Speed of photo.net

Over the past few days I have noticed from both my home and office

computers serious speed related problems when trying to get onto

everything from the main page to even rating the photos of others.

At times it has taken over one minute for the page to load... It's

not a connection issue but looks to be more of a database problem as

it takes a long time to find what it is looking for and then all of a

sudden "pops" open.

 

Any thoughts???

 

Thanks,

Norman Perkel

No idea why, but I can confirm the same behavior slow on minute, fine the next. It has been so bad that at times I can't even connect to photo.net and then the next minute it will be fine for hours.

I think it would be a big help to PN if more users would become paying members, that way PN would be able to upgrade the site.

Don't underestimate PN earnings. :) as good as their "donate to become a member" sounds, it is notheing more then a business, hence the banner from google on top. :) They make it out, and I'm sure there are plenty letovers too! lol

..oh, and not to mention the links to buy cameras after each review :) man! ...come to think of it, they make a good, really gooooooooood living. Being in the same industry I can tell ya that for sure! :)

When the response time is glitchy like that, recently this has been because of robots. We are getting hit by them quite a bit, and some of them are not very well-behaved.

 

As for the comments about how photo.net is rolling in dough: as I've said before, the site is run by one full-time person (me), and a couple of others who are paid to work part-time. In the last two years the site has gone from paying no salary to me at all, to an amount that was laughable, to an amount that I can justify to my wife, although far short of what I was getting before. (However it has its compensations, such as being able to work at home, which is a major plus.) But nobody is getting rich from it, and it is a lot of work, not to mention that I have to be watching the site more or less 7x24.

 

Subscriptions are increasingly important for the site. The advertising pays the ISP and bandwidth charges, and everything else including most of the salaries, new hardware, etc, comes from subscriptions these days.

:) I hear ya. Don't get me the wrong way. :)

<br>

<br>

It is just seems to me a little more then you say. ;) With the ammount of the traffic your site is getting and the trust people have in your business (if I may call it so :) ) you should be getting along more that just fine. Are selling any cameras of the reviews? .... at the end of each review, you list places where the camera can be purchased, the links ofcourse include your affiliate ID. If you not selling enought cameras thru that... wow..... then you are in trouble! lol there are a LOT of people reading these reviews, I would amagine some good income there. Plus the google banner, hmm....probobally adds some pennies, :) oh and the subscribtion. Are sure you making the right choise with your hosting company??? .... how much they are actually charge you? ....they gotta be overcharging you, if you saying you make just enough. If you ask me, you have to reevaluate everything this site does, as far as marketing.... you caould be much better off! Sorry for the personal questions and "counting someone elses money" , it is a proffesional desiese with me lol didn't mean to come across as something bad. :) <br>

<br>

Thanks for your time.

.....oh, and if I could be of any assistance, I'm certainly willing! :)

Ummm, just wanna say it happens to me to alot. The connection thing I mean, you know listed at the top. ;)

Alon, a site like this doesn't just run on $69/month box from 1and1.com... You need multiple boxes to start with to handle the load, reliable ones at that with big storage for all these images. Then you need equipment to balance the load acros these servers, backups, etc, etc. The only reason places like 1and1.com can offer low prices is because every customer gets the same; they sell a comodity. Photo.net is too complex for someone to offer a "standard" package and you have to roll your own, hence the higher price tag.

 

I am sure photo.net could be run a little cheaper if some different design decisions had been made in the past, but even then Brian wouldn't have thousands extra each month.

Bas, lol sorry, but you maid me lough for a second there! lol when did I reffer ti 1and1.com or a $69 a month hosting?!?! lol I do this for a living and I should be the last person you explain how hosting or wesites work! sorry, not trying to offend you. :) I run websited for living and have a VERY good idea of how things work or should work. I'm sure the hosting is well above $69, but it doesn't have to be thousands or even hundreds either. You could get a good dedicated server for around $250 a month + the backup another $250, pay upfront and get the whole package for around $400 or so a month. <br> <br> now, that's $4800 a year, ok, lets round it up to 10k ok? <br> <br> Now lets see the income: <br> subscribtion: a couple of thousand subscibtions a year will bring - 25x$2000=50k right? ...that should cover all the hosting costs? :) <br> <br> Now for the real earnings: <br> Sale of cameras of the review pages - who knows, but I speculate a LOT. <br> <br> Advertasing space - that banner you see on every page on top, if you know how that works and how many views photo.net get, you should realize = $$$ <br> <br> There probobally more ways of income here, I would need to look closer :)<br> <br> All I'm saying is that treating photo.net as a charity or a support needed site - is not right. I got to give it to the owner! Way to go man! Seriorusly! :) You got something big here and with effort, you could eat your competition alive and then go ahead and sell the site to microsoft and retire! lol sounds like a plan? lol Don't mind me, I'm in the taking mood today, kinda bored in the office. :) <br> Thanks for your time!

