After being throughly trashed by crowd sourcing techies here and everywhere for freezing the paypal account of Regretsy.com, PayPal has issued a statement acknowledging the error of their ways. Calling it a "resolution", Anuj Nayar, Director of Communications, PayPal writes:

Last night we became aware of an issue with one of our account holders, Regretsy.com. Though we can't comment specifically on the account due to our privacy policy, we can confirm that the funds have been released and we are working directly with the account holder on this matter. Just like anyone else, we believe strongly in helping those in need, especially around the holiday season. We are making a donation to Regretsy to help their cause, and we're truly sorry this occurred.

For background, we have clear guidelines for any business that uses PayPal to accept donations. For example, we require certain documentation to prevent misuse of the donated funds and, if the recipient claims charitable status, to determine whether they are properly registered. We do this to protect our customers and to protect our business. As a regulated payment service, we're also required by law to follow these guidelines.

We appreciate that this can be an inconvenience, but we have a responsibility to all our customers - both donors and recipients; and buyers and sellers. In this instance, we recognized our error and moved as swiftly as possible to fix it.

First up Paypal... The only reason Regretsy still has an account is the ridiculous list of conditions attached to closing the account... besides it was frozen.

Secondly... Regretsy doesn't need your money. They raised enough of their own

Thirdly... Resolutions are made at New Years. Need a suggestion? How about this year I resolve not to be such a douche bag

Fourth... No, actually, you don’t have clear guidelines regarding businesses accepting donations to perform charitable acts. “Subject to review” is pretty much the same as “depends on which way the wind’s blowing”

Next.... What an marketing opportunity for another online payment company... Are you listening Google Wallet

Meanwhile, over  at  web host Hostropolis , Regretsy.com server continues to contend with the little extra load.

A server over  at  web host Hostropolis may be contending with a little extra load today after the latest stunt by “when is this company going to die” Paypal began to be crowd sourced.

The slightly irreverent but charitable community at Regretsy.com decided to share some cheer by trying to buy Christmas presents for kids. Almost like Santa and his elves, they took lots of applications, vetted them carefully and set about creating a giant gift exchange program, where you could buy a gift for the over 200 children that may have been naughty or nice, but were in need of being helped regardless!

After the fund raising they found themselves in the enviable position of not just being able to send toys, but to send a monetary gift to the families as well. A little extra Christmas cheer that  may have helped make a holiday dinners more special, or maybe just pay a pressing bill.

PAYPAL SHUT IT DOWN

“Donate” buttons have been used by numerous small community organizations, startups, and web developers for years yet Paypal is now claiming they are only for nonprofit organizations to use. Paypal has now frozen the account!

Regretsy 's Helen Killer says:

After a very long and jaw-dropping conversation with an incredibly condescending representative, they have decided that I must refund all the donations and purchases that have not been processed.

Regretsy highlights of the conversation

PAYPAL: Only a nonprofit can use the Donate button.
ME: That’s false. It says right in the PDF of instructions for the Donate button that it can be used for “worthy causes.”
PAYPAL: I haven’t seen that PDF. And what you’re doing is not a worthy cause, it’s charity.
ME: What’s the difference?
PAYPAL: You can use the donate button to raise money for a sick cat, but not poor people.

ME: The problem is I’ve already bought all of these toys, so now I’m really in a position like any other merchant – which is to say, I have inventory I need to sell. Why can’t I sell them as gifts, like any other retailer?
PAYPAL: Don’t you think it would look suspicious if the same people bought them again?
ME: Why? These are my customers!
PAYPAL: If you wanted to do that, you’d have to start a new website.
ME: What? Why would I start a new website?
PAYPAL: I’m not going to argue with you.

PAYPAL: You say you’re selling these as gifts but there is no information as to what the gift is.
ME: People sell mystery gifts and grab bags all the time. What about sites where they say, let us choose for you?”
PAYPAL: It doesn’t say that on your site.
ME: Is that the problem? If I say it’s a mystery gift would that be sufficient?
PAYPAL: You aren’t going to be able to get around this. It’s too late, we know what you’re trying to do and we’re not going to let you do it.
ME: But there are hundreds of toys! Do you think it’s reasonable to create a drop down menu for hundreds of gifts, all of them different, and create an inventory for each as “one?” So that every time one sells, it’s sold out, and the customer has to keep choosing options and going through check out to see if they can find a gift that’s still available?
PAYPAL: Yes, I think it’s reasonable.

At this point, Helen asked to speak to a supervisor and was told that “No one above me will talk to you. No one at my level ever makes phone calls. We’re only doing this to help you.” … Well how could you argue with that logic. PayPal is being nice!

When she asked how to close my account, he said she had to “refund everything, write a letter saying you understood what you did WAS WRONG AND YOU WILL NEVER DO IT AGAIN, and then request permission to close your account.”

Then, for good measure, they froze her personal account, which has revenue from book sales, e-books and all the other Finnish Folktales Swag. They’ll be holding that money for 6 months.

Recap

$ They allowed me to use a donate button, and got a portion of the donations
$ Then made me return the donations, and kept a portion of the fees on the donations
$ They allowed me to use a Buy Now button to sell gifts individually, and got a portion of those sales
$ Then made me return the sales, and kept a portion of the fees on the sales
$ They processed the toy purchases, and made fees on that

Wanna tell Paypal how you feel? Here’s a list of every administrative Paypal email address and phone number The Consumerist was able to find.

Isn't PayPal owned by eBay?

Also check out a prior post... Risk losing Revenue if you don't offer Paypal alternatives

 

Julie Whitaker Web & Social Media Strategist, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières writes:

Here at Doctors Without Borders, we are blown away by the efforts of this community to support our work. We created this reddit account just to thank you for this effort.

Doctors Without Borders exists for one purpose - to provide first-rate medical care to people who need it, with no regard for race, religion or political affiliation. We have no agenda, and the fact that we receive 93% our funds from millions of individual donors around the world is very often the only thing that allows us access to people trapped in conflict areas where other organizations are unable to work.
So, congratulations on such a successful fundraiser, and thank you for generous support!

Thank you to the 85 anonymous donors and to these 906 people who donated in the last 24 hours:

