:56 PM

nathanlake
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p.1 #8 · SmugMug Reliability

mdude85 wrote:
nathanlake wrote:
mdude85 wrote:
You might be able to create a script that forwards a user from the outage landing page to a page you specify, for instance, your portfolio -- or, a page that explains the outage and invites the customer to glance at a bank of your other images.

I could do that...but I won't. This is a business, not a toy. If SmugMug can't meet my needs, I will have to go somewhere else. The whole idea of having my site hosted by someone else it so I can shoot pictures, not spend my time working on a website.

HEY SMUGMUG...are you listening?

Good luck finding a dedicated photo hosting service that is up 100% of the time.

No sever host guarantees 100%, but I used to work in the IT world and service agreements are routinely written (in the non-photography world) that include guarantees of 99.99%. Properly designed data centers, with redundant or clustered servers easily achieve this level. The last time that Yahoo has a service outage was almost 4 years ago. Yes, Yahoo is a big company, but if a company can't deliver the service, then they should not be in the business.

I have four other non-photography web sites hosted by a relatively small company in Virginia. I have had two short outages over the past 18 months. It can be done.

Oct 08, 2009 at 06:28 PM

mdude85
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p.1 #9 · SmugMug Reliability

nathanlake wrote:
mdude85 wrote:
nathanlake wrote:
mdude85 wrote:
You might be able to create a script that forwards a user from the outage landing page to a page you specify, for instance, your portfolio -- or, a page that explains the outage and invites the customer to glance at a bank of your other images.

I could do that...but I won't. This is a business, not a toy. If SmugMug can't meet my needs, I will have to go somewhere else. The whole idea of having my site hosted by someone else it so I can shoot pictures, not spend my time working on a website.

HEY SMUGMUG...are you listening?

Good luck finding a dedicated photo hosting service that is up 100% of the time.

No sever host guarantees 100%, but I used to work in the IT world and service agreements are routinely written (in the non-photography world) that include guarantees of 99.99%. Properly designed data centers, with redundant or clustered servers easily achieve this level. The last time that Yahoo has a service outage was almost 4 years ago. Yes, Yahoo is a big company, but if a company can't deliver the service, then they should not be in the business.

I have four other non-photography web sites hosted by a relatively small company in Virginia. I have had two short outages over the past 18 months. It can be done.

Heh. Maybe you should move your photos to Flickr then?

Oct 08, 2009 at 06:30 PM

anotherview
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p.1 #10 · SmugMug Reliability

nathanlake: Thanks for the link to the SmugMug service log.

I detect growing pains, amplified by success.

Meanwhile, this photo gallery site provides a convenient means for display of my images.

I particularly like the third-party upload utility allowing me to send images to an online gallery direct from my computer's hardrive.

Oct 08, 2009 at 10:33 PM

Matt Shelton
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p.1 #11 · SmugMug Reliability

I'm a SmugMug user, and I can tell you that the SmugMug CEO and COO are in fact listening - hard. Both the CEO and the COO - the COO in particular - are regular contributors on SmugMug's forums, dgrin. The CEO posted a fairly long message last month taking full accountability for the outages, clearly realizing that they're a big problem, and committing to fix them. I'll say, though, that today's outage wasn't good!

Oct 08, 2009 at 10:39 PM

donnie hagan
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p.1 #12 · SmugMug Reliability

..

Edited on Nov 11, 2009 at 08:33 PM · View previous versions

Oct 12, 2009 at 01:40 AM

Marty Bingham
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p.1 #13 · SmugMug Reliability

nathanlake wrote:
The SmugMug maintenance log... http://smugmug.wordpress.com/

No offense but you seem to have all the data you need to make a decision if you are thinking about dropping them. What do you hope to gain from a discussion here?

Marty

Oct 12, 2009 at 01:52 AM

Kelly Phillips
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p.1 #14 · SmugMug Reliability

I have been with smugmug for a while. The customer service is the best of any company that I have ever contacted. The outages have been a pain to me lately also. I did indeed lose (or delay) a sale because of one last week, I think it was. The lady told me she wanted to order and the site was down....She still hasn't ordered.

That being said, I will NOT be leaving smugmug. The customer service alone makes up for the lost sale. Another sale will come along. It really does mean alot when you can email a company about a random problem and have an answer within hours, even on a Sunday. I recently suggested smugmug to a friend and she signed up as well.

Oct 12, 2009 at 02:03 AM

nathanlake
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p.1 #15 · SmugMug Reliability

Kelly Phillips wrote:
I have been with smugmug for a while. The customer service is the best of any company that I have ever contacted. The outages have been a pain to me lately also. I did indeed lose (or delay) a sale because of one last week, I think it was. The lady told me she wanted to order and the site was down....She still hasn't ordered.

That being said, I will NOT be leaving smugmug. The customer service alone makes up for the lost sale. Another sale will come along. It really does mean alot when you can email a company about a random problem and have an answer within hours, even on a Sunday. I recently suggested smugmug to a friend and she signed up as well.

I don't disagree about the support...it is some of the best I have come seen, but consider this...does it make up for a lost sale? How many people did she tell about her experience? Is it just one sale that you lost or were there others that just did not mention it to you?

I don't argue at all that SmugMug puts forth great effort, but I am concerned with their continued outages despite that effort. Didn't they make some major server changes a few months ago that were supposed to improve things.

Oct 12, 2009 at 02:45 AM

Kelly Phillips
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p.1 #16 · SmugMug Reliability

Nathan you raise a good point. I don't know if there are other lost sales. I do feel more comfortable knowing that I live in a small community with 2 high schools and I pretty much have the HS sports programs to myself. There is no one else shooting as of now. I don't wanna lose sales, who does? I suspect that most other sites are going to have downtime as well. If it becomes a major problem, I'm not saying I will stick with smugmug until my business fails, but for now I'm still very happy. Maybe things will get better for us soon.

Oct 12, 2009 at 06:19 PM

donnie hagan
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p.1 #17 · SmugMug Reliability

Nov 09, 2009 at 01:01 AM


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