About a year or so ago, I did some host shopping, and after a bit of research, I was pretty confident about my switch to a new host. I knew it was a small, two-man operation, and apart from a few glitches, and slow response to support requests, I was happy with the cost/features. I had even made a point of recommending them to anyone I knew requiring hosting [ed—Something we don’t do often. Good hosting is subjective/relative.]
So this past July was a surprise, when I started to run into problems. The first clue that there was a problem was my site went offline for a few days, though email was still working. After contacting the host, I found out that they were in the midst of a server move, something I hadn’t been notified about, and something I wasn’t completely prepared for as far as backups were concerned. I also found out that they were having a problem, and were working with their new server company, (recently aquired by Hostway), to find a quick solution. The site came back online not long after, so I made a couple of quick backups (not everything), and assumed all was well. Wrong assumption.
In August the site went offline again. This time email was down as well. One day turned into two, into three, and so I contacted them again. This time there was no response. A week passed. Nothing. I waited patiently. I emailed them. I opened a support ticket. Still nothing. I checked the host’s website. Their homepage was changed to a note that they had received hundereds of emails and couldn’t get back to everyone, but that it “should be sorted out in a matter of days”.
By the second week I was signed up with a new host, and getting ready to put things back together. Near the end of the month I’d gotten a message from one of the people I’d recommended the now funked up host to that there were some new people answering questions in the forum, so I poked my head in to see if I could get some answers about the status of my site/data.
First, it was, “We have no record of you on our servers”, then it was, “Sorry, but you should have backed up your data”, and although it was a bit frustrating, the most frustrating part was that this info wasn’t coming from the site owners/admins Aron Nimani, and Jorge Catena, but from Brandon Rivers and Martyn (last name witheld by request) of Southeast Creations, who had recently merged with the troubled HostCulture, and although they were now partnered with HostCulture, were acting as though they were just good samaritans, doing a thankless job by posting DNS settings, and fielding questions from customers wondering what the hell happened to their websites. Their lack of professionalism and experience in customer relations quickly showed, and I became increasingly irate with their detached attitude, and the pretense that they’re only involvment with HostCulture was in a support capacity.
I mean, here’s a company (Southeast Creations), who although they weren’t defending him, had decided it was a good idea to go into business with a kid (Aron) who shirked his responsibility to his customers, and then ditched them when things went bad. You think they’re helping out of the goodness of their heart? Please.
So instead of addressing the concerns of those that lost websites, they simply adopted an attitude of, “Your site’s gone. It’s your fault for not backing it up. What more do you want us to say?” Then when they had enough dealings with irate customers, they closed the thread, directed all support questions to the Southeast Creations forum, and then closed the HostCulture forum. Now they’re having fun playing at being a multi-national corporation complete with a board of directors, which you’ll notice Aron is on. All the pretty Dreamweaving and Photoshopping on the site aside, you’d think a company that professes to be a “global leader in Web Solutions” would know how to to prevent directory indexing on their site.
At the end of it all, I was left extremely upset, most especially over the fact that someone can set up a business, throw up some bogus TOS, forgoing any responsibility or liability, and leaving the consumer without any expectation of warranty for services rendered. What are you supposed to do when faced with entering into a non-negotiable service agreement with an online business? Grin and bear it?
16 responses so far ↓
1 Jim // Sep 15, 2003 at 8:48 pm
So now what?
2 michael // Sep 15, 2003 at 9:16 pm
Well, there isn’t all that much to do. I could get a refund, but what it amounts to is so small it isn’t worth bothering. So forward we go with a new host, and I learn to backup more often, and more completely. That, and let everyone know what a bad experience it was.
What I’d like to see is some sort of interactivity and negotiation regarding online agreements/terms of service.
Actually what I’d really like to see is a company that believes in their responsibility as a service provider, and to the consumers they offer those services to, and not just covering their own ass.
3 Matt // Sep 16, 2003 at 8:50 pm
If you drop me an email I might be able to help out.