0ctobyte, 1800biteme, 1freelectron, 20, 2716057, 2fat2dance, 2oublethink, 3migo, 84_sheepdog, 8AMclass, A nony, AJL, AKDuckie, ALM1017, AU_SnackyGoo, Aaron B., Aaron Law, ActuallyThatGuy, AdHawk, Adam Anderson, Adam G, Adam Tomkins, Addequate, Adnan Selimovic, Agata, Alessandro Bassi, Alex Wolff, Ambulant, Amir, An Evangelical Christian, Andi Li, Andrew, Andrew Huang, AndyyRi, AngelOfLight, Ann Palowitch, Anon, Anony Mouse, Ansis Rezgalis, Antilogic, ApatheticElephant, Apollos_Anus, Archonium, AreYouMyMummy, Arsenic42, Ash, Astronuts, Asuka, AtheistInAFoxhole, AviusQuovis, B3arjew, BACON, BCSteve, BGilb, Babyeatingatheist, BadViper, Bandit1379, BarcodeNinja, Beans&Pinot, BecomingX, BeliefSuspended2008, Ben Randolph, BenLew, Benjamin CUrrier, BigLuckyDavy, BlaikeMethazine, Blinkinlincoln, Bob Chen, Bob_Ross, Bobicuss, Bojac Prime, Boles83, Bolnazzar, Brandon Overall, Brecourt, Brendan Sugrue, Brett-eCo, BrightWinter, Bristolshambler, Brock-o-lee, BrownianGala, Brychan Manry, Burlok, Business Markie, Buzkie, CGoller, CJT39, CWGM, Cadza, Cadza & Mende, CallieMarie, CandyCornVampire, CapnKronos, CapnM, CauchyDistributedRV, Cause_I_Got_High, Ccoralli, Cecil900, Chanther, Chaous, Charles Kressbach, Cheeser McFace, ChemicalOle, Chris Glynn, Chris Martin, Chrisbux, Christian Bundy, Claclink, Clever_Name_Here, CoffeeNtrees, Corey Hatch, Corinne, Creator11, Cricketwhacker, CrimsonKevlar, Cunundrum, Currently_me, Curtis Smith, DHumeFan, Dakota A. House, Dan, Dane De Forest, DangerSnack, Daniel, Daniel C, Darren, Dasan, Datrio, David, David Hooper, Dejan, Denster, Derek Richards, Derkistan, Destitude, Deuski, DexterJameson, Dhekke, DillonJMcGuire, Din, Dingo Dave, DiscountPhil, DisturbedPsycho, DoTheDew, Doggie, DolphinBoy, Dravleboy, Dreamnotgentle, Drew Bulman, Drodain, DukeThomson, Dumbledore, E-Pro, ERAlderidge, EatTheBar, Ejyler, Eldoop, Elipsys, Eothred, Erebose, Ezy, Fairycross, FajitaofTreason, Felipe Goetz, Fiech, Fl3et, FleetingThought, Fredrik, Fullerer, Fuzzywobs, G-M, GOBLE, Gabrielseifer, GalaxyRise, Galdor04, Gdcalif, Geedunk, Geobrew, George, George Engelbrecht, GetStapled, Glader, Gnorris, GodDid911, Goodolbeej, GoonerGirl, Gorman Freedon, Gottlos, GraharG, Grumpy Mr. Gruff, HarbingTarbl, Harry RIckards, Harryman11, Helios6, Here4TheCatPics, Hereletmegooglethat, HereticAlpha, Hibno, HisCrispness, Hobbes, Htech, I'm new to reddit, IHasIcing, I_Am_The_falconer, I_am_Mexico, Iananan, Ijoy_, ImNotAWhaleBiologist, ImpetuousRitual, InMyHead2Much, Inashadow, Ipigack, Isenki, Ishcakes, Ishouldgetanaccount, Isis, Itoucheditforacookie, Ivan Occam, JGHagood, JTFM, JTK, JakOswald, Jake Waldie, James, James Gray, Jan, Jason, Jawood Ashur Muhammad, Jayda5th, Jeff M, Jekalope, Jenez, JennaSighed, Jerik, Jessica Mason, Jimmyhoffa45, John Small Berries, Jokiesamoster, Jon, Jordan Calo, Josiah Johnson, Jsmrcina, Just some guy, Kahvikone, Kam, Karl Buckland, Kattpiss, Keith, Kelwyn, Kenny Moore, Kevin519, Kid_Burrito, Killtron82, Kim Berg, Kjetil Albrechtsen, Konrad Curze, Ksr7, Kvankess, Kyle, Leo Sprinzen, Leon Fedotov, LeonProfessional, Lester Mathias Andersson, LiarParadox, Lisa Aronovsky, Little_Joe, LivingDying3-4Time, Lokikong, LolaVi, London AHS Daniel L., Lovegood, Lowbacca1977, Lowfuel, Lynx7, M. Paepcke, M_Bot, Makken104, Malfunctional89, Mark Biesheuvel, MarshaRose Joyner, MathiasKrogh, MatterStorm, Matthew Sullivan, Maxime Petazzoni, Maytopo, Medice, MegaHz, Metasheep, Michael, Michael Arkwright, Michael Gale, Michael McDowall, Mihai, MikeDobbins, Mister_sulu, Mizoballa, MooseRidingRoosevelt, Mr. King, Mr. Tinney, MrArtless, MrAttractive, MrBlueShirt, MrGarbonzo, Mr_Hamburglar, Mr_Oppenheimer, Mr_Tulip, Mufflin, Mulligans_Steakhouse, MyFistUpYourBalls, My_First_Pony, Nate, Nathan, Nathan Brazil - Zambuka42, NerdxBomber, Nick, Nicoledm, Nieht, Nik, NinthEidolon, Notch, Noxous, Nsot, NukeThePope, NullXorVoid, OJ Simpson, OasisDK, Ocell, Ochita, Ole Marius Skodje, One Of Many, OsipKoba, Osiris02, Ovreel, P McBryde, PBAsydney, POQbum, Palodin, ParallelParadox, Parmenion, Paul H, Peachfuzz17, Peatore, Pele411, Philip Rodger, Pialpha, PoorCollegeStudent, ProjectileHerpes, Pwnasaur, RL, Rabin Joshi, Random Redditor, RandomNed, RangleGoose, Ratchard, Rayne, Redslate, Remulasce, Renewable13, Rich, Rigurun, Riven89, Rob64, Robert, Robert Neumann, Ronin44X, Rory Devonport, Rosie2jz, Roxie, RunJun, Ryan, Ryan Brenner, SSgt Lee, Sam Shore, Samit Sarkar, Sammer, Scott, Scott_B, Seanothan, Sexcellence, Shearur, Shemko, ShortNeckGiraffe, Siddharth Rajan, Simpletonlol, Sir-Captain, Sirhyl, Slowlyturningzombie, Soapy9, SociologyGuy, SodaAnt, SofaKingSomething, SolInvictus, SolarUppercut, Sourkeys, Speak_of_the_Devil, SpencerAdam, Spoungebob, Sputnik Sweetheart, Steffi, Sten Golds, StormTAG, Stuart Creedican, Stuart Grieve, Sumurika, SunAvatar, SupaGreg1, Superism, SweetPickles, SystemOutPrintln, TBTmn, Tai1983, Takamata, Taldan, Tangelasboots, TaoDao, Taptalotapus, TehHat, Teng, The Coatses, The Monks, The-Tots, TheGoshDarnedBatman, TheKibster, TheManintheSuit, TheMikeGuy, ThePoorAthiest, TheProAmateur, TheScriptKiddie, TheShrubber, TheThundering, The_phonetic_faelyia, Thekipz, Themias, ThisGodlessEndeavor, Thomas Walther, Tim, Tobias Nalepa, Todd66, ToxicToastCraft, Travisdy, Tree Lobsters, Triassic, Typesmith, Uberface, Uller999, Unconfidence, VanillaPlanet+1, Vegemash, Vik, Villy, Virek, Waqas Ali, Wazabbi, Wei, Wheelman67, Will, William_Nilliam, Yangle, Yet Another Atheist Chris, Youngdun, Zach, Zaev, ZanzaraEE, Zealotte, Zeesis, ZeroDivided714, Znsale01, Zola jesus, Ztiegs, (continued...)

