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Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

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Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#261

Post by falava »

holgate wrote: post #165
obiefernandez wrote: post #163

Here's the answer you'll get if you write to their support complaining about the change: Hi Obie, As often happens in the software business, vendors “end of life” older platforms and migrate customers to new versions or platforms. The service you purchased a “lifetime subscription” to will no longer be supported or available from Joyent. On the other hand, we appreciate and value your business as an early customer. A…

That's the boilerplate that the support desk is sending out to everyone. I suppose the question to ask is this: "Were you lying back in 2006 when you said the offer was good '[a]s long as we exist', or are you lying now? Or did you decide to renege on your promise somewhere in-between?" You'll get the same boilerplate response, but it'll be on record.

I have obtained 50% refund from the support desk by replying to the sunset email and asking for it.

This morning I found this Jason Hoffman post about the EOL and a possible refund here and added to my response email: http://discuss.joyent.com/viewtopic.php?pid=240955#p240955

In my case and theirs, I consider this partial refund ok because I have been using his service 8 years and now I will move my small sites to a cheaper host.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#262

Post by mikeash »

jacques_chester wrote: post #260
mikeash wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asking them to do it is fine, but you can't obligate them to do it. A contract can never force you to perform work, because that is slavery. It can force you to perform work or suffer some kind of penalty. In this case, I think the appropriate penalty is a full refund for all of the affected customers.

Are you a lawyer? I'm not, though I studied law for a while. What you say may be true of common law. But I suspect the doctrines of equity may have other ideas. The return of funds is not the same as lifetime hosting. Those clients want specific performance and equity may yet grant it to them.

No, I'm not. And yes, the clients want specific performance, but do they have the right to get it? Seems like at most, the clients would be entitled to a refund plus whatever damages they could show (e.g. the cost of switching to a different service, plus any losses they take from other arrangements they made based on the promise of lifetime service). Could a court really order Joyent to keep providing this service against their will? Seems like restitution would be it.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#263

Post by falava »

gaoshan wrote: post #208
velcrovan wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VC here...How did you get this? Did it come in response to a support ticket? Did you ask them for a full refund? Is half of your original investment $100 or more like $1000?

I asked for a full refund. They came back with "half".

I have obtained 50% refund also (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4396503)

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#264

Post by tait »

gexla wrote: post #7

Mixed Griller here. I don't remember what the language was, but perhaps in this case "lifetime" meant the lifetime of the product, shared hosting. Personally, I'm happy with the accelerator, I never did like shared hosting and quit using it a long time ago except for a couple of sites that are gathering dust.

Gexla, I'm on an accelerator. They are going away too.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#265

Post by jacques_chester »

mikeash wrote: post #262
jacques_chester wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you a lawyer? I'm not, though I studied law for a while. What you say may be true of common law. But I suspect the doctrines of equity may have other ideas. The return of funds is not the same as lifetime hosting. Those clients want specific performance and equity may yet grant it to them.

No, I'm not. And yes, the clients want specific performance, but do they have the right to get it? Seems like at most, the clients would be entitled to a refund plus whatever damages they could show (e.g. the cost of switching to a different service, plus any losses they take from other arrangements they made based on the promise of lifetime service). Could a court really order Joyent to keep providing this service a…

Some people don't want damages or restitution. They want specific performance of the contract. In this case they may be in a position to get it.

We're not discussing labour laws here, the slavery argument doesn't apply. This looks to me like straight up contract + equity.

> Could a court really order Joyent to keep providing this service against their will?

That's what an order for specific performance is for.

I've emailed a self-described law nerd of my acquaintance. She geeks out on equity law, so this sort of case is right up her alley. I'll be interested to see what she thinks.

Of course ... IANAL, TINLA.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#266

Post by mikeash »

jacques_chester wrote: post #265
mikeash wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm not. And yes, the clients want specific performance, but do they have the right to get it? Seems like at most, the clients would be entitled to a refund plus whatever damages they could show (e.g. the cost of switching to a different service, plus any losses they take from other arrangements they made based on the promise of lifetime service). Could a court really order Joyent to keep providing this service a…

Some people don't want damages or restitution. They want specific performance of the contract. In this case they may be in a position to get it. We're not discussing labour laws here, the slavery argument doesn't apply. This looks to me like straight up contract + equity. > Could a court really order Joyent to keep providing this service against their will? That's what an order for specific performance is for. I've e…

Please let me know what your law friend has to say, would really be interested in the reply.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#267

Post by holgate »

Isofarro wrote: post #245
holgate wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. The founding story goes something like this: Dean Allen had built a CMS (TextPattern) and he, along with other TextPattern users, wanted a hosting provider that would support it in a no-hassle way. He couldn't find one that fit his needs, so decided to create his own; after discussing and rejecting formal VC methods, he turned instead to his userbase with "an opportunity to acquire a piece of TextDrive at it…

So as an investor, you'd prefer that the company you invested in continued offering a loss-making service until they went into bankruptcy? Rather than allowing them to just shut it down and concentrate on more sustainable business offerings? That strikes me as the kind of investor a company wouldn't want. Great, you bootstrapped a company, and they used those funds to grow. And in return all you got was a shared host…

I dispute your premise that the lifetime plans somehow threaten Joyent's existence as a going concern; if the infrastructure of the lifetime services is difficult to support within Joyent's current business, I'd prefer that they honour the spirit of their promise instead of pretending that they promised something different and hoping that lifetime customers go away.

And again, I'd suggest that you get working on that time machine, because your powers of 20/20 hindsight are truly remarkable.

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#268

Post by NateEag »

For anyone who's interested, a "Money back or five free years of your own virtual server" offer has been posted by Jason Hoffman: http://discuss.joyent.com/viewtopic.php?id=33682

It doesn't come close to honoring the "as long as we exist" that we bought in for, but it's a lot better than the starting position, and Jason is talking a little about why we're being cut.

(From what I can see, it looks like cutting the lifers may have been a requirement of some of the recent VC investors. That's me reading between the lines a bit, though.)

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#269

Post by eli »

teach wrote: post #181
freehunter wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I host three sites on Linode, lowest plan at $20/mo. They're excellent, as just about everyone can tell you. It's a full install of a Linux distro of your choosing, any software you want. It's as good as having a Linux machine sitting in your office. However, $20/mo might not be the lowest price you can find for two low-traffic sites. edit - I should point out, I host three low traffic sites on one low-end Linode ins…

I use Linode for several low-traffic sites as well, and I'd recommend them. However, there's one crucial aspect in which they're different than having a Linux machine sitting in your office (which I also have): for $100 I can put a 2TB drive in the local server. The equivalent space at Linode would cost $1000 a year.

If you have lots of data, Linode probably isn't a good fit. I'd look into Amazon S3 (which I suppose you could use with Linode hosting in front of it, but I'd probably just use AWS if I were relying heavily on S3).

Re: Joyent ending "lifetime" hosting accounts

#270

Post by freehunter »

eli wrote: post #269
teach wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use Linode for several low-traffic sites as well, and I'd recommend them. However, there's one crucial aspect in which they're different than having a Linux machine sitting in your office (which I also have): for $100 I can put a 2TB drive in the local server. The equivalent space at Linode would cost $1000 a year.

If you have lots of data, Linode probably isn't a good fit. I'd look into Amazon S3 (which I suppose you could use with Linode hosting in front of it, but I'd probably just use AWS if I were relying heavily on S3).

Despite my post, I'm more into server administration than I am programming. Might be why I love Linode. I've helped a couple people set up their Linode sites, and tie it into S3 (and other services) for various uses. The thing I love most about Linode is that it's anything you want it to be.
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