HostBlog.co.uk – ramblings of a hosting provider

Othello Technology Systems Ltd (www.OthelloHosts.net), an established leader in UK web hosting and internet services for over a decade, announced today the completed acquisition and integration of the domain and web hosting clients from Mobius Web Services and sister firm Lavender Web Services – boutique hosts specialising in small business web design and hosting of ecommerce systems on Windows/DotNetPanel. Read more…

It is with regret that we have to announce that CNNIC has imposed an immediate and indefinite suspension of all .CN registrations from overseas Registrars.

As a result of this action by CNNIC, we have no choice but to stop accepting new .CN registrations through OthelloNames.net and OthelloReg.net with immediate effect from today.

Please note that currently renewals will continue to be supported.

Availability checks for .CN domains via the Client Portal, OthelloNames.net Web Interface and API will be changed to return Not Available for .CN domains. Read more…

Jan 1st 2010, UK VAT returned to 17.5% (from the temporary discount to 15%)

To ease the pain for domain registrants for the whole of January, Othello Technology Systems Ltd Domain Registration Service will effectively pay the VAT on your new domain registrations with our special 17.5% discount on all our registration prices with money-off coupon VAT175

Take advantage of the lowest pricing of any UK based, ICANN accredited domain name registrar today at OthelloNames.net – .uk domains as low as £2.53/year (exc. VAT)!

• Search for an available domain
• Follow the simple online order process
• Enter VAT175 in the money-off voucher box and click validate voucher
• Save 17.5% on your new domain name

Nominet Registrar Day today at Lords MCC.

To celebrate we’re offering you the chance to get your own .UK domain during the conference for just £2.95/2yrs (saving £3)

Use promocode “LORDSCRICKET” when registering a new domain at OthelloNames .UK Domain Registration

Promotion Terms & Conditions: one domain per customer, new and existing clients allowed

As part of the preparation for the launch of Othelloreg.net ICANN Accredited Domain Registry we have been assigned our official IANA Registrar Number #1471

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has terminated Red Register Inc.’s accreditation, 26/September/2009

Due to multiple breaches of their Registrar Agreement Read more…

The most desirable/requested .ME domain names applied for but not allocated in the Sunrise and Landrush pre-ordesr will now be available at auction…

Domain names that come up for auction in April:
April_Auction_List-2009

Domain names that come up for auction in May:
May_Auction_List-2009

First auction – Sunrisers

April 1: List published

April 20: Closing date for applications by registrars

April 22: Notification to participants

April 23 to April 29: Auction held

If you’d like any of these domain names, please contact our Domain Broker Sales Team
who can arrange your participation in the auction, or to bid on your behalf.

Second auction – Landrushers

April 1: List published

May 10: Closing date for applications by registrars

May 13: Notification to participants

May 14 to May 20: Auction held

If you’d like any of these domain names, please contact our Domain Broker Sales Team
who can arrange your participation in the auction, or to bid on your behalf.

2009 will see an explosion of new gTLD’s appearing after proposals under the new ICANN guidelines ICANN New gTLD Program relaxed a number of the constraints.

First up is .paris … a city with it’s own domain type …

Standard Tactics LLC, a hidden/shell company owned by registrar GoDaddy is set to close.

After all the hypocrasy of Bob Parsons, CEO of GD, complaining about domain tasting and kiting, yet running his own domain tasting/cybersquatting company, GoDaddy have finally announced that their sub-company “Standard Tactics LLC” is closing, after numerous trademark infringement cases for cybersquatting.

Whilst this can only be good news for domain purchasers (for actual use or search engine spam or whatever) it’s still not a complete clean-up of their act as a registry/registrar.

If a domain is not renewed, which had previously been registered by GD, and that domain has any sort of “residual” traffic or backlinks – they’re listing them for sale @ $300+ on TDNAM the GoDaddy owned domain aftermarket – rather than release them !

Up until recently, TDNAM had also come under heavy criticism after it was discovered that their own “VP of Aftermarket Sales” was caught bidding against his own clients to shill-bid up the price on 2ndary domains – GD have now issued a “policy” preventing staff bidding against clients on behalf of the company – a practice illegal on auctions in the US – it would be like ebay knowing yor max bid and always forcing you to pay it !

All are located in China !

1. Xinnet Bei Gon Da Software
2. BEIJING Networks
3. Todaynic

And joining the top 3, with guest appearances in the top 25 registrars of spamvertised domains and spammer friendly registrars are:

• Xiamen Ename (ENAME.CN)
• Beijing Innovative Linkage (DNS.COM.CN)
• OnlineNIC (CHINA-CHANNEL.COM)
• HiChina Web Solutions (NET.CN)
• BIZCN.COM

Perhaps if the Great Firewall of China was setup to stop things leaving rather than getting in,
the internet in general and mail in particular would be a safer and more productive place.

For more information about these scum visit knujon registrar listings

Parents, be VERY worried about sending your children to school, unscrupulous IT literate students might be getting them hooked on a drug called Linux …

This is both funny ( I dare you to read the letter outloud and not smile) and sad (because if peple like this really are in positions of power, the human race will be extinct shortly through it’s own ignorance)

Linux holds our kids back.

Thousands of people have fallen for a fake DM (Direct Message) Email claiming to be from the micro-blogging service Twitter.com and proceeded to hand-over their passwords/usernames.

I wonder if the complete muppets that fall for these scams will ever learn to *READ* the url’s of things before randomly clicking on them !

