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Are they rolling it in?
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Are they rolling it in?

miTgiBmiTgiB Member
edited March 2012 in General

I saw this comment and it made me think, what do you think providers do with the money?

@LES said: not able to continue his business or hire someone to do it. He can piss off!

Now I'm not picking on @LES as this is a common comment I've seen made many times in the past and I'm sure I will see it made many more times in the future. What I take from this comment is providers are rolling in all this cash, living the good life, driving BMW's, lavishing hookers, and smoking lots of rope. Where are my hookers and fancy cars? Are you all daft? I just can't imagine those not in the business side of this really seem to think this.

I do ok, I pay colo fees and other business expenses first, them my rent, electric and cable bill, buy food, and if there is anything left, buy equipment for new nodes. I don't have money for frivolous things, so I don't buy them. If demand and my ability to buy nodes gets to a point that I have free cash in excess of need to deploy new service, then I might, but that day is not today. When I do have excess cash, I would like to hire some help, not big toys, but I don't really need help at this point, and who would I trust to provide the level of service I do, and how much is that going to cost me?

Yet every time some provider dives head first into the dead pool, all you see are wild accusations of so-and-so filming the next installment of Admins Gone Wild.

Comments

  • NickMNickM Member

    Well, with the deadpoolers, they're usually not spending the money on colo fees and support personnel and whatnot. In fact, that's usually the reason that they finally close up - their DC pulls the plug on them for not paying. Most of the deadpoolers go into it knowing that they're going to end up closing up shop in a few months. They just want to make a quick buck while they can, to feed whatever drug or kinky sex habit or whatever that they have.

  • SpiritSpirit Member
    edited March 2012

    I think that such statements as @LES gave should be taken with context to understand them. Personally I don't think that (most) providers roll in cash. Infact with all this competition, low prices, etc... imho many barely survive.
    But to return to quoted statement. I think that those angry, often desperate statements are mostly call for taking responsability, call to do something. Here is not that much expectation that host rolls in money than expectation that host will do right thing. That whole business won't turn out as someones part time hobby - as something what we often experience in this low end hosting segment.
    When things turn out that way client is pretty much powerless and apart from venting on forums like LET, WHT... there's nothing what can be done regarding lost money, time and trust.

  • prometeusprometeus Member, Host Rep
    edited March 2012

    I want to support @miTgiB here. This particular hosting market (low end virtualized server) can be interesting and funny, but I don't see how you can became rich with the price tags you see here. Let's do some math saying that I'm a runner with a plan to not pay for services (dedicated servers and bandwidth, you cannot run if you colo and buy your servers, switch and router) and get as much money as possibile in a small time.

    If you have good relations with the DC you can last 2 months without pay your bill before you're disconnected. How many clients you can attract with a good visibility on LEB? 1000? Even if you get 7$ x 2 months x 1000 users you get $14k.

    You should be in some third world country to start a new life with $15k...

    I think that most dead pooler are simply inexperienced people looking for a way to cut the edge.

  • The only way you get rich in this business is if you're bought out by a bigger company. I know a lot of people who run one/two man shops (I'm one of them) and nobody is living in mansions and riding in limos. It took me four years to get to where I am now... and I could still make more per year if I had a tech support phone job.

    Most one man shops are run by the same type of person... young, single (or at least no kids), and would rather work for themselves and make just enough to get by, than to work for someone else and have extra income.

  • I love this "Make a quick buck" lark, do you know how long it takes to grow a client base?

    We make around £150 per full node, i don't think that's a lot judging on how long it takes to actually fill a node.

    If i didn't have other sources of income i wouldn't be able to live from VMPort alone.

  • On our VPS sales, it took us 10 months to build up enough of a client base to break even.

    Now that we're past the break-even point... we're still not making piles of cash, especially since most of our profit gets recycled into the business.

    Adam and I started this venture to eventually quit our day jobs, but we'd rather get there slowly and stably.

  • FranciscoFrancisco Top Host, Host Rep, Veteran

    @subigo said: The only way you get rich in this business is if you're bought out by a bigger company.