(And ...continued) _Heisenberg_, a human being, a. lawrence, aGloriousDawn, a_tone, aaerox, ab57, abstractanvil, accioknowledge, adamcw, adlibitum, admbmb, aggatt, aggie1391, ajaw, ajg, ajpolson09, alanakali, alanayvonne, alanita, alex14, alexlinftw, alieonicable, aluminumfalcon, anarkyinducer, andreimarkov, andschwa, andy, angelkimne, anonymous, anothersoapbox, apollo2H, aroomacanvas, arterialblack1989, astrolia, audiodude, avnguyen213, axylone, azazaz44, bak, bdavidson1030, beans, benco, benoitcsirois, biowidth, blahspam, bmunichman, bobbiegirl, bowlerroot, bpiraeus, brithog, bromar, brugaltheelder, bryakles, bspielburg, bugalooflu, butterflystyle, cakwalker, carlandreas, carmentosca, catalyticanalytics, cbnyc, cchugon, champah-gen, cheesecake, chimpus, chloraseptic, choi152, chrisknyfe, chucatawa, clawdeeuhh, code5037, codefocus, cookmybook, coreyander, countbakula, courtandspark, crazylilrikki, crimson090, crocboss, cupofjoseph, curly_fry, cursuve, cyrusmandrake, d4th, daedalean, dakevster, damajed_goods, damian78, dappopp, darkmodem, davebgray, daversa, daytrader247, deadBB, deepfriedmarsbar, defensorveritatis, defpearlpilot, dembones01, diadem, dilbertmouse, djpk19, dlaw_14, dr_itor, drinkthepill, dripless_cactus, dubious_alliance, duckvaginas, dustinechos, dvyjones, eien, elbarto, elisa_fdm, elodin, emptypockets, erdcaged, errchy, eugenetabisco, euthyphro, everner, evolvedape, ewo2, fabioperez, faja720, floompy, floydian, fluviusindus, flyrice, foulflaneur, fractalsonfire, franciscogalt, franctastic, frenger, frosty256, funkmasta98, funkyshit, gabaji123, gabecockfive, gazeheuristic, gbendinelli, gburgdan, gearios, gizbon, gnuotaku, goldenpandora, goldenthorn, goodwithoutgod, gotyourqueen, grandarcmaster, grandia256, greenplasticjim, guregu, gyrfalcons, hackettlp, hahawaitwhat, hectorse2011, hendriks, henzi, heyt, hibbitron, hihatfedora, horn_ok_please, horstl, hskiel4_12, i don't have a redditid... i just lurk..., i hate jack, iAvocado, iFlashie, iamfantastikate, iamzepia, icewarrior, ihatenamingshit, ilikepoops, illjot, illogical_operator, imthedudeman77, in_circles, inikul, ispewbrains, itsnotthethrowaway, ivan t, izzzzzzzzzzzzz, jakebeans, jakemb, jam_spoons, jamie1743, jangofandango9, jarnish, jasowadams, jaswon1, jayisrad, jbasile1, jcdark, jchmski, jdorf, jdsmx, jellydoughnuts, jensmartin, jerekeys, jerseyslegend, jhagan, jimklopchic, jk2512, jmint52, johdan, johnridegoodwithoutgod, joka86, jomsie, jsncrs, julesa, jzeramiiiii, kane.malakos, karlfranks, karlikarli, kcsx, kdabomb, kenako, kgst, kiaga, kiaran ritchie, klmcree, kouhoutek, kpal, krangksh, kronos64, kwcannotbekilled, l33tsniper05, lag051183, lati0s-, lenish, liam_lifad, livinginspain, longboarder116, luc1fel, lukyleprechaun37, m, macterra, magic, magruff, mainacht, marainman, mathiaspius, mathmeth, mathrallan, mattypants, mawkish, md619, meatmechanic, melissa714, mhuang2286, mike rolin, mikejordan, mikeonthebass, mil24havoc, mindcheck, misterthirsty, mitchtastical, mjohniii, mkay, modern drift, monesy, mrreoweh, mrstickman, mto92, munchbunny, myeir214, myfaultstudios, mynameistoey, nalhagen, natteke, naust, necron30, nerdotron17, newgnij, newsgent, nezumiiro, nicksbrother, night81, nnagflar, nobi77, noloodler, nosmint31, notaprodigy, notverycreative5, nybgrus, offwithyourtv, ohnoeslawls, ot86, ozzzzzz22, p1985401, pHo22, p_e_t_r_o_z, pajam, panda, pandabunny, paramitepies, parasadi, pckrrr, pellucidrockstar, pfafffffff, phasors, phauwn, phillyxd, pillscavenger, pishooo, pistolpete, pmwilkins, pregnantandnursing, prettywitty, princenarwhal, protoman115, puddle_pirate, pugg_fuggly, punctuationmark, purpleevilt, pyrokittens, quirkymonsta, r/rule34, raaynes, rabbitambulance, railk, random, random-42, rapartist, ravenstar, razorbladedog, redheadjessica, reemusk, rhapsblu, rockdude14, rooibosaur, roscoegiddyup, rprz, rumfa, rvsn, salalimo, scarecrowslayer, scott, scottaino, seacreature32, seatoski, seignuers, semicoldjello, seonte, shadowhunter22, shadowman965, shalmanese, shawncplus, shawnpeps, shitloadofbooks, shoelaced, sifarat, sillyrob, simon113, sinsecticide, skinnytwit, skittyskat22, slin555, smellyeli, sophisma, sortcel, soswiss, soundtrain, spearhard, spider_dijon1, spiritofthestaircase, spriggig, squishlefunke, sriliff, srujan, staringatmaqaque, staygoldponyboy, sueeeee22, superkeer, takingcandyfromababy, takuflow21, teh feral kittehs, tempozrene, teqland, texasraindrop, theDeedster, the_sleepiest, thejem, themanifold, theodoreros, theregularlion, thetiger756, theultimatejames, theworldismycountry, threeDspider, tm258 & ageeksgirl08, topside, toytruck, treesareleafy55, trollsrfunny, tsphan, twanky, twbassist, twilightkeyblader, tylercap, ubergossen, uncoder0, uncommitted, unicornsoup, upwaaaards, user54, ushimitsudoki, vectorspace299, vegemite_is_people, vitrael, vogon_poem_lover, volantene, vtrac, waketherabble, we_dont_serve_miners, wehyrgt, whatupdave, whlabratz, whoadave, whyofry, wikilowe, willywanka86, woodrew1027, wtfhbk, wxu, x70x, xWOBBx, x_anima, xelfer, xiann, yesua, zaner123, zlucas, zombiebarbie, zomgie, zoopcupness, zswanson

You helped save lives today! Thank you!

The Sunlight Foundation took a look at donations from big media companies to politicians supporting SOPA and PIPA... and,the verdict is in. Representatives of the American people have been moonlighting as... just follow the money!

Among the 25 SOPA cosponsors from both sides of the aisle, here's a breakdown of which legislators have brought in donations from big media in TV, music and movies during their careers in Congress.

 

• Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., $1,727,156. His southern district border is Hollywood Blvd. and he was the beneficiary at a fundraiser earlier this month hosted by two lobbyists at a firm that represents the National Broadcasting Association.
• Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., $516,400
• Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., $488,731
• Rep. Mary Bono Mack, R-Calif., $488,636
• Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Tex., $392,995 (sponsor)
• Rep. Robert Goodlatte, R-VA, $316,686
• Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., $261,700
• Rep. Lee Terry, R-Nev., $248,168
• Rep. John Barrow, D-GA, $210,900
• Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., $204,199
• Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Calif., $133,023
• Rep. Melvin Watt, D-N.C., $130,100
• Rep. John Carter, R-Tex., $75,850
• Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., $64,648
• Rep. Steve Scalise, R-LA, $54,000
• Rep. William Owens, D-N.Y., $42,850
• Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Fla., $30,000
• Rep. Thomas Marino, R-Penn., $21,300

The nearly 40 cosponsors of the Protect IP Act, SOPA's partner legislation in the Senate, have received more than $13.5 million from the TV, music and movies industry since entering Congress. Here's a rundown:

 

• Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., $1,996,470
• Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., $1,465,160
• Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., $1,295,718
• Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., $899,366 (sponsor)
• Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., $890,668
• Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., $747,491
• Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mont., $503,291
• Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., $493,069
• Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, $492,407
• Sen. Robert Menéndez, D-N.J., $445,575
• Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., $430,500
• Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., $368,733
• Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., $365,589
• Sen. Robert Casey, D-Penn., $343,225
• Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., $312,320
• Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., $297,771
• Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, $291,621
• Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, $284,225
• Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., $254,162
• Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., $237,084
• Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., $230,569
• Sen. Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., $218,539
• Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., - $217,847
• Sen. Kay Hagan, D-N.C., - $171,790
• Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., $158,066
• Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., $94,450

Tax Freedom Day in 2011 was April 12 in the U.S.A ... later 'celebrations' for some states. Just be thankful we're not getting all the government we're paying for.

An disconcerting story that started with a number of domain holders claiming that their domains ownerships have been transferred to a foreign individual's account. While initially the domains in question appeared to be registered with GoDaddy, there are now indications that the problem could be affecting domains registered through other domain registers also!

Chris Coyier, the owner of a web design community, had the domain css-tricks.com registered with GoDaddy. It was brought to his attention that the ownership of the domain had been transferred  to PlanetDomain. At the moment "css-tricks.com" DNS nameservers still point to MediaTemple, and the site is still resolving to Chris's website.

Chris has throughly documented a timeline of his day researching when, and what transpired, as well as  possible solutions to resolve the css-tricks.com transfer. It would be difficult to condense the expose.  

Friday 7:30am - Chris found out about all this from emails from David Appleyard. Chris had received no email or phone call verifying the transferring of this domain. The email address in my GoDaddy account was unchanged.
Friday 7:45am - A call to GoDaddy support at (480) 505-8877. Was not helpful. Was told just to email domaindisputes@godaddy.com (which I did immediately).
Friday 8:06am - I tweeted about the problem. GoDaddy sent me a DM saying to fill out a form, but the form was a 404 page.
Friday 8:30am - Got the correct link to the domain dispute form and filled it out. This included a scan of my driver's license. The website says it will be 3 days for an initial response.
Friday 9:00am - Sometimes a banjo lesson is just more important!

Friday 10:10am - Trying to contact PlanetDomain … No Twitter account.

Friday 10:15am - Got generic email back from GoDaddy:
We have reviewed your claim and we will contact PlanetDomain and request an FOA (Form of Authorization) for the transfer. If their records also show the same registrant at the time of transfer, we will work with them to see if they can transfer the domain name back. However, they are not required to transfer the domain name back.
If they are unwilling to transfer the domain name back you will need to contact the current registrar or registrant for further assistance.

Friday 11:50 - Just got off the phone with GoDaddy (Tony in domain disputes and Alon in customer service, I think). The current status is that they have already sent a request to PlanetDomain, and the next step is to wait for them to do the due diligence and get back to GoDaddy with an answer on whether or not they will return the domain. This be a matter of days, or a week (sine it's Friday, very likely won't be until early next week). Other facts about GoDaddy:
-So far they have found this has happened to around 12 accounts, all within the "Web Design" genre (so most likely a targeted attack).
-There is no accessible log from with your GoDaddy account to see what/when things happened.
-They do have access logs, but they can't share that information with me.
-The domain was transferred away from GoDaddy the evening of Nov 20th
-They have, but cannot provide me with, the email address used to transfer the domain away.
-GoDaddy confirmed my global account email has never been changed, but it WAS changed for the domain css-tricks.com prior to the move.
-The request to unlock the domain happened on Nov. 14th at 4:30pm Mountain Time. -Normally there is a 5-7 day waiting period, but GoDaddy offers instant transfer and they remarked that it was unusual that the hacker chose not to do that.
-They confirmed no other domains have left my account.

