Today, we’re excited about launching The Planet’s Ready-To-Go servers. These are servers that we can provision and activate for customers in under an hour.

We’re able to commit to such fast delivery times in part because we limit the customizations, but mostly because we keep servers pre-provisioned in the HOPPER. Believe it or not, this stands for Hardware Object Pre-ProvisionER. This is a specialized function of our Auto-Provisioning system which essentially matches orders for servers to our available inventory of servers.

Once we’ve picked the configurations for the HOPPER — and for now we’re sticking with just three of our more popular configurations — the HOPPER is kept full. What this essentially boils down to is that the HOPPER takes servers and pre-installs the OS (RedHat) and the control panel (cPanel). Once that’s done, the Web site is ready to start taking customer orders. When the HOPPER runs low, we simply “refill” it. It really is just that simple.

The Planet’s goal is to add additional server configurations into the Ready-To-Go family. Which is why you’ll find that we’re not charging extra for these servers.

However, for now, we just need to figure out how we prioritize which servers should be brought into the Ready-To-Go family next. I’d love to hear your suggestions.

Happy instant gratification …

- Urvish

At the beginning of this week, The Planet sent a gaggle of sales and marketing folks (and an iPod) to the Windy City for HostingCon 2007. Having never been to Chicago, I jumped at this opportunity to get a slice of deep dish pizza and meet with some of the other players in this wild world of web hosting.

Little did I know that I would be walking into a maze of buzz words, tchotchkes, and salespeople eager to explain why their product was the most innovative, dynamic, and usable development to hit the hosting market since email.

I don’t want to use this post to brag about the assortment of toys that will be cluttering up my desk for the next month or two, and I am in no position to speculate on whether or not a new server-kicking robot will be the solution to all server-related problems in the future, but I can break down a few of the buzz words that have been creeping around the industry for a little while: Service Empowerment, Grid Computing, Software As A Service (SaaS), Virtualization. I am a technically literate guy with a few years of experience in the hosting realm, but I had to stop and scratch my head about what some of these terms meant (assuming that they actually mean something).

Service Empowerment

On Tuesday morning, a keynote panel was scheduled to discuss Service Empowerment, but that discussion quickly led into a Grid Computing, Virtualization, and Software as a Service debates. The panelists unanimously shrugged at the title topic and admitted to searching for the term in preparation for the discussion. This buzz term has not built much steam (yet?), so by nipping the potential confusion in the bud, I’ll keep you from furrowing your brows and running to “The Google” in the future … it’s all about usability.

While “usability” has gotten more than its fair share of buzz in the past few years, it has gained such a broad understanding that its vernacular definition perfectly defines Service Empowerment: Allowing your customer to use your service easily and intuitively. If I offered you a petabyte of storage and an account that allows you to upload a megabyte of storage per day, I am not empowering you to use the service I am selling you. That example may seem silly, but it is a clear-cut way of thinking about the issue.

Grid Computing

The Planet’s very own Bryce Edwards explained the basics of clusters and Grid Computing about a month and a half ago, but I hope that you will accept my toonie on the topic (because two Canadian dollars are worth just a bit more than two cents here in the US).

In theory, grid computing allows for high availability across a group of servers and failover in the event of hardware failure. Imagine that your single server’s resources are water in a water glass. If your site or service has an influx in traffic or usage, the glass fills up. If the water reaches the top of the glass, your server is operating at 100%. But what happens when one more person comes to your site or uses your service?

In a true grid computing setup, you will have a group of servers functioning as one. Grid computing would be illustrated in our example by placing several other drinking glasses next to yours. One glass takes some parts of the water, the other glasses around it take other parts of the water. The glasses will not fill up nearly as quickly because the water is spread among them, and if necessary, more glasses can be added. Putting it back into server terms, your server will share the work with as many other servers as are necessary to provide the same seamless service for your users/customers as one user/customer accessing one machine. In this setup, because no single server is shouldering the entire processing load, individual servers in the grid can be replaced without service interruption.

Currently, grid computing is in its infancy, but as we see operating systems and software developed to fully realize its potential, this technology could gain a whole lot of momentum.

Software as a Service (SaaS)

A large compounding factor in understanding Software as a Service is understanding the idea of “advanced” or “managed” services. An advanced service, in the IT infrastructure sense, is a hands-on hosting solution. Whether you order an advanced service to monitor the loads on your server or seek software-specific service and support, you are essentially paying for additional features from your hosting provider. The idea of “Software as a Service” is a hands-on hosting solution that provides you specific software service and support.

