Strolen's World · Legacy archive
Reselling Conversation (moved from email)
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Reselling Conversation (moved from email)
#1Display all headers
Date:
Tue, 24 Dec 2002 17:12:35 +0900
From:
"Strolen"
To:
strolen@strolen.com
Subject:
ddd
Big Bob,
Should be finishing my paper but have had too many ideas flying through my head lately.
First off, check out this thread and see if it interests you.
http://www.rpgcitadel.com/guild/index.php?topic=79.0
I think that would be a fun one and you would be starting entirely from scratch. I got enough going on this site and I think you need a project of your own to play with, whatever you decide to do. We could get a new domain name and I could host it or go out on your own, or just make it a subdomain of strolen.com whatever.
If you want to do that, or you have a different idea that is cool. Another idea I have is thinking bigger now and I have some serious ideas for you to consider, but I definitely want a partner in all this so tell me what you think of this plan.
Big Picture:
Start combing the web and find some pretty good sites that are stuck on crappy free servers like geocities or angelfire, whatever, and offer to host them for free. All we want is a darn good link back to strolen.com. We hook somebody else, plus we draw their traffic, plus we start building a little network of sites under the strolen.com umbrella. Gotta be good ones though, no crap. And there are more then I thought there would be! Even one good site would be a great boon for strolen.com.
Once we get a few, not thinking too crazy here, we continue to host them for free, but then we also get a reseller account and start actually selling webspace. I am not looking to make any great profit, although eventually we could, but we could offer VERY cheap web hosting as a reseller to rpg sites. Get a larger base and maybe increase our prices. The cheap price requires a link back to us. We are talking years to make this all happen obviously. We could offer a larger price and they don't have to link back to us or something like that as well from the get go. There is a site that does this that I noticed after I had my idea. (Been thinking about this for a LONG time.) http://www.rpghost.com/join.shtml Plus they charge $13/month plus a $15 set up fee. We could charge (at my current account) $3 for the whole ball of wax and break even.
We could do this under strolen.com or we can think of an entirely new webpage name and do it under that, still with the requirement to link back to the page we decide and strolen.com to continue with the community. The pay accounts can have their own domain name or use a subdomain, up to them.
A couple names that are open.
rpgideas.com
rpghomepage.com
rpgcommunity.com
rpgcitadel.com
I found another webhost, and have actually asked them specifically about doing the subdomains for free, and they don't care as long as we don't eat up tons of resources. I figure that our little niche websites we will host will not eat up that much space. This is the webhost I am looking at.
http://www.webhost2.com/
There are some more but that one gives you the most for the least. Can't find many reviews on them but they were quick to respond to email and they are hosting about 400 sites according to a separate source. Money back guarantee can't go wrong.
Right now I can host probably 3 or 4 more sites under my strolen.com account. I have about 60MG free still and could always upgrade for a few more bucks, but if we get somebody that offers unlimited and big webspace we could take advantage of that. New webhost=new name though. I don't want to move strolen.com unless I have to.
Just a wild thought I have been tossing around. I think it would be great fun to be a reseller, especially when we are doing it for fun, and maybe a little profit, but I think we could do this if we wanted…and if you are interested.
What do you think. Am I talking crazy or you think this is doable. I am still waiting for my webhost to come back and see if they hook me up with some more FTPs.
By the way, I saved your site if you want me to put it back? Or if you want to start on another personal page that is fine too. Let me know and I will put something up for you.
Hope you have a good holiday. Will talk to you when I talk to you :-)
Mike -
Reselling Conversation (moved from email)
#2
Display all headers
Date:
Tue, 24 Dec 2002 17:11:53 +0900
From:
"Strolen"
To:
strolen@strolen.com
Mike,
Having fun working toward your degree?? I am done !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway enough of the bragging. It is time to get down to buisness.
Before I start throwing suggestion at you I would like to explain more in depth what I have been doing at SAIC for the last year. This will give you more of a sense of where I am coming from. (I am not listing this to brag)
SAIC duties
1. Create a database schema to hold 20 billion pieces of vehicle data and to allow any and all searches on the database to take a resonable amount of time.
2. Create a database schema to control user access to the vehcile data.
3. Design and manage a secure network to allow Ford to access the data stored in Dayton from their desks in Detroit.
4. Mantain eight webservers (3 Apache tomcat, 2 JavaServers, 3 IIS) running on Linux, Solaris, and the dreaded Windows.
5. Maintain 5 database servers (3 Oracle, 2 MySQL (Coworker is helping manage the MySQL server))
6. Design and code a Jave Servlet web application to act has a front end to the database servers. (close to 250,000 lines of code)
These are a few of my duties place I have to help research information for proposals.
