No Run-Of-The-Mill Week, This!

January 19, 2007 on 3:24 pm | In Business, Foobars, Funnyish, Insider View, Musings, Updates by Josh Jones | 23 Comments

First Allen Iverson, now Martin Luther King, Jr.?!

MONDAY!

We started the week off by having a little MLK, JR. weekend sale on our web site. Apparently, some of our affiliates hate civil rights because we got some angry emails that our little MLK, JR. day stunt was stealing their referrals by putting a promo code of our own right on our website!

They have a good point. Why would somebody use the promo code they were given when they get to the website and see a better one in a pop-up window! All these affiliates are working super-hard in the hopes of some good paypal lovin’, only to find out the very company they’ve been shilling to all their croneys has turned around and STABBED THEM IN THE FACE!

Et tu, Joshé?

Now, why so ever would we do something like that? Of course we don’t want to hurt our affiliates! So why steal their referrers in this way? Especially when our promo code was more than $97, it actually costs us more to “steal” these people about to sign up with some other promo code.

The strange, but true, but unbelievable, but really honestly true, but you-can’t-comprehend-it, but it’s for reals, truth is we’ve found that putting a pop-up promo code like that on our main site actually helps all signups, ACROSS THE BOARD.

We’re not sure why ourselves, but we get more no-promo-code signups, more affiliate-promo-code signups, and of course, more DreamHost-promo-code signups whenever we have that pop-up there! And, it seems to also have no residual effect on signups on other days afterwards.

Maybe people just feel some loyalty to their original promo code. Maybe they don’t care. Maybe they just don’t see or read the pop-up. Maybe seeing that code gets everybody in some kind of weird web-hosting frenzy and they just decide to sign up, whether they use the code or not! I know, it’s CRAZY, but that’s why I like marketing!

So basically, please please PLEASE trust us, affiliates! We try our best to only take actions in everybody’s best interests, and we’ve got nothing to gain by “stealing” your referrals!

TUESDAY!

Brett was checking the public voicemail when he came across this little gem apparently from a phone number in British Columbia.

Now, most of us didn’t really think that was the scariest bomb threat they’d ever heard. But, it was decided to notify our main data center building anyway. They then called the LAPD, and so a lot of Tuesday was spent explaining what “we do,” and how we have a “voice mail” in a “computer file”.

Also that “Brea” is a city in the LA area, different from “La Brea”, a street.

P.S. No bomb so far.

P.P.S. And really, what sort of threat gives you a deadline that’s a 48-hour window?

WEDNESDAY!

Ladies, avert your eyes!

Head Honcho Michael is out of town right now, so apparently ANONYMOUS LAZY HAPPY DREAMHOST EMPLOYEE thought it’d be fine to sneak in a little nap on his office couch. And it would have been fine, if he could have only kept his pants on.

(Notice the huge amounts of DreamHost power that permeate the office?)

THURSDAY!

Your charity dollars at work!

Aw shucks! We just got a huge shipment of World Wrestling Fund (or something?) pint glasses and travel mugs for thanks for the generous donation DreamHost and her customers gave a few months ago! Well, we’d split all the glasses in half with you, but I guess we’re just pessimists.

Consider them gifts from you to us for keeping prices down while we REDICLOUS-LY add (and subtract) bandwidth and disk space!

FRIDAY!

Whoops, did I spell something ridiculously wrong up there?

My apologies, I must have just been influenced by this SECRET PACT email I received today from an UN-NAMED WEB HOST!

I’m just trying to get some key players in the industry to agree on a few things:

a. That the current disk space/bandwidth allocations are rediclous
b. To cap them at a specific range (based on price)
c. To create a self-enforcement method for the industry

I was wondering if DreamHost would be interested in joining the discussions. So far, I have spoken to almost every major hosting provider in our segment.

I guess somebody doesn’t read our blog! Doesn’t he know our whole “lowering disk and bandwidth” thing is just a coy marketing ploy?

And in summary, what a wild, zany, not-run-of-the-mill week it’s been!

And, OH, I just remembered.

This IS a run-of-the-mill week at DreamHost!

Busted!

23 Responses to “No Run-Of-The-Mill Week, This!”

  1. Oli Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 3:55 pm

    Seriously people are trying to price-fix now? Shouldn’t you report them to the “better business” people or whatever it is you have in the US?

  2. David Harrison Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:04 pm

    At the end of that bomb threat, does anyone else hear him … peeing?

  3. Jon Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:11 pm

    Haha this blog is enough to stay at Dreamhost :) Keep up the good work.

  4. subversified Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:13 pm

    I hope someone considered this “bomb threat” might actually be a skript kiddy trying to warn you about his 1337 haxoring.

  5. rlparker Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:13 pm

    Nice picture, there ANONYMOUS LAZY HAPPY DREAMHOST EMPLOYEE …really..um, nice..

  6. Peter Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:28 pm

    What’s with the flute music in the background of the bomb threat?

  7. Mike Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 4:53 pm

    I wonder if Mr. Friday knows that price fixing is a felony in the US.

  8. Kelly@DreamHost Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 5:30 pm

    Re: Price fixing

    If only we could get the major players busted for it. (Some of them, again.) See record labels, car manufacters, etc, that will “pay your advertising costs, if the advertised price is this or greater.”

  9. Anonymous Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 6:17 pm

    Price fixing in the US is highly illegal. Referring that to the DOJ would probably get a number of people in deep.