The biggest player associated with this buzz term is Microsoft Exchange. Exchange is the most widely recognized enterprise email solution on the market, and when businesses seek Exchange hosting, they are actually ordering Microsoft Exchange’s software as a service from their hosting provider. Rather than starting with a blank slate, ordering Software as a Service sets up your account to be immediately usable in a particular way.

If all of that isn’t confusing enough, I’ve got one more gem for you: If you have ever ordered Web hosting, you have likely ordered software as a service. The control panel that you are given with a new hosting account is the software you are given to control the tangible server resources you ordered! Because everyone has spoken so generally about “Software as a Service” recently, I’m not surprised to see blank stares around the room when someone mentions it.

Virtualization

Virtualization is a very broad term in the IT infrastructure environment, so I do not have an easy task in trying to define it. Essentially, virtualization is the process of fooling software about hardware resources. In one case, virtualization can break down a single server into multiple similar and independent instances (a la Virtual Private Servers), and in another case, it can combine multiple servers together to appear as one single server (a la Grid Computing). The process of virtualization separates hardware and software layers working together in order to more efficiently manage resources and scale.

As soon as the virtualization concept is fleshed out a little more and developed, it will lead to a different IT infrastructure perspective. As one of the keynote panelists at HostingCon explained, “It will allow us to get away from looking at boxes (servers) as containers.”

I know, I know … this picture doesn’t have anything to do with Virtualization, Software as a Service, Grid Computing, or Service Empowerment, but I was going to get in trouble if I didn’t include it.

Before I get into the meat of this entry, I feel it is necessary to address the comment made by my esteemed friend and colleague Thanh Tran, general manager of our Houston operations. In his blog entry earlier this month, Thanh mentioned “I work with a bunch of geeks. But that’s ok, because I’m a geek myself.”

I feel that this might have been a light-hearted jab at my previous entry, which I will readily admit was steeped in a healthy dose of science geekery.

Now, Thanh says that he too is a “geek.” For the record, I would like to point out that keeping a MS Paint-drawn Buzz Lightyear image file archived on a hard drive somewhere for nearly ten years pretty much seals the deal on one’s level of geekishness.

Thanh, I don’t think you had to tell us you are a geek; consider it self-evidenced. Just kidding around, of course …

All kidding aside, I’ve been looking forward to this blog entry, because I wanted to take a moment to acquaint everyone with just a few of the many outstanding data center technicians that our customers have probably worked with in the past. The next time you are reading a support ticket, check the usernames of the employees working the issue with you, and see if you recognize any of these excellent technicians.

For example, Jac has been with The Planet for more than two years, and is currently a Level 2 data center technician. A few days ago I was reading a recent ticket that he was working on for a customer who was suffering from a bit of “new server syndrome.” That’s the critical window of time after someone orders a new server that we have all experienced at one time or another. The customer was hard at work attempting to get his configurations in place so the server could be usable for his business, but he was running into some pretty wicked permission errors that he simply could not deduce.

Jac responded to the customer’s questions quickly and effectively, adjusting the settings to address the issues. He then went above and beyond expectations, providing the customer with some very detailed documentation related to these permission configuration issues. The problem was wholly solved, and the customer was quite happy. But more importantly, the customer was enabled to address his server needs more quickly in the future as well. It’s all about responding to business needs precisely and rapidly, and Jac Lindley does an excellent job of helping our customers achieve just that.

Another Level 2 data center technician I wanted to “introduce” is Johnny L., who has been with The Planet for almost three years, and in that time he has proven to be a strong anchor of knowledge in our data centers. Johnny is a whiz when it comes to server hardware; I’ve seen him swap out bad drives and start degraded array rebuilds so quickly it would make your head spin.

The pace of work in our data centers can be dizzying at times, and seeing guys like Johnny work can be awe-inspiring. But in the midst of all this activity, the thing that makes a guy like Johnny stand out is his attention to detail. Anyone can whip through a dozen unique hardware upgrades in record time, but not many can do it with the level of accuracy and care that Johnny displays.

I’m proud of all the technicians we have working in the data centers, but I thought to would be great to introduce a couple of our techs to everyone. Keep an eye out for them in a support ticket coming to an Orbit portal near you!