Friday 12:15pm - I asked VaultPress if they could tell me the IP address of the person who changed the index.php file, but they don't have that information. It might be in my server logs if I have them from that long ago.

Friday 1:05pm - Former employee of PlanetDomain tells me that it looks as if the hacker attempted to remove the nameservers, but the PlanetDomain system for that failed. (This line in the WHOIS: "No name servers present.") The hacker would have to call PlanetDomain to "fix" this, which they have not (thank god).

Friday 5:25pm - About the end of the work day here and heading in to the weekend, so it's unlikely anything will happen until early next week. I'd love to get at least an acknowledgment from PlanetDomain / NetRegistry that they've gotten the domain dispute from GoDaddy. But no such luck.

Presently it appears that there are 24 domains that have been transferred to the account holder of Planet Domain. Without actual proof, it does appear that a common denominator may be the use of gmail accounts by the legitamate account holders. Many domain registers associate an email address with the domain, and any requests to transfer a domain from that email address would not raise any red flags.

Hint: never use a free email account to register a domain! The contact email address can be modified in the client area of your domain registrar.

HostJury will continue to update this post as more information emerges.

css-tricks.com - Originally at GoDaddy

Domain Name: CSS-TRICKS.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS1.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Name Server: NS2.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Status: ok
Updated Date: 21-nov-2011
Creation Date: 04-jul-2007
Expiration Date: 04-jul-2019

Designshack.net -

Domain Name: DESIGNSHACK.NET
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS1.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Name Server: NS2.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 20-nov-2011
Creation Date: 05-may-2008
Expiration Date: 05-may-2013

KIRUPA.COM - Originally on NetworkSolution

Domain Name: KIRUPA.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS1.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Name Server: NS2.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Status: ok
Updated Date: 30-nov-2011
Creation Date: 10-feb-1999
Expiration Date: 10-feb-2016

davidwalsh.name -

Domain Name: DAVIDWALSH.NAME 
Domain Status: pendingTransfer

scriptandstyle.com -Originally at GoDaddy

Domain Name: SCRIPTANDSTYLE.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS15.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
Name Server: NS16.DOMAINCONTROL.COM
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 20-nov-2011
Creation Date: 18-jul-2008
Expiration Date: 18-jul-2013

sohtanaka.com - Originally at 1and1

Domain Name: SOHTANAKA.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS57.1AND1.COM
Name Server: NS58.1AND1.COM
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 23-nov-2011
Creation Date: 12-apr-2005
Expiration Date: 12-apr-2013

instantshift.com - Originally at GoDaddy

Domain Name: INSTANTSHIFT.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: NS1.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Name Server: NS2.MEDIATEMPLE.NET
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 20-nov-2011
Creation Date: 21-aug-2008
Expiration Date: 21-aug-2013

shiachat.com –

Domain Name: SHIACHAT.COM
Registrar: PLANETDOMAIN PTY LTD.
Whois Server: whois.planetdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.planetdomain.com
Name Server: No nameserver
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 02-dec-2011
Creation Date: 26-mar-2000
Expiration Date: 26-mar-2013

 

UK2 Group has announced the launch of a HostPuro. The the press release states their newest web hosting brand is intended to target the hosting needs of the Spanish-speaking community.

Each HostPuro account will comes with unlimited web sites, bandwidth, disk space, and a free domain for the lifetime of the account. Hosting plans are $5 per month, and there doesn't appear to be a discount for annual payments in advance. The release states that HostPuro boasts 99.9% uptime (editors note: I am assuming that they are assuming.. domain was created September 2 2011), a 100% lifetime satisfaction guarantee, and an anytime money back guarantee.

“Web hosting is a global need and we’re very pleased to offer affordable shared hosting solutions now to the Spanish-speaking community,” said Jeff Hunsaker, UK2 Group President – US Operations. “The great thing about HostPuro is that it’s supported by a company and employees who have been in the web hosting industry for over a decade,” said Hunsaker.

Because HostPuro is part of the UK2 Group, it instantly brings years of professional hosting experience to the table. It’s also backed by a Tier-3 data center in one of the most disaster-safe locations in the U.S.

One of the main goals of HostPuro is to provide the best available technology for the Spanish speaking community located anywhere throughout the world. HostPuro offers exceptional customer service in Spanish and strives to make the user experience simple and easy for anyone, regardless of technical know how.

 

 

Other UK2 brands

UK2.NET

The founding brand of the UK2 Group, UK2.NET was created in 1998 and has sold over a million domain names. Known for it’s wide range of domain names and hosting solutions, UK2.NET offers professional low-cost hosting solutions to a wide-range of customers.

Midphase

Our flagship US brand, MidPhase is a one-stop shop for all of your web hosting needs. Innovative services such as DesignPhase (our revolutionary hosted web design service) and shopPhase ecommerce will give your website the best possible start.

10TB (directs to 100TB)

High power, high performance dedicated servers each with 10TB (tera bytes!) of dedicated tier 1 bandwidth. If you want high performance hosting with attitude as backed by Softlayer, look no further than 10TB.

ANHosting

Our budget-level shared hosting specialist, ANHosting keeps it simple by offering one all-inclusive web hosting account that can host up to 20 web sites without breaking the bank.

Autica

The Reseller platform of choice, Autica now provides more space and more features than ever!

Resell.biz

The ICANN accredited domain registrar provides low-cost domain registration and management services to domain resellers.

WingSix

Why should shared web hosting customers compromise on service? WingSix provides shared hosting solutions with enterprise-level service values.

Dotable

Our friendly forum-led hosting brand, where customers are encouraged to become an active part of the team.

WestHost

Our premium hosting brand where personal service, industry-leading response times and superior performance ensure we are always recommended by our customers.

Virtual Internet

Virtual Internet (VI) specialise in High Availability Managed hosting for mission critical web sites and applications which demand 100% availability. Founded in 1995, its philosophy has been to work with world class technology providers to deliver unrivaled hosting and support services.

VPS.NET

Cloud offering, bringing the flexibility and high availability of the Cloud to the masses.

Supreme Support

Relax, we’re in control; our experts are on hand 24/7 to offer high performance professional server management and task-based systems administration services.

 

 

The age-old advice to "work smarter, not harder" applies ten-fold on the web. If you're not finding techniques and tools that help you save time and do more with less then you're missing the whole point. On top of that, you're literally wasting your life.

But "working smarter" doesn't just mean saving time, it also means doing the right thing in the beginning to save yourself pain and suffering down the line. A loophole might help you make progress but is it sustainable and what is the risk involved? A shortcut might save you a couple of hours every month but is your output lower quality because of it?

The four things below all have two sides to them: a side that works and a side that will get you into trouble. Where is the terminator line between the two? It's a big, broad grey area and the further you get, the harder it is to go back. Just make sure you experiment cautiously, always iterate, and check back often.

I start with a definition of each term so it's clear what I'm addressing. I'll tell you why it's done, where it can be helpful, and where you can get into trouble.

Purchased links

A purchased link is a link from one site to another where the linking site was paid. When you purchase a link, you're doing it for one of two reasons: you want traffic from that site or you're looking for the SEO benefits of an organic text link.

There's nothing wrong with the first case here; buying a link for traffic simply equates to advertising. There's a special step in this process, though: the link has to be "nofollow" (a special HTML attribute added to the link) or the page it goes to has to be inaccessible by search spiders. A lot of extra work but Google says so. If you're doing legitimate advertising then these steps help your site so it's worth the effort.

The other side of the coin, the "shortcut to better SEO," is buying a link for the purpose of increasing the number of pages linking to your site. I'll be the first to admit it: link-building is time-consuming and frustrating. After you've been building links for a while, buying a few - or a few hundred - seems like a great way to save time.

The problem here is that you're risking your existing (and future) search engine ranking by cutting corners. Is it more likely Google won't find out you purchased links? Yes. Is it worth risking a penalty of indeterminate length or impact? Definitely not; take it from the experts.

Instead of purchasing links (or using a service that buys them for you), offer to do something for the owner of a particular site. Write a guest post, provide them with some useful information, or, if they're local, go mow their lawn (mostly kidding). The difference is that you'll be getting a better link and one that will stick around for a lot longer.


Automation

Automation is using software to do tasks automatically when once you did them manually. If you've ever connected your Twitter to your blog, your Yelp to your Facebook, or your phone to your Flickr account, you've used automation.

There is so much about automation that I love. Every new app I sign up for has to plug into at least one other thing I'm doing online or I'm already one foot out the door. I use IFTTT to connect apps together creatively to make sure that effort expended in one place isn't lost elsewhere. I also use FeedBurner to connect blogs to Twitter, among other things. If you're not looking for ways to automate certain tasks, you're wasting a lot of time.