  10. lbft Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 7:26 pm

    Some guy’s buttcrack is as good as you can do, Josh? You’re losing your touch.

  11. ANONYMOUS LAZY HAPPY DREAMHOST EMPLOYEE Says:
    January 19th, 2007 at 10:49 pm

    That’s what I said, but that still didn’t stop them :(

  12. faragerri Says:
    January 20th, 2007 at 12:58 am

    If you now suceed in posting what the crazy DH people do all day at work evey single say this blog will be the most visited on the planet¨!!!

  13. Alan Smithee Says:
    January 20th, 2007 at 1:20 am

    I wasn’t an angry emailer, and don’t really care that much, but…

    —
    “Especially when our promo code was more than $97, it actually costs us more to “steal” these people about to sign up with some other promo code.”
    —

    Does it? You don’t have to pay yourself secondary referral fees on those customers.

    —
    “Maybe people just feel some loyalty to their original promo code.”
    —

    My guess is that they feel loyalty towards the programmer that wrote their pop-up blocker, so they never turn it off. ;-)

    Then you have the people that used to get rich off referral links HATE promo codes, so they spread your code around the net/forum beyond the reach of your pop-up, in an attempt to take away sign-ups from other users. They figure if they can’t make $97-per-click, then no one should get credit for anything.

    So, it’s not really a matter of just losing sign-ups that pay close to nothing, but a matter of looking bad when someone with a pop-up blocker uses a $97 code, then finds the forum, or a blog/site, where they’re told they paid too much by someone throwing around the DH code.

    But hey, it’s only a few bucks, right? Exactly! So why not bump the referral fee up to $100 and give loyal customers a $.01 cent advantage as a thank you for helping out? ;-)

    Just messing with ya… sorta. I’m here for the hosting and have been for years before there even were promo codes. I continue to recommend DH based on my experience, even though I’ve made a lot more referral money with other hosts I have accounts with. No promo codes or affiliate policies would change that.

    But at the same time, I’d expect Dreamhost to understand that their promo code looks anti-affiliate, whether it’s intended to be or not. It would seem like it’s paying new customers $2.99 to not use a promo code from an existing customer.

    Okay, I’m done… you’re still the best! :D

  14. Anonymous Says:
    January 20th, 2007 at 2:52 am

    “So basically, please please PLEASE trust us, affiliates!”
    -
    Yeah right, the “1 day only”, “9999″ 9th anniversary promo code that pops up again every few weeks, I believe its now been active 6 times in total, 5 times as a “1 day only” sham, and then it was renamed to the MLK crazy 1 weekend sale.

    While I agree with the traffic increasing while the “9999″ pop up is active, it still doesn’t hide the fact that your “1 day only” sale was a flat out lie, it should be no surprise that affiliates get the feeling Dreamhost is against them.

  15. Joe Says:
    January 20th, 2007 at 9:20 am

    Collusion FTL!

  16. Russ Says:
    January 21st, 2007 at 11:07 am

    POP UP????, what pop up? doesn’t everyone use pop up blockers these days? I’m not sure I even remember what they are!!!

  17. Airwick Says:
    January 21st, 2007 at 2:10 pm

    I agree … if another web hosting company is indeed trying to collude towards industry wide price fixing, then it is your ethical duty to report it to both the California Attorney General (your home state), the DOJ, and the Federal Trade Commission. There’s fine line between industry association standards and collusion. Let the experts sort it out.

  18. Hamish Says:
    January 22nd, 2007 at 12:40 pm

    It’s illegal over here in the UK too and any member of the European Economic Community. Price Fixing can seriously ruin an economy. I agree with the guy above, its your duty to tell someone. (Can’t you get done for not telling them – I know we get done for hiding or not telling the government about anything related to Benefit Fraud, Inland Revenue Tax and Terrorism and probably other stuff too).

    Love the blog.

  19. Foto Zone Says:
    January 22nd, 2007 at 4:40 pm

    that´s, good, and the look light.

    P.D. i go to ca. this summers.

  20. Aaron Says:
    January 25th, 2007 at 10:24 am

    My company was considering hosting our sites with Dreamhost until I read the home page today where Dreamhost accused their own affiliates of hating civil rights. “Marketing rhetoric” and number crunching aside, Dreamhost discredits their affiliates who claim they can offer “the biggest discounts” when Dreamhost outbids them intermittently. That’s enough to turn me off of the deal, but the fact that Dreamhost would then slander their affiliates (angry-letter-writing, respectfully-objecting and silently-complicit alike) on the home page is laughably bad business. Thank you for helping my company avoid the mistake of trusting Dreamhost with our business and reputation.

  21. DreamHost Blog » We’ve been burgled! Says:
    January 25th, 2007 at 12:05 pm

    [...] Sure, there’s plenty of people out there who want to blow us up and some who even want to kick our f$ckin’ a$$es. But who would break into our office just to steal a neon sign? [...]

  22. DreamHost Blog » Some Late Night Moves! Says:
    January 25th, 2007 at 6:14 pm

    [...] Patrick had told Pete (who lives right by the office) that he was just in the area, at 1:30am on a Wednesday, and I wanted him to pick up some WWF glasses for the downtown office. But, HAD PETE PLAYED US FOR FOUR FOOLS?! [...]

  23. Wahine on Storytellin’ »Blog Archive » My web host got a bomb threat…but didn’t take it too seriously Says:
    March 12th, 2007 at 7:53 am

    [...] But what’s this? The call was traced back to British Columbia? [...]

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