- Britt

Sometimes it’s hard to remember that little more than a year ago, and for the four years prior, I worked in sales for a company called EV1Servers. The news that our happy little family was being sold to a private equity firm came as shock to say the least, but the real surprise was when rumors started to surface that this private equity firm had also purchased The Planet, our largest competitor and arch nemesis.

Few entities in history have been as fiercely competitive and fearful of the other as our two organizations. Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, Lex Luthor and Superman and Khan Noonien Singh and Captain Kirk are a few examples that come close, but still don’t quite capture the essence that was the rivalry between The Planet and EV1Servers.

We had several proud and storied traditions, one of which was the Sumofan, a big plastic sumo wrestler holding a foam desktop fan. Aaron Conklin, whose blog appeared on Tuesday, had acquired him at a white elephant gift exchange and he became a trophy, bestowed upon the person who had given the last good burn (the term “burn” in this instance refers to “insult”). As the last person to give the other a good burn – although I can’t for the life of me remember what it was – the Sumofan has been in my exclusive possession since I moved from the call center to the corporate office late last year.

When our merger was made official and our two sales teams joined forces, we identified a commonality very quickly. On a visit to Dallas, Aaron spotted a Sumofan on the desk of another sales executive Jeff Reinis. Turns out our Dallas Sales team used him as sort of an anti-trophy, he was the Sumofan of Shame. He was the albatross around the neck of the last salesperson to lose a deal. This striking similarity was really groundbreaking for us and our relationship with Dallas, and we now had cultural ambassadors, Houston Sumofan and Dallas Sumofan, to bring us even further toward our goal of absolute mutual understanding.

When we had our first company-wide corporate meeting in Crockett, Texas, this past April, Jeff brought his Sumofan and I brought mine. We traded, allowing our Sumofans to travel and experience life at the other offices. Dallas Sumofan seems to be enjoying his time at the corporate office, and he’s always good for keeping things cool.

I haven’t gotten any calls from Houston Sumofan begging to come back home so I can only assume things are going alright for him as well. At the next company-wide meeting we will exchange them again, and so on, until the end of time.

- Brooke

I’m Kevin, and I’m the “new guy” at The Planet with the peculiar “Web Hosting Evangelist” job title. This customer evangelist role is a new one at our company, so it’s likely to change a bit as I jump into the job. I can give you a quick run-down of what I’ll be doing, and you can decide if you want to create a “Kevin Hazard Is Amazing Fan Club” or just not read my blog posts. As Chevy Chase explains in Caddyshack, “In one physical model of the universe, the shortest distance between two points is a straight line … in the opposite direction,” so the best way to approach “what” I will be doing is to back into it from the other direction: Why am I doing it?

The “Why”

As you probably know if you have read any press releases, articles, or interviews about/by anyone The Planet,

“The Planet is the leading provider of On Demand IT Infrastructure solutions, hosting more than 22,000 small- and medium-size businesses and 2.8 million Web sites worldwide. By offering the best choice of servers, software tools and world-class support, backed by state-of-the-art facilities and unmatched network connectivity, The Planet helps turn information technology into a powerful competitive advantage that enables customers to successfully grow their businesses.”

While that description accurately and succinctly summarizes a great deal of information about our company, it doesn’t tell much about “who” the company is, and it is certainly not blog fodder. I was hired by The Planet to use a bit of my uncanny wit and debonair charm to provide a little more “corporate transparency” for you. We are not reinventing the wheel by having a blog, but it is one of the “best practices” for beginning the move toward transparency on the large scale.

My goal is to provide a bit more insight into The Planet’s day-to-day business. I may snap some pictures of day-to-day life around the office or interview (read: question mercilessly) some unknowing Planet employee. Do a quick search for “company evangelist” or “corporate evangelist,” and more often than not, you’ll see the word “listen” at least a dozen times. In a word, I’ll be a “listener,” proactively maintaining great communication in the provider-customer relationship.

The “What”

1. Improve the User Experience.
2. Refer to Responsibility #1
3. Refer to Responsibility #1

Those extensive responsibilities are fairly broad and quite general, but entirely accurate. In addition to making some magic happen here through our blog, I will work with our Web development team to improve the user experience on our corporate site and in our order process, from your first click to your server’s provisioning … and even through the “eternal life” of your account (sorry, a little “evangelist” humor). We’ve already got a solid plan of attack to begin some of these experience improvements, and we will tap the advice of you, our customer (or prospective customer, wink-wink) to ensure we continue on the right track to provide the best hosting experience in the industry.

