Business Advertising

[ATAvCEO]

Hello All,

I am going to try and go on a civil rant here. I was going to hold my tongue and bite the bullet here, but this is really starting to bother me.

I have read the Pinned area of this Forum area called RULES. I think a handful of people should really read them and understand them and see what is actually supposed to be posted here in the "Paid Services". As the services they are actually posting really don't pertain to phpVMS Per se and they are also "STEPPING on someone's toes" here that brought phpVMS to the Flight Sim Community "FREE OF CHARGE" for us Flight Sim CEO's and Officers to use for an efficient Flight Sim Virtual Airline.

This topic is geared to the people who are advertising web hosting. I myself have my own webhosting business since 2004/2007 as well as lease game servers and the such. However, I never once had any intention of advertising my business here nor will I ever advertise it here as the Man (Nabeel) who is in charge basically for phpVMS has his own webhosting business and is geared towards the Flight Sim Community which in all rights should be the only one to have such rights to advertise his webhosting as the phpVMS site, forums and VA Central is probably ran from his own servers, which uses up his bandwidth and storage that we all use on a daily basis. His webhosting pays the bills for his server(s) that we all use in one sense or another.

I look at the Forum area right now of the "Paid Services and I see 5 people or threads on the FIRST PAGE advertising their own webhosting. That sucks that you can "step on the toes" of the man who is behind phpVMS. I know that webhosting can be a cut throat business, as again I have been doing it for several years and I know how hard it is to get clients as I have seen many clients come and go over the years due to the undercutting BS that alot of the webhosting business's offer. I know for a fact that one of the business's advertised here used a bogus review to make it look like he has been in business longer then he actually has (won't mention names, but you know who you are), and it doesn't take much to check a business out either if you know what your looking for and doing. Don't PM me asking me as I will not relinquish the name of the user or the business name as that's not the purpose of this post.

I have also seen many post's here with moderators telling people or reminding people to please NOT advertise their webhosting business on this site and still to this day it is being done. I am no moderator but it upsets me greatly to see people doing this sort of stuff. This to me is DISRESPECTFUL for the people who is behind the phpVMS software and the users.

Lets ALL grow up, RESPECT the owner and the moderators here and not advertise such stuff, take it elsewhere. Best form of Advertisement is word of mouth too. I think, since some have advertised here, why don't you do this, for every customer you should pick up from this site offer Nabeel at least 25% of what you make from that one client to help Nabeel offset his costs? This doesn't make it right for you to advertise, but I feel it would be a GREAT gesture on your part, or for that matter, make a monthly donation to phpVMS?

Ok my civil rant is over. Nabeel or any moderator who should feel this post to be unacceptable you may delete this post without any hard feelings on my part. I am just upset to see people "step on the toes" of great people and undercut the services that the great people here offer to us Flight Simmers.

[MichaelD]

Hello, What our your views on free website and teamspeaks ? As i posted yesterday on this topic, i dont want to cause disruption when offering this but because its free of charge it may help some VA's

[ATAvCEO]

My views on this, well lets just say this. Yes it may help some VA's out, however at the same time Nabeel is the one that is being undercut with your Free hosting.

You have to take into account several factors here, 1) Nabeel has to have a server/webhosting to place his place of business, lets say phpVMS, granted he isn't charging for this service, but he still has to pay for the server which also involves costly bandwidth usage on a monthly basis. Then the forums, yes granted it is hosted under the phpVMS main site but that also eats up bandwidth, you figure on average 1 person views say 5+ pages a day which I forgot the breakdown of how much bandwidth usage it takes for one page, but it is small, sure it can be googled. As of right now looking at the statistics at the bottom of the main page for the forums, in the last 15 minutes, 5 Members and 33 guests have viewed at least one page. Thats 38 people who have hit that page alone, which is a pretty good amount of bandwidth used in just 15 minutes for one page alone, not to mention other pages. To get to this post you have had to hit at least 3 pages, if not 4: 1) Forum Main Page, 2) Paid Services Page and 3) The topic which is here, thats just one person hitting 3 pages for one post.

