Hosting and Business Fraud - A warning!
Just wanted to pass this along, as it's likely that at least someone on Flashkit will have this issue at some point in the future.
Hosting is a business. Hosting companies exist to make money. Not all hosting companies are ethical. Knowing this ahead of time will save you a LOT of hassle. Unless you know otherwise, you should always expect that your hosting company will disappear, and have your OWN BACKUPS on your OWN COMPUTER.
The reason I post this today is that my wife's site has gone offline, along with 3 other sites that I've had hosted at a very cheap, but reliable hosting provider since 2002. The hosting company was originally DR2.net, but was then sold to Mesopia.com, and then merged into Netbunch.com, which was recently acquired by WebHostPlus (WHP). That last acquisition is bad news, and the reason for this post
WHP as a business entity seems to have a reputation for acquiring hosting businesses for very little down on a promise of future payments based on future earnings. When the clients are transferred, "problems" arise, clients leave, and the selling entity essentially gets screwed. Unfortunately, the hosting clients also get screwed, many losing websites and prepaid accounts permanently. While the money can hurt, losing your entire business can be much more damaging.
If, as a matter of business, you purchase hosting, please take a few minutes to read the thread below, and take away 2 things:
1) There's a LOT of money in hosting, which draws in some shady characters, and
2) Protect yourself, keep regular backups, and use common sense.
If, as a matter of business, you sell hosting, also note that you're an idiot if you deal with WHP or any of it's subsidiaries.
http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=540279
( Those of you who may know me know that I'm a senior network engineer for a hosting provider, and the obvious questions about "why did you even pay for hosting, when you can probably get it for free" can be skipped - I host many sites outside of my employer's network to avoid problems arising from conflict of interest, and because in this particular case the hosting predated my employment and was *damn cheap*. )