I have already seen a few blog content suggestions in the comment sections of other posts, but if you have any other content requests, drop them in a comment on this post or send me an email at khazard (at) theplanet (dot) com.

- Kevin

I was reading Thanh Tran’s blog post the other night and I realized that I had the other side of that story to tell. I joined Everyone’s Internet in 2001, as the original RAQ 4i servers were just starting to be deployed and most data centers were demanding a huge setup fee to go along with a monthly service charge of $600 or more. At the time, our core business was providing dial-up internet access and this “new hosting thing” was an experiment that the owners had decided to try out.

Our support started out with a focus on control panel guidance (who here remembers the Cobalt web interface?) and reboots (offered within 24 hours, when our sysadmin, Patrick Smith, would drive from the call center to the collocation facility and process a batch of requests). At the time, my primary job responsibility was to visit customer Web sites and make sure they did not contain any adult content, which they often did when you got beyond the home page. How’s that for a job description?

Things went along at a moderate pace until two things changed at roughly the same time. First, Sun purchased Cobalt and stopped playing nice, forcing us to expand our offering to white box dedicated servers. Second, we launched our first $1 setup fee sale. I remember that I had just taken over the Web Sales team, which was then part of our dial-up sales department.

All of a sudden our little six-person team was buried in inquiries, new orders and demands for upgrades. Heady time, especially when you consider how the rest of the “tech bubble” was in the middle of a serious meltdown, and all the economy pundits could talk about was the downturn in business and a growing recession.

Now that I think about it, the ride that started that day has never really ended. 1Ghz servers became 2.0GHz+; white box systems turned into all-Dell data centers; unmanaged dedicated hosting gave way to Custom Self-Managed Servers or Private Racks; and now EV1 has joined with The Planet.

What strikes me most about that last milestone is how we all thought we would be dealing with an alien race, and instead we found we were working with the same people we had always been working with. Sometimes literally, and yes I’m talking about you, Keith.

So here we are, just over a year later, and the company known for having the best data centers has joined forces with the company known for having the best network. We also have several new members of the family on board, determined to make sure we become known for having the best support ever. I only hope the next six years are exciting as the last six were. Then again, with a company like this, how could they be anything else?

- Aaron

I was interested in the recent acquisition of Postini by Google for $625m. Congrats to the team from Postini. I know a few of the guys that are out counting their money right now.

People can argue back and forth all day as to whether this was a reasonable valuation or how much of a strategic fit Postini is for Google. I for one was really surprised by the price, until I saw that it was an all-cash deal. All of my economics profs would always tell me there is no difference in how you choose to fund an acquisition, whether it be cash off the balance sheet, or financed through debt or through stock. However, it seems time and time again companies that generate huge cash balances on their balance sheet are eager to go out and buy with the cash they have.

Public companies that amass a large cash position face enormous pressure to spend the cash. All of that cash on the balance sheet is just dead weight from a valuation perspective. The obvious outs are invest in your company, but that leads to dilution of margin/EPS and hits to market cap; issue a dividend, but that means you’re admitting to the market that you aren’t a growth play; buy back stock, but that is useless unless you use a HUGE amount of cash; or go out an acquire with cash. I’ve talked to numerous executives who feel absolutely handcuffed by these forces. It’s even more frustrating to the guys working at the company who want to do something entrepreneurial from the inside. Having worked at public companies, I’ve personally had proposals shot down since executives would rather acquire than invest internally simply because they hated the alternative uses of cash.

Here is the opportunity and why the cards are stacked in the favor of aggressive startups and entrepreneurs. Simply put, startups and smaller companies provide a pressure valve for these cash-rich public companies that are looking for a growth engine for their businesses. It’s why these guys have VP’s of Corp Dev that are always out scouring the market looking for ways to spend money. These guys are often measured on how many deals they get done. All the more reason to take the jump with the next great SaaS company or media or content service.

Anyone who has worked for a company that’s been acquired knows how tough it can be. I’ve been through it a number of times. The old faithful from The Planet and EV1Servers know this as well as anyone. I know we’re all glad to be able to just focus on growing the business…

- Urvish