Apologies, Farewell and Welcome
Monday, May 31, 2010 18:58Posted in category Uncategorized
For those of you just joining me and for those of you who have visited before, I find myself in the odd position of having to say all of these things. First, to those of you who have visited before I have to apologize to you. Since March 26, Bloggasaurus has been missing from the Internet and you may have wondered what happened. This site was formerly hosted by a company called Hostazar. When I first launched my blog in September of 2009, There was no reason not to use Hostazar, as it was recommended by Rob Benwell of “Blogging to the Bank” fame. It was Rob Benwell’s formula which I followed when I set up my blog. There was no reason at that time not to follow Benwell’s advice since he was, from all appearances, a successful entrepreneur and accomplished blogger as well.
In January of 2010, I began to have my first misgivings about Hostazar. My site disappeared for about two weeks and frantic e-mails to hostazar went unanswered. I found out afterwards that Hostazar’s servers went down and no one was in the building to maintain the systems because of an extended holiday. When the site came back, the urgency to change hosting companies subsided and I busied myself writing the next 30 posts. I should have copied each of these posts to a disc but I was preoccupied with adding content to the site and unaware of the disasterous consequences to my blog, should Hostazar’s servers ever go down again. On March 26, That is, apparently, exactly what happened. I lost all patience and angrily wrote support tickets inquiring about what was going on. I wrote 13 of these tickets and Hostazar’s administrative staff was again, completely unresponsive.
I started doing research and discovered some very unsettling things about which I had been unaware. First, I learned that approximately 4000 of Hostazar’s clients were in a similar predicament as I was and they were expressing their anxiety and frustration in various forums.
I visited a few of these and added my own experience to some of them. One such forum is
http://www.work-at-home-forum.com/web-design-8/can-anybody-help-me-10989-2.html
There were a number of people who visited Work-at-home-forum that were having problems with Hostazar. Another forum was http://www.hotwebhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?20744-Does-anyone-know-anything-about-Hostazar&p=50931
http://www.thecaymanhost.com/customer-hosting-reviews/hostazar-hosting-customer-reviews was a blog that discussed Hostazar.
Some of the things I learned from this research is that Hostazar was owned by none other than Rob Benwell, the Internet Marketing “Guru” from the U.K. Mr. Benwell’s reputation was questionable. I found articles entitled: “ Rob Benwell Scammer or Entrepreneur?”;
http://hubpages.com/hub/Rob-Benwell#comments
and “Robert Benwell Exposed” http://www.scam.com/showthread.php?t=23216
Rob Benwell’s name also shows up prominently in the “Ripoff Report”
http://www.ripoffreport.com/internet-fraud/nichedominationsyste/nichedominationsystem-com-rob-7bbp9.htm
Rob Benwell- Scamming to the Bank:
http://208.86.2.42/showthread.php?t=36018
What ultimately happened is that Rob Benwell sold his hosting company “Hostazar” to a Mr. Mathews at an online auction:
http://flippa.com/auctions/84570/Hosting-Site-For-Sale—33k-Revenue—No-Reserve
Neither Mr. Benwell nor Mr. Mathews, apparently gave any thought to the 4000 plus clients that they were adversely impacting. [ During the auction, Benwell or one of his staff made this astounding admission when answering a query from a prospective buyer about the servers downtime during December/January:
[/i]srini28 – the server went down like already stated and we were on xmas leave but because this is not an important site to us we didn’t have anyone monitoring it and taking care of any emergancies over xmas[i]
Neither Mr. Benwell nor Mr. Mathews bothered to contact these paying clients to tell them what was happening and it would be almost two months before anyone at Hostazar would answer any support tickets.
To be fair, the Hostazar webmaster did send me this belated e-mail:
There was ownership change in the business which was the reason for delay in attending your request.
We are new owner & you will definitely get better service from us.
Please let me know how we can help you.
Also please make sure that all invoices are paid & not pending.
Thanks & look forward to servicing you better.
Subsequently, I asked for, and was granted permission to access the web site control panel. This would enable me to access mysql database and retrieve the missing posts . Ultimately this proved distressingly fruitless as , it seems, the new staff cleared out all the servers and there was nothing there to retrieve.