4 Gabe // Sep 29, 2003 at 11:08 am
I’ve had my hosting done through Dreamhost for about a year now. Their web panel is to die for (I’ve yet to come up with a configuration change that you couldn’t do yourself). They have an email support system that records all communications, allows you to specify urgency of your request, and shows how many requests they have pending and your place in the queue. They have always responded to every email (even low priority) within 8 hours. These guys are true professionals, and I can’t recommend them highly enough. If you’re still in the market for hosting, they would make an excellent choice. Email me if you are still in the market for a permanent host…
5 Martyn Pittuck // Sep 30, 2003 at 1:07 pm
I would like to post an official reply to this, so please do not delete this.
Before we start, HC is not part of SEC, we are mutual business partners. It was an announced
merger which due to legal reasons could not go ahead (Our lawyers advised against a full merger).
For the main problem of data loss was not our fault, it was the fault of the new data centre who
took charge of the server move. As far as I can tell around 30 accounts were lost, but due to
people not updating email addresses in their payment control panel nothing could be done to
inform them. (Could answer the ‘they had no record of me’).
We did try legal action but a clause in the TOS on the data centre’s website meant that they were
not liable for loss of data. To this end if you wish to complain you need to contact them (contact
SEC for their address). Please do not think we are not trying to help you.
As in emails you have posted on other sites all I needed was a card holder name so that I could
match a payment to you and remake the account.
As a reminder to everyone, always read the TOS of a site. It is impossible for backups to be
guaranteed for free. It will cost us an extra $100 per month to create a backup server which will mean prices rising by more than 150%, it explicitly says in the TOS that a backup facility is provided and the included backup is not guaranteed. I know it may seem bad-form, but we have run a very helpful business in the past and have tried our hardest to help people with problems. To be honest, I have been putting around 8 hours per week of my spare time into HC support/server maintenance and have not received a dime. HCs status is that Jorge has left and Aron cannot run it on his own, we partnered while Jorge was there and HC was very stable, now that he has left we have tried to keep it running.
Michael:
If you can supply a card holder name I will reinstate your account and email you the details. (One year starting from ASAP).
Finally, I would have expected a bit more decorum in this matter. Brandon Rivers did reply here only to see it deleted, if it happens again we will contact the website owner to force this reply to be shown, or if that fails seek legal action as by law a company must be consulted before damning information is posted in the public domain.
Thank You,
- Martyn Pittuck
6 michael // Sep 30, 2003 at 3:06 pm
Let me first say that this post (the scoop) details the essential facts with regard to my hosting experience with Hostculture, and my opinions regarding interactions I had with both Hostculture and Southeast Creations employees.
It is factually accurate in its scope, and any opinions therein expressed by me regarding my experiences with both Hostculture and Southeast Creations’ employees are just that; my opinions.
Martyn,
I do not require my account be ‘reinstated’, nor do I wish to avail myself of your belated offer of a year’s free hosting.
"Please do not think we are not trying to help you."
Really? I’d ask where this help was when myself and others were asking for it, but it no longer concerns me. I’ve no wish to have any further dealings with either Hostculture, or Southeast Creations. At the time, what I got for my troubles from Hostculture/Southeast Creations, was my IP banned from both the Hostculture and Southeast Creation servers. So, thank you, but no thank you.
And I make no claims here regarding content posted to my site by others. I am the sole arbiter of what is acceptable here.
7 Brandon Rivers // Sep 30, 2003 at 4:14 pm
Again Michael, I agree with you. And for the record, your IP was banned because of your comments in the forum. It changed from asking "why?" to just badgering about typos, etc. I wanted to close the forums a month earlier when Aron did not show up, because why have a forum, when the owner is gone?
I could have come in there and said, "Sorry everybody", and that’s MY opinion. But unfortunately not everyone accepts help. To you, it was not help. To others, it was beneficial. I understand you too are a Web Developer, and we get this from all Web Developers who works at Development companies. Picking at how our FTP permissions are set to allow you to view certain files.
