Wasn't I just talking about the perils of using free services to host your blog?
Burstnet client, Blogetery.com which offered free and paid services for more than 73,000 blogs, was “terminated by request of law enforcement officials, due to material hosted on the server” according to a Burstnet spokesperson on WebHostingTalk.
The spokesperson went on to say “We are limited as to the details we can provide to you, but note that this was a critical matter and the only available option to us was to immediately deactivate the server.”
The server name was bn.affiliateplex.com. I'm sorry if your blog was hosted there and this is the first time you are hearing about this issue.
From my reading of the thread, affiliateplex offered a free blog hosting service (called Blogetery) supported by Adsense. He had been hit with numerous DMCA complaints which were dealt with — however he failed to police the server for bad content. It also looks like affiliateplex had no backups of any kind.
What amazes me is that the operator, affiliateplex, rants endlessly in this thread – apparently oblivious to the serious nature of the offence.
His very first post to the thread “After being BurstNet customer for 7 months my server was terminated without any notification or explanation. They did it on July 9, Friday at 10:40 PM EST. I was out of the city and when I came back on monday….” invalidates his assertion that he “always responded to any abuse report or complaint within 24 hours and remove abusing material“. He goes on to say:
I didn't do anything illegal, so I'm not worrying about this. But you concern should be your customers in the 1st place, then some law enforcement officials.
The ‘you' in that statement refers to Burstnet. What affiliateplex fails to acknowledge is that part of Burstnet's contract which reads”
Your use of the Internet is subject to all applicable local, state, national, and international laws and regulations, Without limiting the other rights available to BurstNET™, BurstNET™ retains the right but not the obligation, in its sole discretion and without prior notice or liability, to restrict and/or terminate your access to the Internet and BurstNET™ if your use of the Internet violates any such laws or regulations, any prohibitions upon your conduct in connection with the Internet raised in this paragraph or otherwise restricts or inhibits any other user
from enjoying the Internet or BurstNET™.
What type of illegal content was on those blogs, we do not yet know as the authorities have seized the server and are investigating the matter. We can only guess that it was very bad stuff.
Anyway, that's what you get when you put your blog on a free hosting service operated by children.
Don't run that risk. Put your blog on a REAL hosting service that actually manages their business and protects their clients from bad actors.
Do you mind if I quote a couple of your articles as long as I
provide credit and sources back to your site? My website is in the very same niche
as yours and my visitors would truly benefit from some of the information you
provide here. Please let me know if this okay with you.
Thank you!
How is a Dallas Cowboys Jersey Shop in the same niche as mine?
Mari Cruz Harrill,
You may quote and link to my articles along with credit.
Cheers,
Ros
We should not trust free hosting services whether for personal or commercial purposes. This should serve as a warning and at the same time as a lesson.
———-
The better that we can do is be very careful in selecting blog host.
Being in the IT field for almost 30 years now I still find it surprising the amount of data there are no backups for. No telling how many blogs were lost forever because of the inadequate administration of the site. And is simple amazing he is not concerned about the reason the data was seized.
Thank you for this article, Ros. It has given me more reasons to be cautious over the net.
There is such thing called as “netiquette” that bloggers (of any origin) should realize in respect to both free and non-free blog websites. If website owners need to make steps to protect their customers/users, bloggers ought to have a sense of responsibility as well. Both has the capability to contribute to make internet a fun and useful way of transacting and communicating.
Yep, i agree. Get yourself some proper hosting
I totally agree, you do get what you pay for. I never have and never will use free servers, including blogger. It is always better to build up your own portfolio with your own domain names as it looks more professional and you are more likely to build a better reputation.
Thanks for the info again,
Simon
I agree with Ros’ advise that if you have an internet business – get rid of these free blog hosting services.
There may be pro and con issues here but at the end of the day, we don’t control the website lifespan ….
Thanks for sharing, Ros.
Hi Rosalind — how ironic that we were just chatting about the dangers of using free hosting for your website!
News reports today are indicating that the site was shut down after FBI agents informed executives of Burst.net, Blogetery’s Web host,that links to al-Qaeda materials were found on Blogetery’s servers.
Of course, we weren’t predicting anything quite this dramatic but it does serve as a very timely warning to not rely on free hosting services.
I have heard over and over about free hosting services, shutting down or losing blogs. I have a friend who insists on using a free service simply because it doesn’t cost anything. I always say, you get what you pay for!
With your post above, you’ve convinced me to read every issue of NPT you provide. No one else, to whose list I’m subscribed, provided this information. Thank you.
More information is needed on this because:
Most companies do not shut you down if you respond to complaints,in a timely matter.If they shut him down,was he ignoring the warnings?
I agree with Rosalind, if it is your business you should not be on a free hosted site, without back-ups. You need a quality hosting company that you can rely on.
Your business depends on it.
It is sad for all of the bloggers who now must start over, I hope they had back ups of their work.
Just more proof that people should take heed and listen to the warnings, but unfortunately some people will still learn the hard way. They will have to lose all their hard work before they truly believe it. It’s hilarious in a way. I was on a message board recently where one person was encouraging the other people to start their first blogs/sites on Blogger. Then later in the discussion…..2 or 3 people who self-host and use WordPress.ORG stepped in and explained that it would be better to spend time building their own real estate because Blogger does shut people down.
Well…..then the debating started, as one Blogger user who has been FORTUNATE to have a Blogger blog for quite a while just blew it off as some conspiracy theory. Then other Blogger users claimed that they never heard of even ONE instance of this happening. Just because they never heard about it themselves, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. The self-hosting WordPress.ORG people eventually threw their hands up in the air and let it be.