But there is a very distinct line between what should be automated and what should not. I don't send all my tweets to Facebook and LinkedIn, for example. Speaking of Facebook, I don't connect any of my content streams to any of my Facebook Pages. I don't sync all my contacts everywhere, I don't connect every network to every other one, and I don't use any application that helps me "get more followers, traffic, fans, etc."

As soon as you start automating tasks, you run the risk of looking/sounding like a robot (a big mistake if you're representing a brand or business) as well as making an increasing number of mistakes. Software does, more or less, what it's told. When you start over-automating, the patterns emerge quickly and it becomes clear that attention to detail is less important than a few saved minutes. A mistake made once in the beginning can propagate throughout the whole system.

Look for ways to save time and use software to your benefit but be careful of how far you go, especially if it's a human touch point. Be clear on what you're trying to accomplish and talk through the system thoroughly (and with someone else) before you put it into place. Don't confuse automation with outsourcing, talked about below.

Aggregated content

Aggregated content is media that you're getting from other, likely public, sources. It means that there is another copy out there somewhere and that you're not the first person to have it. Usually this comes in the form of RSS feeds.

There is just no substitute for original, optimized, well-written, and helpful content. It gets people talking, gets shared across the web, does well in search engines, and is fun to make. It's also incredibly time-consuming. Not many people can find the time to write an incredible blog post each month, let alone every week.

The solution is to start using content from other people. You have an audience and your audience demands to be fed so you find someone providing the content they want and connect the hose. Problem solved!

Well, not quite. We'll assume, for this example, that you have someone's permission to post this content and you're not going to run into any legal issues surrounding copyright. Even then, you're creating a copy of the original and only one of the two will win out in a search engine (Google makes an educated guess as to which one is the duplicated one). Besides that, you could just be re-displaying something your audience has seen already.

The fair, effective middle ground is . This is where you find the content your audience is likely to be interested in, filter out all the nonsense, and add your own spin to it. It's more work than just re-posting what's out there but it has the huge benefit of being very linkable, shareable, and easier to compile than a post of your own. Combine curated content with your own, original posts and you have a recipe for content success.

Outsourcing

Outsourcing, for this purpose, means paying someone else to do something that you're fully capable of doing yourself. Outsourcing could be hiring contractors to help your clients, using an assistant to manage day-to-day tasks, or paying someone to write a blog post for you.

In my experience, the right kind of outsourcing can really free up a lot of time and focus. I have a virtual assistant that helps me stay on top of billing and income, does basic client outreach, and helps me with small tasks like entering content and creating reports. I also work with contractors who provide me with copywriting, code, and server management. Since one person is not infinitely scaleable, growth always requires finding people that can take on tasks for you.

But there are specific things I don't outsource, and advise others not to. I don't outsource social media management, particularly for small- or micro- (one person) businesses. In the same vein, I don't outsource customer service to another company. I don't outsource my marketing or my content.

For development, I'm very careful. When considering a project, both cost and quality always come into play. The quality I provide my clients is incredibly important to me so I don't hand that off with a grain of salt. Outsourcing to a low-cost group, regardless of their location, is simply a matter of getting what you pay for. In my experience, low-cost development is always bug-prone, difficult to modify, unorganized, poorly commented, and not future proof. It's a matter of paying more at the start or paying more down the road. For a small project that might not get off the ground, this might be a fine trade-off. For something you build your business on top of, it's not.

If you're in a position to contract out or outsource a part of your process, just make sure you're clear what needs to be done and how it needs to be done and communicate that clearly. Be careful who you partner with and remember that a personal recommendation is gold. Try a test period, see what happens, then move on from there.

 

About Josh

Josh C. runs Josh Can Help, a small web design, SEO and development shop specializing in WordPress. In his less-than-copious off time he love to make and eat great food, explore craft beer locations here in Seattle, cycle, drink coffee, and snowboard. He’s a total Seattle cliche but don’t tell him that because it would break his heart.

Josh will be providing some tips on a regular basis! If you got something to say that may be of interest to HostJury readers and want to write a guest comentary, drop up a line. feedback@hostjury.com

 

 

Hostjury announced earlier that we'd be giving away a package for a year of free web hosting! Everyone that submitted a legitimate review of their hosting company services, good, bad, or ugly, was entered to win!

And the winner is... drum roll please...

For leaving a review of MacHighway web hosting service

Jac Atkins from John Atkins & Co.

John Atkins & Co. is described on their website as an award-winning marketing agency providing professional web design, web development, social media, marketing and advertising services from St John’s, Newfoundland... that has also on occasion provided cookies.

John Atkins has won a Business Web Hosting Package supplied by Fused Network.

Fused currently provides hosting for over four thousand websites and serves an average of 60+ million visitors per month. Fused have clients worldwide & over 65 countries represented in their clientbase. Headquartered in Toronto with a support team distributed worldwide allows them to serve 100% of their clients equally no matter the timezone.

The Fused Business packages come with plenty of space to grow a business including 10 Gigabytes of RAID powered storage backed up nightly, and 100 gigabytes of premium transfer monthly. All business packages come with a free dedicated IP & SSL certificate included.

So what now?

For all those reviewers who submitted a review of their web hosting service provider and didn't win, don't fret!

HostJury is now tweaking our 12 days of Christmas giveaway event. For 12 days leading up to ringing in the New Year, HostJury will be giving away lots of prizes. All past reviews are automatically entered for a chance to win along with all eligible reviews submitted prior to the draws. As always, fake, fraud, and invalidated reviews are deleted by HostJury. Hence they will not be eligible!

Tech and Web Hosting Companies wishing to participate in some Shameless Self-Promotion are invited to email:  feedback@hostjury.com

Does your Dot CA website change the world around you?

UK’s managed hosting and cloud computing provider iomart Group plc, better known by its subsidiaries, iomart Hosting, RapidSwitch, Titan Internet, Easyspace and Westcoastcloud announced today that it has acquired Scottish infrastructure service provider EQSN.

The terms of the deal disclosed has iomart acquiring the entire issued share capital of EQSN for a total cash consideration of £2.475m with £2.25m payable at completion and a deferred consideration of up to £225k contingent on the successful integration of the operations of ESQN into the Group.

Based in Glasgow EQSN provides managed hosting solutions to a varied range of clients across all major sectors of industry including: banking & finance, manufacturing, social networking, local & central government, corporate, and the NHS. Its clients include a number of high profile names and quoted companies.

Angus MacSween, CEO of iomart Group plc, said: “We are delighted with this addition to the iomart Group as we continue to drive forward our reputation as a leading provider of secure web hosting and managed services for business. EQSN has an impressive customer base and is a strong strategic and cultural fit for us.”

Alan Lorimer, CEO of EQSN, said: “EQSN is a very successful company in its own right. Becoming part of iomart is a natural next step for us. It means that we can offer our customers even more value through an extended service portfolio and facilities because of iomart’s fully owned, managed and secure datacentre network and its commitment to providing customers with peace of mind.”

EQSN is the third acquisition in less than a year for iomart Group plc. It bought Liverpool domain name and hosting company Switch Media for £1.25m in April 2011 and technical hosting specialist Titan Internet for £4.2m in November 2010.

The press release does not define exactly what constitutes the successful integration of the operations of ESQN into the Group.

Clients of the iomart Group plc, or its subsidiaries, can review their services and be automatically included for a chance to win in HostJury "Happy Holiday" draw on Christmas Day!

The research is complete on the perfect web hosting company and you've inked a deal on a hosting package that delivers the utopian blend of hardware, software, bandwidth, and in the unlikely event  you'll need it... fast tech support. (oh yes you will need it even if you think you won't!)

Next comes installing a content management system eg; wordpress, magento,drupal, using the one click script installer provided by your web hosting company, which always appears to require more than one click. Add content, some website optimization, and a little white hat SEO, and you are now ready to test the server resources denoted in your package limits!

They say if you build it, they will come.

While it is true that offering exceptional goods and services will eventually triumph at the end of the day,  in the saturated internet world of blackhat trickery, link buying, and fake reviews, many will find an uphill battle to reach their market audience. Many more will succumb and fail.

The internet does provide a tool that can only be matched by those with the deepest pockets. The tool is “Viral Marketing”

Viral Marketing

Viral marketing is creating messages that have a high probability of being presented and spread by individuals (and their competitors) in their communications with others over a short period of time, usually though blog post and other forms of social media such as twitter and facebook.

Prince Harry, on a copter training exercise in the US, recently gushed about the delights of Gila Bend's Little Italy Restaurant, where he reportedly enjoyed the Meat Lover's pizza, replete with majestic amounts of bacon, ham, Italian sausage and pepperoni. Viral marketing gurus and animal rights group Peta dispatched a couple of near-naked operatives to Arizona in a bid to lure Prince Harry away from the delights of meat. I'll spare you the picture....

