Site problems
Posted by Kathleen Fasanella on Oct 25, 2006 at 12:53 pm / Admin / Trackback
[post amended, 10/26/06 8:40 am MST]
It would appear that the system is restored, having been moved onto another server without conflicts. Hurrah! Accordingly, comments are no longer moderated (unless you include a hyperlink or your web address) so feel free to post. I also notice the load on this server is much lower than the last one so the site should run faster too. All in all, very good news. I expect to return to a regular posting schedule this afternoon. I’d start sooner but Ida comes to help me on Thursday mornings. See you later.
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Some of you may have noticed that all comments are moderated since yesterday and I apologize for that. Previously, only comments that included a hyperlink (including to that of your own website) were moderated. The reason I’m having to moderate is that for some reason, my spam plugins disappeared from my installation and the site was vulnerable to massive spamming; over 500 a day now. My host has been unable to resolve the issue and it would seem that other sites are far more adversely affected so I’m grateful we’re still up and running, albeit sluggishly. The recommended solution is to move the site onto another server. Therefore, I would not be surprised if the site went down for a bit in order to affect the transfer. Be patient in the meantime. If you experience anything truly untoward, email me. For my part, I will probably hold off on posting and approving comments until the transfer has been completed. I’ll keep you posted.
[Amended 5:30 PM MST]
Well, nothing’s happened yet. I feel like a dope, twiddling my thumbs waiting for something to happen before I can move forward. In the meantime, I was reading Paul Graham today. He’s so on target, in The 18 mistakes that kill start ups, his introduction reads:
In the Q & A period after a recent talk, someone asked what made startups fail. After standing there gaping for a few seconds I realized this was kind of a trick question. It’s equivalent to asking how to make a startup succeed-if you avoid every cause of failure, you succeed-and that’s too big a question to answer on the fly.
Afterwards I realized it could be helpful to look at the problem from this direction. If you have a list of all the things you shouldn’t do, you can turn that into a recipe for succeeding just by negating. And this form of list may be more useful in practice. It’s easier to catch yourself doing something you shouldn’t than always to remember to do something you should. [1]
In a sense there’s just one mistake that kills startups: not making something users want. If you make something users want, you’ll probably be fine, whatever else you do or don’t do. And if you don’t make something users want, then you’re dead, whatever else you do or don’t do. So really this is a list of 18 things that cause startups not to make something users want. Nearly all failure funnels through that.
I know exactly what he’s saying. I get this all the time too. Maybe you could read Paul Graham today too.