2) VACentral is also on his server which sends out several pings to websites and websites sending pings to VACentral that is using that service which eats up bandwidth as well. Not to mention if he has FSHost running on his server(s) which I think he does, each person logged into that uses even more bandwidth.

With just those 2 factors his bandwidth is probably higher then most normal sites which means he probably has to pay more then what we do for his bandwidth usage.

Now with that said, put yourself in his shoes. You offer a GREAT service and software like phpVMS, you have webhosting to help OFFSET your costs for the servers and you advertise your hosting and you really hope you pick up clients to help with these costs because you really could use the extra income made off of webhosting to keep things going. How would you feel if say Nabeel or I or others come in and advertise FREE Webhosting on your site knowing there is a possibility that some of your clients may think "hmmm free webhosting, huh. Lets cancel our hosting with MichaelD's site and go with Joe Blows site since it is free". Guess what? You loose money and Joe Blow may later make money. Say you loose all your customers over a month and something drastic hits you hard and you are no longer financially fit to keep the site up because no more hosting clients, no more money coming in and you personnally cannot afford to keep everything going. Well you loose your hosting, then the community is out of a great piece of software and the friendly atmosphere to go along with it. phpVMS would no longer be.

I can somewhat digest the Free TeamSpeak alittle, but still alittle out of bounds for my taste. As it would mean the clients would have to come to your site to setup the Team Speak and then guess what "Whats this? Free Webhosting too for phpVMS" still not a good thing as far as I am concerned. I personally would never advertise anything of the such, but that's just me and the way I do business. I have Ethics, Morals and respect for others who are trying to make something a go with what they have and are doing.

And by no means am I trying to start any war here with anyone, I am solely voicing my opinions here about this matter.

[ATAvCEO]

Here is a good guide to calculate bandwidth in case anyone wants to see whats involved - http://blog.brainhost.com/how-much-bandwidth-does-my-website-need/

[MichaelD]

Hello,

No, you have a valid point and i will remove the free webhosting side on my post. I will keep the free teamspeak as i dont think he offers that yet and people have to contact me directly over teamspeaks, they do not visit my website. Thanks for your feedback.

[ATAvCEO]

Michael

Ok, well I am glad you see my point. I am not trying to take things away from anyone or keep someone from gaining clients for their business via this post, as again I am in the same business as you and many others are in and to me it just isn't good business ethics to do this.

As far as the TeamSpeak, I think it would be fine as long as they contact you via email or PM. I am not a moderator here nor can I speak for Nabeel or the moderators, nor will I as this is their house. So that is strictly up to them.

Your quite welcome for the feedback and I hope all feels the same way. I am not saying this to start trouble or even to gain enemies. We all come here for the same several things and I for one like this place (atmosphere), the people here as well as the great support that everyone freely gives.

[MichaelD]

I have used phpvms before and now i understand how he funds it. I have removed the web hosting side of my post from yesterday.

We all know your not causing trouble, you speak a valid point which I total missed when posting.

Thanks

[rpalmer800]

Hi, Thanks for pointing this out. All my topics have been edited. (I Think i got them all.)

[Strider]

I dont think you quite get it, this is paid services, web hosting is a serivce, and paid one at that. People can advertise their webhosting business here, unless Nabeel posts saying he does not want them, they are not breaking the rules. People want variety, and want to be able to choose which hosting company to go for. Not just stick to one. If you don't like it, don't post in them. You just cause arguements that really help no one. Nabeel would say something if he was really upset about it all. He works so his hosting side is not his main source of income. He offers hosting for a small fee, to help people so that they dont get problems with freehosts.

[simpilot]

I think this is basically an issue of respect for Nabeel more than breaking a written rule.

[Strider]

Nabeel obviously does not mind, as he has never complained about it.