One sure fire way to get some traffic is get a take down notice by offering an alternative form of white meat. The website ThinkGeek got a 12 page take-down notice from the National Pork Board, over a little parody they did on April 1 (April Fools) when some legal types felt using the slogan "The Other White Meat," while advertising Radiant Farms Canned Unicorn (yep... Unicorn) meat may confuse the consumer.

While slightly more costly, online retailer Zappos teamed up with the Massachusetts Department of Transportation to pay tolls on a section of road for a couple of hours complete with signs announcing that Zappos was covering the toll. While not free, it certainly is an inexpensive marketing ploy when executed hours before Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Viral marketing whether by design, by chance or relying on some good old fashion quick witted opportunism, has the ability to drive traffic to your website that can not be understated or denied.

Now how's about the rest of the country, Zappos?

German web hosting provider intergenia AG has been acquired by a private equity fund.  Headquartered in Cologne, Germany, intergenia AG operates the hosting brands PlusServer, serverloft and SERVER4YOU. Oakley Capital Investments announced that it will acquire a 51 percent stake in the web host.

Oakley Capital Investments appears to gravitate to technology with prior  investments in TelecityGroup, HostEurope, and involvement in the sale of managed hosting provider DediPower to Lumison.  intergenia founders and senior management will retain an indirect 49 percent stake in the business post-acquisition.The transaction, which is currently under conditional status, is expected to be completed on December 31.

A report from Canadian researchers at  The Citizen Lab linked several websites belonging to the government of Syria, and the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah to web hosting providers in Canada, the US, and Germany.  Some of the web sites do appear to be a contrevention of existing laws (Canada, US, and Europe) that prohibit firms from conducting any business with.

The Report  names iWeb,  SoftLayer, Vault Networks, HostDime, Strato Hosting,Tiggee LLC, and Giga Hosting as hosting either Syrian government websites, or Hezbollah-associated websites.

HostJury will post responses from the named firms.

iWeb Responds:

Several media outlets have recently published articles based on a report from the Citizen Lab organization.

The report, entitled “The Canadian Connection: An investigation of Syrian government and Hezbullah web hosting in Canada” highlights a very important issue, providing a summary of what has become a complex problem for the web hosting industry.

The Canadian government has enacted regulations that restrict Canadian firms such as iWeb from doing business with certain foreign individuals and entities. iWeb is committed to strict compliance with these laws and continues to monitor its compliance.

In 2008, iWeb inadvertently hosted two websites affiliated with Hezbollah. When iWeb learned of the websites’ affiliation, it canceled its web hosting services.

Canada has enacted targeted sanctions against certain Syrian government entities and individuals. Canada has not enacted a broad embargo against doing business with Syria.

The Citizen lab report identified a number of Syrian government entities for which the internet address resolves directly or indirectly to iWeb. With one exception, none of the listed entities are subject to Canadian sanctions. The exception is Addunia T.V. which was listed as a sanctioned entity on October 3, 2011. iWeb has not provided any services directly to Addunia T.V. and is investigating whether its facilities have been used by one of its customers for the benefit of Addunia T.V. without its knowledge. iWeb will be taking all appropriate steps in light of its findings.

 

Read More

• Web Hosts respond to report of Hezbullah and Syrian Government websites...
• American WebHosts home to Hezbullah and Syrian Government websites

 

Update 

 

The report from Canadian researchers at  The Citizen Lab that linked several websites belonging to the government of Syria, and the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah to web host iWeb also implicated numerous other web hosting providers in the United States and Germany for hosting Syrian government websites.

The Report  names SoftLayer, Vault Networks, HostDime, Strato Hosting,Tiggee LLC, and Giga Hosting as also hosting either Syrian government websites, or Hezbullah-associated websites.

After a 2008 report by the CBC (Canadian Public Television) that websites affiliated with Hezbullah and Hamas were being hosted on iWeb, an initial take down requests was not successful. Once the CBC translated Arabic content on a discussion forum found on one of the sites and contacted iWeb claiming that the content could be considered a violation of Canadian anti-terrorism legislation, the websites were removed. The sites for Al-Manar (almanar.com) and Hamas run Al-Aqsa TV (aqsatv.ps) were both previously hosted on iWeb. In reaction to the CBC story and take down request, iWeb issued a statement that noted “two websites that promote the activities of suspected terrorist organizations had indeed found their way onto iWeb’s infrastructure; however these sites were shut down as soon as this was confirmed”.

Al-Manar’s primary website is still being hosted in North America

Citizen Lab research shows that Al-Manar’s primary website is still being hosted in North America. Almanar.com. is currently hosted in a round robin DNS configuration by three different hosting providers: SoftLayer and Vault Networks in the U.S. and iWeb Technologies in Canada. Al-Manar has an additional domain (almanarnews.net) that is also hosted in round robin DNS configuration on three U.S.-based hosting providers: SoftLayer, Vault Networks and MegaNET.

Hezbullah’s media operations also include a radio station called Al-Nour (al-nour.net/) that broadcasts from Lebanon and offers audio streaming of its live broadcasts. Like Al-Manar, the U.S. includes Al-Nour on its Specially Designated Nationals List. 

The group found that the Al-Nour website is hosted on U.S. web host Tiggee, while the radio stream is hosted by U.S.-based web host, Sago Networks.  They also found additional Hezbullah-associated websites hosted on U.S. web servers.

One example is the website of “Islamic Resistance In Lebanon - Hezbullah” (moqawama.org) --which refers to itself as the “official website of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon” -- is hosted by U.S. web host Tiggeel.

Syrian Government Websites Hosted in the United States and Germany

Department/Agency	Domain Name	Hosting Country	Hosting Provider	IP Address
Ministry of Economy and Trade	www.syrecon.gov.sy	United States	SoftLayer	174.120.51.2
Ministry of Finance	syrianfinance.gov.sy	United States	SoftLayer	70.84.218.92
Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform	moaar.gov.sy	United States	HopOne Global	209.160.33.125
Ministry of Endowment (Religious Affairs)	www.mow.gov.sy	United States	Host Dime	66.7.198.11
General Commission for Competition and Antimonopoly	www.competition.gov.sy	United States	SoftLayer	174.120.51.2
Export Development and Promotion Agency	edpa.gov.sy	United States	Server Central	216.246.46.101
Governorate of Hama Website	www.hama.gov.sy	United States	WeHostWebSites	72.18.131.37
Aleppo Wakf (Endowment) Website	aleppowakf.gov.sy	Germany	Strato Hosting	85.214.127.204
General Syrian Authority for Books	syrbook.gov.sy	Germany	Giga Hosting	193.200.241.24

 

A report from Canadian researchers at  The Citizen Lab states that several websites belonging to the government of Syria, as well as media companies sympathetic to the Syrian government and the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah, are currently being hosted on iWeb servers based in Canada .

According to the report — entitled The Canadian Connection: An investigation of Syrian government and Hezbollah Web hosting in Canada – Websites belonging to the Syrian Ministries of Culture, Transport, Electricity and the Syrian patent office are currently being hosted byiWeb , a Montreal-based company, through a series of intermediary companies, one of which is called “Platinum Incorporated.”

 The report concludes:

   Websites of the Syrian government, including the Ministries of Culture, Transport, and others, are hosted on Canada-based web servers through intermediary companies, one of which, called “Platinum Incorporated,” advertises that it has co-location servers in Canada.

  The Syrian TV station Addounia TV, which is sanctioned by Canada and the European Union for inciting violence against Syrian citizens, uses Canada-based web servers to host its website.

  The website for Al-Manar -- the official media arm of the Lebanese political party,
Hezbullah -- is hosted on Canada- and US-based web servers and employs Canada-based web servers to stream its TV broadcast globally. Al-Manar satellite broadcasts have been banned by the US, France, Spain, and Germany as well as the European Union. The United States includes Al-Manar on its Specially Designated Nationals List, a list of entities with which U.S. persons are generally prohibited from dealing, and the assets of which are blocked. Canada currently classifies Hezbullah as a terrorist organization.

  There are legal questions concerning the provision of web hosting services to each of these organizations. As the Syrian government, Addounia TV, and Hezbullah are all subject to Canadian sanctions, services provided by Canada-based hosting providers to these entities may fall within the scope of the sanctions.

Addounia TV, a Syrian television station which has been sanctioned in the past by both the Canadian government and the European Union for inciting violence against Syrian citizens, is also making use of Canadian Web servers owned by iWeb.