I scrambled, rummaging through all my papers to find the hard copies of past posts and found some still in draft form on my computer. I was able to recreate about 20, all together, but 20 were lost. That is why I say “Farewell.” The old Bloggasaurus is extinct.
However………
I used the downtime as creatively as possible, and completely remodeled Bloggasaurus, giving it new features and widgets and improving its appearance, where possible. It is nearly complete. I have many new posts to add and I hope that my readers before will come back and visit again, but when a website is down for such a long time, people drift away, much as they would with a physical store that suddenly was vacant without notice.
Hostazar may be willing to render better service now, and I wish them luck, but for the rest of us, the damage has been done. I have to start all over again and begin the traffic gathering process anew.
Originally, Rob Benwell’s Program “Blogging to the Bank” and “Hostazar” hosting were prominently advertised on my front page. I have since removed these because I am committed to advertising only services and products of the highest quality and best reputation. I hope no one has been inconvenienced because of signing up with Benwell’s program or Hostazar, as a result of the advertisements they saw on my Blog.
So Bloggasaurus is back. That is why I say “Welcome” to both my former visitors and new readers. Bloggasaurus is “New and Improved” I am being hosted by a very reliable hosting company, “Godaddy” with an almost 100% favorable rating among users.
Among the new features are a “Contact Me” form where readers can e-mail me directly with questions or suggestions and a Visitor Map which shows where readers are from. Other features of course may be added eventually as a blog is always evolving and, hopefully improving.
So, whether you are visiting for the first time or are a returning reader, let me Welcome you again to Bloggasaurus. Please visit again and feel free to leave a comment if you are moved to do so. Take Care and Be Well.
–wil
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Wynell Bayless says:
June 9th, 2010 at 5:46 am
I love when I have free time to check out blogs online. I learn a lot from then and many are very funny. Keeping a smile on my face while relaxing is always a pleasure! Thanks for sharing yours.
admin says:
June 9th, 2010 at 5:47 am
Thank You Wynell for checking out my blog. I hope you enjoyed it.
—Wil
Alla Hisle says:
June 9th, 2010 at 5:19 pm
great site and your writing style is amazing. just found your site on yahoo. I¡¯ll come back later for sure
admin says:
June 9th, 2010 at 9:45 pm
Thank You Alla for your kind remarks. Please feel free to stop by again; you are always welcomed here.
–Wil
wow loot 1000g says:
June 9th, 2010 at 9:58 pm
Dear admin, thnx for sharing this blog post. I found it wonderful. Best regards, Victoria…
admin says:
June 9th, 2010 at 9:59 pm
Hey Victoria, I am glad you found my blog “wonderful.” Actually, I am glad you found my blog at all ( it has been offline for 10 weeks)…I hope you will find your way back here again and bring some friends along. Thank You for the comment.
–Wil
hoodia says:
June 10th, 2010 at 10:00 am
I don’t mean to be too rude with this, and I know it’s completely irrelevant but I will just say it anyway! Whhhhhaat the heck has Obama been smoking these days? There, I got it off my chest!
admin says:
June 10th, 2010 at 9:59 pm
Greetings Hoodia (Gadlin586): Thank you for your exemplary comment. I do not want to be rude either and I hope it will not be too much of a shock to you when I point out that your comment is a perfect example of SPAM and as such is useful as an illustration for others to see what kind of comments they can expect to get sometimes. [ I received this exact comment a few months ago in the spam filter of my original blog.]
Do not be worried that the comment is too rude; it is just about the right level of rudeness. I must also compliment you on your sharp intuition and sense of what is appropriate concerning the relevance of your comment. You are exactly right: It is completely irrelevant.
Now, I will answer your completely irrelevant question: Mr. Obama smokes Marlboro Reds. I would recommend that you switch to these as an alternative to whatever you are smoking; just a friendly suggestion ; ) –Wil
ben wales says:
June 10th, 2010 at 10:56 pm
Great post full of useful tips! My site is fairly new and I am also having a hard time getting my readers to leave comments. Analytics shows they are coming to the site but I have a feeling “nobody wants to be first”.
admin says:
June 11th, 2010 at 9:19 am
Thank You ben. I have another sixteen posts to add which I hope will be helpful as well, to new and established bloggers. Provoking comment is sometimes a challenge. It is true, what you say: “nobody wants to be first.” Most people are “lurkers” until they feel comfortable. Asking readers for comments may help to encourage responses, but sometimes it is the content that a reader finds irresistible that compells them to write. Patience ben. After a while, the comments will increase which makes me think that comment volume is a function of both traffic, content and how long the blog has been on the Internet. Good Luck with your newly established blog.