First item Webhosting --
Over the past six months, I have been thinking about getting a static IP address for my cable account and hosting strolen.com in my office.
The advatages of this would be.
1. We could install anything we want on the server.
2. We could use any database application and code we want.
3. We have complete control over the space we need.
4. We could sell space on our servers.
5. Plus many more I cannot think of right now.
The disadvantages are.
1. We control everything.
2. Increased security risks.
3. Increased upfront costs.
4. Increased monthly or Quartly cost.
I have the experiance and capability to do handle the maintance and security of the servers. The only issue I see would be the cost of the dedicated IP connection and the server. I currently have three machines at my house but the only one that I would feel comfortable handling this task I use it to program on.
If we do not go this route then I saw we go with what you suggested before. I liked the name rpgcitadel.com since it goes with the Citadel theme.
Second item World Building.
I must say I love the idea. I am going to work up some ideas over Christmas and get back with you.
Third item Connection and Code.
I total forget how to get to the admin page to look over the site information. Can you please give me a refresher course.
Does my email still work there??
Thanks,
Bob
P.S. I am now in this for the long hall there is nothing I csn see in my future that will take me away from this.
Thanks alot for letting me get back into it I have been thinking about it for a olong time but I have been swamped.
-
Reselling Conversation (moved from email)
#3Surface, sounds really cool.
How much are we talking cost wise?
Right now I pay about $8 a month. If we get a reseller account through my host now it would increase to $20 a month but get more of everything. I don't mind eating those costs at all, really are not that much when
it comes down to it. With that the price we pay for accounts we sell is about half of what they currently charge.
What we get. Guaranteed 99.5+ up time. They are also on a major backbone. We are also going to need the SSL crap or whatever so we can charge online for the accounts. Can we do all this? And how reliable
are those kind of connections? I know my cable connection goes down occasionally, and when it does it is usually for a good day or so.
Most people will expect some kind of control panel with an account with site statistics and all that stuff. CPanel is the most popular and one everybody seems to have, except it is like $1400 for a license
http://www.cpanel.net/buy/ . As much as I would like having you do all the stuff, I would still enjoy being able to have as much control as possible over the whole deal. Resellers have the reseller control panel
that allows remote set up of pretty much everything needed for an account. Do you have any of that kind of stuff? I would be bummed if you got to do all the setups, after all, that is a lot of fun. Not worried about a
lot of the other stuff, set most of it up on my laptop so I could develop offline, and if I can do it.... Just the actual administrative programs that probably cost a buttload is what I would miss.
Don't know the legalities of it either. Not the hosting part, but the agreement thing and our liability to our customers if you have storm that takes out your cable or something silly. Would have to research that before
diving in.
The cost is what I most curious of right now. Depending on that we can talk more. Strolen.com is set for like 10 more months, paid for a year, so we have plenty of time to play with this idea a lot deeper. Got to do
some deep thinking on it and see if you have some more to say. How, unstatic, are you at the moment? Maybe we do an experimental set up and see what happens?
I am sure we will go back on forth on this a bit. This isn't a light decision. -
Reselling Conversation (moved from email)
#4
Display all headers
From:
"DrFluid@EarthLink"
To:
"'Strolen'"
Subject:
RE: Got an idea
Date:
Mon, 23 Dec 2002 21:57:46 -0800
Comments on you idea:
Combing sites and offering free web space. I have to say that that may
be easy to do. Offering free stuff is easy to do. However my first
reaction to a deal that is too good to be true is to think that it IS
too good to be true. But that is not to say that I have any better
ideas, I think that it is a good way to start. I honestly believe that
if we get enough free-loaders then sooner or later we can get a reseller
account and get at least a few of them to pay some portion of the fees.
I haven't done any research lately, but I think that four or five people
slitting the costs that hostmatters charges for a reseller account would
be the same rate as what you are paying now. I would be willing to go
in on this with you (the reseller account), and if Bob or any two other
fantasy site web masters did this with us then BLAMO we would be even
with where you are now. Obviously everything after that is gravy. I
have to warn you though I am going to go for MCSE certs and a graduate
degree so my time will be somewhat limited. Fortunately I am QA at work
so I some time to screw around on the clock, I mean do little browsing.
Thoughts:
If Bob is willing to do it then we should look for a couple of
free-loaders and when we get three or four then go for the resellers
thing. I say if Bob is willing because I am and it was your idea so you
are.
I am going to do some research and then write more.
Dan