 

Department/Agency	Hostname	Hosting country	Hosting provider	IP Address
Ministry of Culture	www.moc.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
Ministry of Electricity	www.moe.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	209.97.212.140
Ministry of Transport	www.mot.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
Ministry of Electricity (Branch Office)	www.damasreef- elec.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor	molsa.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
Syrian Patent Office (Ministry of Economy & Trade)	www.spo.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	209.172.50.157
Ministry of Irrigation	irrigation.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
The Directorate-General of Antiquities and Museums	www.dgam.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
Public Establishment for Electrical Generation and Transfer (Ministry of Electricity)	peegt.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
City of Homs	homs-city.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Industrial Research & Testing Center	itrc.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	174.142.53.8
City of Deirezzor	deirezzor-city.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Palmyra City	palmyra-city.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Old City of Damascus	www.old- damascus.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Lattakia City	www.latakia-	Canada	iWeb	67.205.85.166
Governorate of Raqqa Website	www.raqqa.gov.sy	Canada	iWeb	184.107.58.236

We will update this post shortly.

 

Many foreigners have been viewing with a cynical eye the soap opera in the U.S. Congress embroiled in a debate over the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) legislation. While many supporters argue it is needed to combat online infringement, the rest of us shake our heads with disdain as the USA spirals into a seemingly bottomless abyss once reserved for banana republics ruled by tyrants and puppet governments of the cold war era.

While far-fetched that the “great firewall of the United States.” will be enacted in its present proposed state, a more plausible scenario will be something slightly less ominous with a slew of politicians slapping themselves on the back arguing we should just pinch our noses and grimace as we swallow like a bitter pill the hard fought compromises that make their way into the final package.

Canada's Michael Geist took a look at the bill from a Canadian perspective and realized that the bill would lead to censorship of Canadian websites as well, as those in many other countries thanks to the ridiculous broad manner by which SOPA sets up its censorship mechanism: (Michael Geist holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and e-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law.)

The U.S. approach is breathtakingly broad, effectively treating millions of websites and IP addresses as “domestic” for U.S. law purposes. The long arm of U.S. law manifests itself in at least five ways in the proposed legislation.

First, it defines a “domestic domain name” as a domain name “that is registered or assigned within a judicial district of the United States.” ...Which means every dot-com, dot-net and dot-org domain is managed by a domain name registry in the U.S., so the law effectively asserts jurisdiction over millions of domain names without regard to where the registrant actually resides.

Then it defines “domestic Internet Protocol addresses” — the IP addresses, as “an Internet Protocol address for which the corresponding Internet Protocol allocation entity is located within a judicial district of the United States.” … ARIN allocates the block of IP addresses used by Canada, its federal and provincial governments, as well as 20 Caribbean nations as domestic!

Third, the bill grants the U.S. in rem jurisdiction over any website that does not have a domestic jurisdictional connection. For those sites, the U.S. grants jurisdiction over the property of the site and opens the door to court orders requiring Internet providers to block the site and Internet search engines to stop linking to it.... well it appears they still know what a court order is.

But, should a website owner wish to challenge the court order, U.S. law asserts itself in a fourth way, since in order for an owner to file a challenge, the owner must first consent to the jurisdiction of the U.S. courts.

Then it makes it a matter of U.S. law to ensure that intellectual property protection is a significant component of U.S. foreign policy and grants more resources to U.S. embassies around the world to increase their involvement in foreign legal reform.

Just what we all need... the U.S lobbying around governments around the world! Seriously... this has got to stop!

If you need just one more reason to dump the dot com dot net domains ... back in July, Verisign announced that effective Jan. 15, 2012, an increase in registry domain name fees for .com and .net, per its agreements with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). 

This Wednesday, Congress is considering a law that gives the US government (and any private corporation) the power to block any website, remove it from search engines, and cut off its sources of funding.

Leading civil liberties and tech policy organizations are organizing an internet-wide day of protest in response, inviting sites to turn their logos black and drive people to contact their members of Congress. It's called American Censorship Day (americancensorship.org and #USACensored on Twitter) and sites can participate by turning their logos black on Wednesday or by running "website blocked" splash pages directing users to contact Congress.

Insiders say that HR 3261 or the "Stop Online Piracy Act" -- which enjoys the support of both parties, the Chamber of Commerce, drug companies, Hollywood, and even several unions -- is likely to pass barring an unprecedented uproar from the public and the tech community. The protest aims to create just that.

(We want as many sites as possible to participate, and we're making it easy for them to do so: If you're interested in taking part, [click here] and email us at protest@fightforthefuture.org)

SOPA is hurtling through Congress because it aligns a number of narrow corporate interests. Hollywood wants the power to shut down entire file hosting sites and sue social media websites into submission. Media companies want the power to block streams of sporting events. Drug companies want the power to block Americans' access to affordable drugs from Canadian pharmacies. The net result? America's Internet could careen away from the principles of freedom and openness it embodies -- and towards the likes of China's, with the government and corporations blocking Americans' access to large swaths of the web.

Its Senate cousin -- the PROTECT IP Act -- has already passed through committee and is awaiting a floor vote. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have asked Congress to kill the legislation, but the interests pushing for it -- the Chamber of Commerce, Hollywood, Big Pharma -- wield indescribable power in Washington.

Says Gigi Sohn of Public Knowledge, "This is a dangerous bill. It is an unwarranted expansion of government power to protect one special interest, the Big Media companies, would give Internet Service Providers a way to evade open Internet rules on the basis of 'protecting' copyright and allow advertisers and Internet registrars carte blanche to close down a site for the vaguest of reasons."

Or, put more simply: "This bill gives Hollywood a chance to kick that pesky Internet off their lawn," said Corynne McSherry, Intellectual Property Director at The Electronic Frontier Foundation.

According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, companies could successfully block a website over just one infringing link posted by any user. It could be a copyright claim, a trademark claim, a patent claim (technology patents are notoriously overbroad) or even or right of publicity claim, with celebrities suing site over the use of a name or photo. If the action is successful, the site is blacklisted: American ISPs can be sued to block users' access, search engines and other sites can be sued to take down links to it, and advertisers and payment processors will be forced to cancel its accounts.

One result of the legislation will be a storm of lawsuits and an extremely hostile legal environment to small startups planning the next Youtube or Twitter.

Websites are currently protected from liability for users' posts, as long as they take down infringing material. Sites like Twitter and Youtube (or indeed almost any site that allows user comments, including this one) owe their existence to these protections. SOPA throws these protections out the window, replacing them with an environment where any social media startup (and its investors) will have to count on hundreds of lawsuits, any one of which could shut down their site.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) is calling it "the end of the Internet" -- and that's barely an exaggeration. The sites we use and love the most are the ones most at risk, and the basic principle of open access is under attack.

If you have a website of your own, you can get everything you need to participate at americancensorship.org -- just paste a snippet of code in your site. If you work in tech, try to get your own company to participate and spread the word to friends. This bill is an assault on internet freedom and a direct threat to the livelihood of tech entrepreneurs and anyone who works in tech. And the crazy part? Most don't even know about it.

For more information on how to participate, write us at: protest@americancensorship.org or visit AmericanCensorship.org

Author Salman Rushdie has won the battle with Facebook over what to call himself on his profile page on the social network. The dispute with Facebook began after he asked to be allowed to use his middle name Salman - the name that has made him infamous around the world.

But Facebook, which has strict real name policies, had insisted on Ahmed - the novelist's first name. Mr Rushdie says Facebook "buckled" after he began tweeting the ordeal on Twitter.

@SalmanRushdie "Victory! #Facebook has buckled! I'm Salman Rushdie again. I feel SO much better. An identity crisis at my age is no fun. Thank you Twitter!"

"Just received an apology from The #Facebook Team. All is sweetness and light."

'Twitterverse ridicule'

Mr Rushdie, aged 64, told about his run-in with Facebook in a series of tweets. He says the social site even deactivated his account over the weekend "saying they didn't believe I was me". Mr Rushdie that he had to send a photo of his passport to Facebook, which led to the reactivation of his account - but only as "Ahmed Rushdie".

Angered by this, Mr Rushdie then decided to turn to what he described as "ridicule by the Twitterverse" about the row.

"Dear #Facebook, forcing me to change my FB name from Salman to Ahmed Rushdie is like forcing J. Edgar to become John Hoover.

"Or, if F. Scott Fitzgerald was on #Facebook, would they force him to be Francis Fitzgerald? What about F. Murray Abraham?" he tweeted.

A number of Mr Rushdie's followers retweeted his posts and shortly afterwards Facebook changed his account to Salman Rushdie.

Mr Rushdie lived in hiding under police protection for many years after the fatwa issued in 1989 against him by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini over his novel The Satanic Verses.

It was regarded as blasphemous by many Muslims, who protested by burning the book in public.