"Really? I’d ask where this help was when myself and others were asking for it, but it no longer concerns me. I’ve no wish to have any further dealings with either HostCulture, or Southeast Creations."
Not really a choice but listen to a group who is helping you when the main culprit has vanished. You ask where the help was when you needed it.. That is for Aron to answer. Martyn and I help you from what we are able. Southeast Creations did not promise you backups, nor promised you flawless hosting. HostCulture did. We are not HostCulture, and in fact we are levels beyond HostCulture. But does that mean we can’t support people in the forums who have questions?
Is that a reason to hate Southeast Creations and post about it? We have had 100% perfect service to you thus far… why? Because we did not offer you services yet. We had clients for the past few months coming to us with Domain issues and Website issues asking for help out of money they lost. We literally gave hundreds to people who came to us. Testimonials from people who appreciated the services "WE" offer can attest to that.
So thus far, your only issue for Southeast Creations is that "we could not help you fully with a problem you had with another company." Still not a reason to express "hatred" toward a company that you have no dealings with. After all your issue is with HostCulture, but a majority of your post is on Southeast Creations. It’s simple, you speak about us because we are the only ones who care. HostCulture doesn’t - you can say what you want about them and they will not budge.
We ask, please, that you not voice opinions concerning us in this manner. Let’s have it end today.
Thank you.
Brandon S. Rivers
Southeast Creations
8 Martyn Pittuck // Oct 1, 2003 at 2:54 am
Ok, you were on the email system right?
Did you try the ticket system we posted on the forums before they were closed? We had much better results through that system as we could track how conversations were going.
And as my closing point I would like to say that we have stoped accepting orders for Host Culture until we can offer a satisfactory offer. We closed Host Culture about 2 weeks after people started complaining as we were not satisfied. Now we have plans to re-build HC with the proper systems which will be able to track orders and allert their admins to any problems. Me and Brandon have stoped working with HC as support staff (only answering to our customers).
Thank you for drawing this to an end, and we would like to point out that any hosting done by Southeast Creations in the future will be done on our servers hosted at ev1.com (formaly rackshack.com). Please accept our sincerest appologies.
Thank You,
- Martyn Pittuck
9 michael // Oct 1, 2003 at 12:14 pm
Ok, not that I’m in the mood to rehash this discussion, but here goes…
Brandon, what you failed, and apparently still fail to understand is that I became swiftly dissatisfied with the level of service/support you were providing.
What many customers got in the forum was an attitude, from both you and Martyn, that in my opinion (as a consumer) was unprofessional, and showed a lack of experience in customer relations. I don’t give a hoot if you felt hassled, frustrated, or even the least bit put out. It was (in my opinion) your job as a service provider, and support representative (a job you took on), to rise above it, and leave your personal feelings and personal narratives out of it. I don’t need to hear about school, or how much of your personal time this is taking up, or how you’re doing all the work for a hosting company you don’t work for. You accepted the ‘burden’ of dealing with Hostculture’s customers, you should have remained professional, or simply walked away.
Let me draw an analogy.
If I walk into a store and ask the store clerk for some help, I don’t expect to hear, "Sorry, I’m just filling in", or "I’m really not even supposed to be here", or "My studies are my first priority", or "How did I get stuck doing all the work?", or "Don’t blame me if you can’t find what you’re looking for".
What sort of reaction do you think these responses would elicit? What sort of opinion might you form of the store clerk? What sort of opinion might you form of the company they work for?
Nowhere in this post (the scoop) did I blame you, Martyn, or Southeast Creations for losing my data, however, how can you say I had "no dealings" with you, and by way of association Southeast Creations? I did nothing but deal with you and Martyn in the Hostculture forums. You both represented yourselves as Southeast Creations employees, so it’s not a far walk to assume that in dealing with you, I was dealing with Southeast Creations.