BTW - didn't try to offed the site or anyone, please do not take it the wrong way, photo.net is a great community! I'm exited to be a part!

I'd love to see how you would run a million or two complex dynamic pages a day, with 200GB of photo storage, 10s of millions of posts, comments and ratings and transfering several hundred gigs a month (my estimates from the 2003 statistics) on a single $250/month dedicated server.

 

Sure you are playing in the same league as photo.net with the websites you run for a living?

Alon, the equipment to run photo.net requires two full standard cabinets (although the second one is mostly empty) The bandwidth is most of a T3. It costs a lot more than $4K per year. It is close to that per month.

<i>I run websited for living and have a VERY good idea of how things work or should work. </i><br><br>Hahahahahaa!

I don't see a problem. So, once in a while its glitchy. Compared to how it was working before, I think its fantastic!

<i>...who knows, but I speculate a LOT.</i>

<p>

Yeah, that's becoming pretty obvious.

I got to admin, my projects are usually smaller, but even thou, 4k a month for hosting of one full box one half empty....hm..... I bet you can save some money here. Will have to do more research..... oh you right, didn't take the T3 in to consideration..hhmmm... ok, I will rethink it and come back..... lol ... :) give some time, oh, and if possible the specs of the box for photo.net. thanks!

Thanks to the Administration,

 

Whatever the costs are, for the price of a simple membership at $25.00, Photo.net is one of the biggest bargains I can think of. I think that Brian deserves special praise for the good job he's done and the (sometimes) abuse he takes.

 

Aside from the occasional glitch (and he's explained this glitch very well), the site runs pretty wonderfully these days, and Adminstration is no longer getting overburdened by complaints and arguments from raters with hurt feelings (they now have to keep them to themselves and look at their photos more closely -- as I always have done mine).

 

(By The Way, Brian, my money's waiting -- together with return receipt request -- in PN's P.O. Box whenever anyone gets to opening it, but if it waits too long, the postal service will send it back once again -- but one $25.00 money order just disappeared already completely into thin air. I'd truly LIKE to be a member and haven't received delivery confirmation yet, and I'll keep waiting.)

 

As to critiquing PN by making accusations that it makes too much money or should be by first making the assetion, then putting PN on the defensive, making it look like an overrich piker if it doesn't give an explanation back, I think anyone inquiring should first ask the questions, get the answers, and then make the assertion(s).

 

That's probably the only fair way to do that. The other way strikes me as not 'fair play', and 'shooting from the hip', and if someone did that to me, I'd be pretty unhappy, as I'm sure Brian's wife probably heard he is (privately).

 

Brian, it's not a thankless job -- there are many of us who day by day give much thank to the work you have done, and we don't write letters of praise, but we come back daily (and sometimes hourly), to get our 'fix'.

 

And our photos and our recommendations send new 'browsers', 'members' and 'contributors', each of whom is a potential purchaser of one of your advertisers' cameras and lenses and frankly I have no problem with your providing me this wonderful place to display my work in exchange for your advertisers using it to sell their wares -- in fact, please thank your advertisers for helping bring some joy into my life.

 

And I've had discussions in person and by e-mail with other members and contributors who feel the same way, so this is not just one person's opinion. Could this or that be done better? Probably, but so what? It works pretty well, and thank you for providing a wonderful service.

 

John (Crosley)

I've not had a problem accessing PN from home or at work. The speed has been fine.

I really think it unfair to cheap shot the adminitration about "salary", especially from non-subscribers. Answer is simple. If one doesn't like the site's performance, there are other sites to choose from. Guarantee you will return here.

interesting how many folks out there become instant experts on websites......

Well, its relatively easy to set up a web site that gets a few hundred or even a couple of thousand of hits per day. The problem is when people think they then know what is involved in running a site that has hundreds of thousands of visitors per day, 15 to 20 million hits, and chews up a couple of racks of servers and most of a T3 connection. Quite a different league. And photo.net isn't even in the majors. We 'd have to grow by another order of magnitude to understand those problems.

Mr. Mottershead, I rise to second the honorable Mr. Crosley's remarks, wholeheartedly.

Photo.Net and National Public Radio (in the USA, where I am) are the best value I ever get

for my money. Thank you, Brian, and please pass my thanks on to your understanding

wife, and your accomplices. I propose that, when access seems slower than usual, we

should

think of it as a brief membership pledge drive, during which we should reflect on our

membership status and think a kindly thought or two towards those who bring us so much

for so little. I now yield the floor.

Photo.net is getting attacked by robots? I read the Times every single day and haven't heard anything like that. Robot attacks should be front-page news, dammit!

 

Hang in there, staff.

Subscriptions are way to cheap - even with all the bitching. Immediately this site should

raise the annual fee to $35.00 - or even $50.00. A n d NOT let non-subscribers have so

many privileges. So what if we don't all get it exactly the way we want it? I know I don't.

That's life. Make the best of a good thing and have fun with it. Just reading the forums is

worth $50.00 a year! JVK