 

An open letter to our customers, past and future

You’ve no doubt heard about patent battles in the world of software. Companies such as Nokia, Apple, and Microsoft use their incredibly large patent portfolios against each other in a multitude of ways. Often defensively, sometimes offensively. While there are many patents for truly inventive things, there are also a great number that are for things that already exist. Patents are a good idea that have been appropriated over the decades as a corporate tool for establishing limits to competition, no matter if the ideas described by those patents are truly inventive. Furthermore, this kind of use of patents isn’t just limited to the world of computing.

We’ve been aware for quite some time that one of our competitors applied for a patent relating to camera slings in 2007. Their patent application contained dozens of claims that centered around two primary concepts. One of these concepts—that of using a sliding connection to connect a camera to a sling—applied to our product line. We did our research, consulted our lawyers, and found more than enough prior art related to this concept.

That prior art starts with the US 1885 Carbine Sling, which clearly features an attachment that slides along a leather strap and connects to the rifle with a hook. It goes onto Leica’s 1938 TROOV wrist strap which connects to a tripod-based connection with a hook assembly that would slide freely if not for the way that the strap was constructed. Leica went on to develop a neck strap with sliding screw mounts that seems to have first appeared in their catalog in 1969*. Many other makers—especially in the specialty Leica marketplace—developed these variants further. For example, thanks to the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine, we know that leicagoodies.com was selling their version of this concept in 2005. One look at the photo on that page of a product made of a keyring, hook, and webbing tells the story.

In short, the idea of a sliding camera sling isn’t an amazing new invention. It’s just a really good idea that’s been around for a while and which has been iteratively developed. Neither we nor our lawyers believed that the USPTO would grant a patent for the claims related to this concept. It was a surprise, then, when our competitor was granted a patent covering the concept on November 1st, 2011. To say that we’re disappointed that the USPTO couldn’t find the prior art around the idea is an understatement.

Our disappointment doesn’t matter much in the scheme of things, however. Our competitor now has a legal tool and we’re pretty sure that they desire to use it. This is, as they say, a problem. We and our counsel are more than confident that we can defend ourselves, and will do so vigorously if necessary. On the other hand, we’re a very small company that sells our products in limited volumes and mounting such a defense would consume the majority of our resources. After all, it took three years to rescind a patent about a method of using a swing. In other words, we have a Hobson’s choice on our hands. We could very well lose everything even if we won.

Therefore, we’re acting unilaterally and conceding the market by immediately discontinuing the Loop and LoopIt. Full stop. We apologize for the sudden nature of this decision and our implementation of it, but we feel like our options on this matter are limited.

This isn’t the end of Luma Labs LLC, however. 

We’ve been working on an interesting new camera strap concept for the last six months. It’s nearing completion and we were planning on introducing it soon as a companion to our existing product line. Now, it will be our primary product. We’re planning to bring it to market in December, the month we’ve traditionally introduced new products. Furthermore, we’ll continue to support our existing customers. Our accessories, including the PodMount, will become available for sale again soon as we take this opportunity to retool and reinvent ourselves. And, we will continue to implement all of our current service and support policies.

It’s a bet the company moment. It’s not without risks. Big risks. But looking at all the alternatives, we’ll take it.

—Duncan and Greg

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) wants to help users control how their personal data is managed by designing controls to shield personal data and reveal when sites do not honor privacy requests. "Users have the feeling they are being being tracked and some users have privacy concerns and would like to solve them," said Dr Matthias Schunter from IBM who chairs the W3C group drawing up the Do Not Track technologies.

Co-ordination

The working group is defining software specifications that will:
-let browser settings tell websites to do less tracking
-let websites acknowledge privacy requests
-define best practices for sites so they can comply with different privacy needs

Dr Schunter said the specifications aim to end the current situation in which different browser makers adopt incompatible Do Not Track systems. "Currently websites need to implement all these different protocols. There's no standard way to respect privacy preferences, and we want to standardize all these protocols so they talk the same language and then tell websites what to do with them," said Dr Schunter.

The tools resulting from the W3C work would aim to be "privacy friendly" and surrender as little information as possible, he added.

Users could be warned about sites that do not do a good job of respecting requests to keep information private. While the W3C cannot insist that sites and software vendors follow its lead , it wants users, browser makers and businesses to help finish and implement the specifications by adopting the technologies.

More than 15 firms and organizations are involved in the Do Not Track work including Adobe, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Stanford University. The goals and best practices are expected to be implemented by browser makers first in mid-2012 with websites hopefully following soon after.

Warburg Pincus and GS Capital Partners (private equity arm of Goldman Sachs) announced that they have reached an agreement to acquire a majority stake in web hosting provider Endurance International Group, from Accel-KKR.   Endurance's current management team and Accel-KKR will continue to maintain an interest in the Company.  Terms of the transaction were not disclosed in the press release but Reuters is reporting that "a person" familiar with the matter said the firm, Endurance International Group, would change hands for about $1 billion, or 7.5 times forward earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization.

While the press release doesn't specifically mention Endurance International recent acquisition of Canadian web host Netfirms, GS Capital Partners' Managing Director, Joe DiSabato does state "Endurance is extremely well positioned as a leader in its rapidly growing yet fragmented market, and we look forward to working with the Company, Warburg Pincus and Accel-KKR in the next stage of building this enterprise."

While it is open to speculation exactly what that statement confers, negative reviews from Netfirms clients have positioned Netfirms next to last on HostJury's Reviewed Host List.  But the good folks at Warburg Pincus and GS Capital Partners never paid that kind of cash for a fragmented market and  the recently acquired Canadian web host Netfirms.   There's are numerous other companies and hosting brands out there actually owned by the same folks at Endurance International Group including the now infamous iPowerWeb.

AccountSupport
BizLand
BizHostNet
BlueDomino
BlueHost
Choopa
Dot5 (Dot5 Hosting)
DomainHost
EasyCGI
eHost
EntryHost
FatCow
FreeYellow
HostCentric
HostClear
HostYourSite
HyperMart
ImOutDoors
iPowerWeb (iPower)
iPage
JustHost
NetWorksHosting
PowWeb
PureHost
ReadyHost
Startlogic
ServerBeach
USAnetHosting
VirtualAve
Xeran

Did I miss any?  

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The Advertising Standards Authority has been asked to reopen an investigation into Microsoft's claims of 99.9 per cent uptime for its cloud services. The ASA was asked by a Microsoft customer to probe Microsoft's uptime claims after numerous outages of the Business Productivity Online Suite and Office 365 earlier this year.

The Reg is reporting that according to a letter from the ASA, Microsoft told the regulatory body that it had "omitted" the word "guarantee" in error and had amended the ads, making it clear that the uptime promise was linked to an appropriate service-level agreement (SLA) that justified the claims.

"Because Microsoft has already assured us that the advertising complained about has been amended, we consider there is little to be gained from continuing with a formal investigation," the ASA wrote.

In certain circumstances, advertisers or complainants can request a review of the ASA Council’s adjudication, including a Council decision not to investigate a complaint after its deliberation.

Both sides have 21 days to ask the Independent Reviewer of ASA Adjudications to review the case.  But they must be able to establish that a substantial flaw of process or adjudication is apparent, or show that additional relevant evidence is available.

The customer said that he was returning to ASA to ask it to revisit the complaint. "The ASA completely got the wrong end of the stick and thought I was complaining about the word 'guarantee'," he told El Reg.

"I have to pen a new complaint being specific about Microsoft not meeting their advertised SLA rather than stressing the 'guarantee' issue, which is important of itself, but only as a remedy," he added.

A search of the Advertising Standards Authority website reveals no information regarding the original complaint, nor the appeal.

 

A story originating with The Birmingham News and spreading its tentacles across the web has Go-Daddy agreeing to abide by a permanent injunction barring it from hosting Internet sites which publish information stolen from the Jefferson County Sheriff's computer system.

While it seems like a noble gesture on Go-Daddy's part, it appears somewhat disingenuous as GoDaddy does not appear to host the domain in question!

The injunction was granted by Jefferson County Circuit Judge Helen Shores Lee, after Jefferson County Sheriff Mike Hale filed a request for such a court order barring GoDaddy Group from hosting sites with stolen information about the county's law enforcement arm.

It appears that's someone hacked into sheriff's department computers and stole personal and professional information about deputies and civilian employees. The information was then posted on a site called Pastebin.com, which is a site used by Web aficionados to share snippets of text or computer code. In 2009, someone posted 20,000 stolen Hotmail passwords on the Pastebin.com site.

GoDaddy said it is cooperating with Jefferson County and works hard to clamp down on abuses.

From pastebin.com
Pastebin.com website hosting report. A DNS lookup shows that Pastebin.com links to IP address 184.154.125.14 which is geographically located in Chicago, United States. The coordinates of this location are latitude -87.644100 & longitude 41.882500.

"Pastebin.com is hosted at SingleHop"

Great detective work Sherlock Holmes!

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I  received an email earlier today that boldly announced:

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