–Wil
Richard D says:
June 14th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
Hi Wil,
I had exactly the same problem with Hostazar. It drove me crazy at the time as I thought I could build a blogging empire with the ‘Blogging To The Bank’ ebook and recommended hosting! How wrong was I!
I had two blogs hosted with them and one of them is still down – I’m currently working on other blogging projects as this episode knocked the wind out of my sails for these blogs.
I do hope to continue – and I’m glad to see you got yours sorted out/ Looks good!
Best wishes,
Richard
admin says:
June 15th, 2010 at 12:49 am
Thank You Richard for stopping by. Now that you know where I am, feel free to visit again sometime. I am very sorry you had the same unsettling experience as I did when Hostazar’s servers went down. I spent some time debating with myself if I was going to try again or just explore a different possibility, but I put too much work into this blog to let it disappear so easily, so, I rebuilt it. It has taken months. (and I still have more work to do to get the blog where it should have been without the 10 week absence.) I do hope you have changed hosting companies and I hope you get both your sites back to where you want them, in the near future. Good luck with your projects.
–wil
Louboutin shoes says:
June 16th, 2010 at 7:41 am
Was an interesting article, thank you..
admin says:
June 16th, 2010 at 11:27 am
Thank You. Thanks for the comment.
–Wil
elie palima says:
June 17th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
hello wil, this is a very useful post indeed. hopefully, this post explains everything regarding “why everyone should stay away from rob benwell and hostazar” lols.
anyways, I suggest you to change your blog theme as well. (you know, Just to “erase” the rob benwell bs) lols. =D
-elie
admin says:
June 17th, 2010 at 9:21 pm
Thank You Elie for visiting and for your comment. You correctly advised me to change the theme and eliminate the questionable products and, of course, that was the very first thing I did as soon as my site was ready to go live. Do visit again and your comments are welcome.
Take Care and I wish you continued success with your blogging projects
–Wil
cna training says:
June 19th, 2010 at 3:22 am
My cousin recommended this blog and she was totally right keep up the fantastic work!
admin says:
June 19th, 2010 at 10:21 pm
Thank You. I will do my best.
–Wil
okayliving says:
June 20th, 2010 at 4:09 am
Hi there could I reference some of the information from this post if I reference you with a link back to your site?
admin says:
June 20th, 2010 at 9:42 am
Yes. Thank You for asking.
–Wil
Lori Redmon says:
June 22nd, 2010 at 4:33 am
hey, I am agree with your posting about that but i found something strange that i felt you didnt know the news before you posting this. i want to ask :where do you know about this friend ?Regards Owner of Bertoiastool.com
admin says:
June 22nd, 2010 at 4:40 am
Thank you for your perspicacious comment but I am a bit unnerved because, you say there is something strange—- in my blog?; …and I didn’t know the news before posting this? Oh No. I believe you are exactly right! I still don’t know this news; and honestly, I do not know where or even who this friend is, of which you speak. I am very confused. Hmmmm. There is something very strange going on here. Please keep me posted as to the results of your ongoing investigation and hopefully, we will “get to the bottom of this.” BTW thanks for your fascinating comment
(which I rescued from the spam filter.)
Gilberto Fosselman says:
June 22nd, 2010 at 5:04 am
Hi I have been reading your blog for the past two weeks and it is interesting, do you have a RSS feed?
admin says:
June 22nd, 2010 at 9:46 am
Yes. I do, and you may freely subscribe to it. Thank you for visiting.
–Wil
Emmanuel Magaziner says:
July 1st, 2010 at 2:56 pm
Hey admin How are You ? I like your post and i want to stumble it for my friend but i cant see your social bookmark widget in this blog. Please help me friend Thanks
admin says:
July 1st, 2010 at 9:25 pm
Hey Guest! I am fine. Thank you for visiting, again in a different incarnation. To find “the Stumble” icon, locate the “bookmark us” window and hover with your cursor over the share+ icon. This will activate the drop down menu which displays all the various social networking icons including “stumble.”
Thanks for visiting—again.
–Wil