See more on the oficial twitter blog … http://blog.twitter.com/2009/01/gone-phishing.html

Microsoft have announced that the forthcoming Windows Server 2008 R2 release will be available ONLY in the x64 version.
- leaving all users of the current release of x86 W2k8 Server (Web and Datacentre editions) with a near-immediate upgrade issue for both hardware and software.

With many of the initial problems of the 64-bit version still not fully been addressed…

• missing driver issues
• no compatibale backup software
• antivirus/anti-malware software not fully converted to 64-bit
• random crashes of W2k8 Hyper-V Virtual Servers

it seems we’re basically forced to migrate and update, or simply stop offering M$-Windows based hosting solutions

At least R2 appears to offer some useful and necessary upgrades/fixes …

• Hyper-V improvements – fixed Quick/Live Migration, bringing it up to what we already have with our XEN Enterprise linux systems.
• Completed PowerShell – powerShell best 2 finally brings the Windows Server command prompt upto scratch
• Multi Core Support – ability to assess the amount of processing across systems with multiple cores, and under certain hardware setups, to dedicate work to certain cores, or shut cores down completely – true SMP at last, only 6 years being Unix !

Cheers MickeyMouseSoft – a novelty supplier, of minimal use at best – just what we need in the current climate, you forcing a £150k hardware and software upgrade plan onto us

Found a fantastic little plugin for WordPress which reads your blog entries by TTS (text-to-speech) and is remarkably accurate.

The Odigo – Voice Your Content plugin provides you with mp3, online audio and best of all, a link to send it to your itunes account, for adding to your ipod.

There’s a really usefull Java based word-map (tag-cloud) generator which can analyse a blog by it’s RSS Feed and generate an image Wordle

The next ICANN (34) public meeting has been announced – it will be held in Mexico city between 1st and 6th March 2009.
The icann 34 meeting is now online with information on the host, the venue and the meeting.

As a new member, Othello will be attending to have our say in how the domain industry moves forward and is regulated.

• Are household chores cutting into your social life ?
• How many important calls have you missed whilst doing laundry ?
• Dont want to take two appliances into the utility room ?

Then you need …. An Iron Phone

Cleverly combining two of a womans favourite things ( ironing and talking ) into one handy little tool – yes the Iron-Phone really is the social-life saver you have been waiting for.

Now you need never miss that crucial chat with someone you’ll see in person later anyway, about the spotty guy from work and his small dinkle problem …

With 30 minutes of steaming, and 11 hours of talktime on a single charge, it’s powerful enough for even the most dedicated follower of fashion …

Tags: laundry, utility room, ironing, talking

I like gadgets – devices to perform a specific function/purpose, to make my life easier, more enjoyable, or just different.

I’m not alone in this – which is why every high-street has a gadget-shop of some kind.

Sadly the human brain is wired so you can only think one of:

• “bling” is fashionable
• technology is clever
• voting Liberal Democrat is a good idea

Sadly, those always on the lookout for stupid people to buy utter crap for lots of money (aka snake-oil peddlers or marketers), have decided to once again combine tasteless “bling-bling” and hi-tech wizardry into the absolutely F-ing stupid concept that is …

The Google Vanity Ring

Yes, now you can look an utter prat and billy-no-mates at exactly the same time, simply by Read more…

Tags: gadgets, The Google Vanity Ring

Mergers and Acquisitions RoundupIts been a busy time in the ISP/Registrar/Host M&A world, with providers vanishing almost on a daily basis.Some of the more notable M&A’s included:

2007

December

• Spanish Registrar Arsys sold to The Carlyle Group and Mercapital private equity~£120,000,000 outright purchase. 550,000 registered domains, 170,000 customers, 250 employees
• WebHost Automation Ltd (WHA) authors of HELM Windows CP taken over by SW-Soft (now renamed Parallels)No figures quotedbased on their (lack of) performance with other control panels acquired, thats the death-kell for HELM users
• Chicago Hosts midPhase purchased in a cash deal by UK2 GroupNo official figures quoted, best guestimates £5,000,000. 250,000 hosted websites. 40 staffSeveral original MP staff setup a new brand SingleHop and party hard at HostingCon

2007

November

• Swedish Managed Hosting pi.se picked up by InterouteNo figures quoted
• Hostroute and Nameroute merged into UltraspeedShare Exchange between existing client and supplier. 50,000 hosted websites.
• BuyAVPS acquired by prolific WHT poster AxisHOSTNo figures quoted

2007

September

• Berkeley Data Systems sell online storage Mozy to EMC Corpororation£40,000,000 outright purchase. 180,000 clients.

2007

August

• NaviSite goes on acquisition spree, buying Alabanza and Jupiter Hosting£8,000,000 cash

2007

July

• NamesCo Registrar and Web Host sold out to Italian ISP Dada (Register.it S.p.A)£24,000,000 for the entire company. 265,000 registered domains, 80,000 hosted websites

(reproduced with permission from Host Acquisitions)

I’ve recently discovered a MMRPG (Massive Multiplayer Role Paying Game) browser based and free, very reminiscent of the early sim-city type programs. This wonderful gem is called Travian, and available to play right now

It’s been around for a while, with active forums, comprehensive wiki, clans (alliances) and so forth, but takes a bit of planning and forethought to get into “late in the game” as I have – so here is a shortcut guide to getting your Empire up-and-running as quickly and efficiently as possible …

Get a good initial resource base

field workers need feeding, building staff need feeding, an army marches on it’s stomach … etc
so start by producing more food … and don’t forget buildings use clay, weapons are made from wood and iron … so your “fields” and the resources they produce are your lifeblood. Read more…