    You know what's sad? For a while there, when Rus Foster was on his buying spree with his previous brands, this was actually a common thing. 'HazeNET' did that very thing and cashed out tons and left the users to rot. Rus bought the company for however much and HazeNET was scott free.

    Francisco

  • You mean $1/mo VPS sales don't get you guys stripper poles in the DC between each rack, gold plated rack mounted switch gear in your racks, disco balls, stacks of hundred dollar bills as toilet paper in your imported Italian marble floored bathrooms, and Ferarri's parked outside?

  • @rajprakash If it doesn't, I will have to rethink my plan to offer VPS services.

    /sarcasm

  • JacobJacob Member

    Don't forget the cuban cigars..

    @rajprakash said: You mean $1/mo VPS sales don't get you guys stripper poles in the DC between each rack, gold plated rack mounted switch gear in your racks, disco balls, stacks of hundred dollar bills as toilet paper in your imported Italian marble floored bathrooms, and Ferarri's parked outside?

  • Not everyone has the view that you guys are "rolling in cash." When I run some quick estimations I wonder how a lot of the LEB box operators manage to eat every month. With the small numbers it takes a lot of unit sales to make anything. It makes more sense to me once a large number of subscribers is in place, but until those large numbers are achieved it's got to be a tough go.

  • prometeusprometeus Member, Host Rep

    @Jacob said: Don't forget the cuban cigars..

    I do smoke cuban cigars at time, so I'm way ahead of you! Just missing the stacks of hundred dollar bills as toilet paper, the Italian marble floored bathrooms and Ferarri's parked outside

    :)

  • @prometeus said: smoke cuban cigars at time

    no no no... must be every time ;)

  • kiloservekiloserve Member
    edited March 2012

    @cleonard said: It makes more sense to me once a large number of subscribers is in place, but until those large numbers are achieved it's got to be a tough go.

    That's it...ramping up to Large volumes of clients quickly. That's the only way to make it with an LEB business if you don't have a sidejob that helps to pay for your food and rent.

    As VMPort said, it's hard to start out if you don't have a secondary source of income or a large amount of business capital.

    I think the big mistake new providers make is that they don't have a regular job to help with their daily life expenses.

    Push comes to shove, food and house rent takes precedence over colo/dedi fees and we have another deadpooler.

    Seems to me there are alot more deadpoolers than companies that actually make it to a few years.

  • FranciscoFrancisco Top Host, Host Rep, Veteran

    @liam said: Who wants a Ferarri when you have a pony, right @francisco ?

    S'why when we're all loaded we'll drive around mustangs.

    :3

    Francisco

  • FranciscoFrancisco Top Host, Host Rep, Veteran

    @liam said: I guess you're waiting for the phone call from russell foster.

    He tried twice, we said no thank you and continued to print money.

    Francisco

    Thanked by 1jamson
  • @liam said: phone call from russell foster.

    I can only think of a single company waiting for that call, and 2gb @ $7 probably fits in nicely with the pump and dump gamesmen.

  • @liam said: you sure you wouldn't consider it?

    Been there before, passed on the offer, I'm in this for the money to live, but not to cash out.

    Thanked by 1jamson
  • FranciscoFrancisco Top Host, Host Rep, Veteran

    @liam said: Can't believe he did! I was only joking haha.

    He offered back when he was doing thrustvps so he was likely just looking to increase the total client count.

    Francisco

    Thanked by 1dancom96
  • FranciscoFrancisco Top Host, Host Rep, Veteran

    @liam said: Thought so. He went on a spree, obviously to meet a quota set by iomart.

    Did he offer something or did you not get to that stage?

    Rus: 'Hey if you ever want to sell BuyVM let us know'
    Me: ' Thanks but no thanks, we enjoy our brand too much :)'

    • a month or so passes -
      Rus: 'Hey, sell me BuyVM, im very interested'
      me: 'Thanks but no thanks :)'

    He was very polite and I returned the favor. It never got to the figure point because we're simply not interested in selling then or now :)

    Francisco

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