I have spoken about how I was treated by Hostculture and Aron, but I also believe it is fair to speak about how I was treated by both you and Martyn. I am not dissatisfied with you for not being able to resolve the data loss problem. I am dissatisfied (again, my opinion as a consumer) with the way you represented yourselves, and the professionalism you failed to show as a support team. Nowhere have I expressed "hatred"; simply dissatisfaction.
I’m happy you feel proud of the level of service you have shown some your clients. It is a courtesy you didn’t show me.
10 RootXtreme(aka Todd) // Oct 1, 2003 at 2:42 pm
*Lost and confused*
For gods sake this isnt cnn. i hosted with host cutlure, and i admin it went dead and sucked badly, but now its up and everything is fine. i bakked up my stuff by myself cuz i only had like 4 pages up. hehe
I dont want to be no bodys enemy hhere so i will say that i liked the services from south east creations. i guess its not for evrybody
kiss and make up all this complainin isnt goin to take us no where dude. lets all hug and sing a song.:D
btw, what kind of guitar is that with the light shinign on in your photogallery???? It looks pretty awesome!!!! Alos post some music tracks here man, i wanna here it!
11 Suzanne // Oct 2, 2003 at 4:06 pm
It’s not http://ev1.com btw, that redirects to General Motors. http://www.ev1servers.net/ is the new location of RackShack.
Arguing with the customers has got to be the highest level of "corporate" incompetence. Any PR Manager with any sense knows to bow out gracefully, try to solve the customer’s needs right away and minimize the damage from screw ups — not by engaging in subterfuge, silence and arguing in the first place. Blaming the customer is a signal to your customers that you have no internal auditing nor action plans in the event of problems in place, another sure sign of incompetence. (I’ll ignore the serious faux pas of posting to a former-customer’s personal website as an exercise for the reader: incompetence or brilliant marketing?)
Speaking of back-up plans, for a world-wide corporation, $100 a month for a single back-up server is a laughably insignificant expense.
Of course, most real corporations aren’t run by kids.
12 Rudolf // Oct 2, 2003 at 9:54 pm
Nice write-up, Michael!
Interesting replies, too. I was particularly amused by the bit where they say, "the main culprit has vanished" about a guy who is supposed to serve on their Board of Directors.
Look, whichever data centre they use now, SouthEastCreations started out as a HostCulture reseller. The Whois still lists them on the HostCulture server, which is run by Candidhosting, which is the "adult branch" of Neutelligent, which is the server company Aron moved HostCulture to. When Aron walked away from the mess, he tossed SouthEastCreations the keys: they’ve got access to the Cpanel and to the HostCulture PaySystems account. So HostCulture is run by Martyn and Brandon: it doesn’t make any sense for them to claim that they "we are levels beyond HostCulture"; with Aron gone, they *are* HostCulture.
The "service" they provided when things fell apart back in August consisted in one useful piece of information about the domain name servers — useful to a few people, that is — the rest was obfuscation, insults, and a comical attempt at portraying themselves as selfless helpers when they were basically trying to appropriate the customer basis of a failed business while declining to assume any responsibility.
I got my IP address banned by SouthEastCreations for a) wanting to know where Aron was b) insisting on an explanation of what exactly happened and c) reminding them of the fact that customers do not like to be put in their place by the people they pay for a service.
13 Rudolf // Oct 3, 2003 at 3:19 am
A few weeks ago I received an e-mail from Martyn which stated, on behalf of HostCulture, that something or other wasn’t working but was going to be working again soon. Earlier, also on behalf of HostCulture, Martyn offered me a refund. The HostCulture boards were taken down by you rather than Aron and after they disappaeared, they had a link to the SouthEastCreations support page (I was, incidentally, banned from that page, not from the HostCulture Boards). So the claim that any help offered by SouthEastCreations on the HostCulture boards was the equivalent of what anyone else could have offered is groundless. You had control over the infrastucture. A bit further up you also offered to rebuild HostCulture in the future, so I’m assuming you still have control over the infrastructure.
But if HostCulture has indeed ceased to exist, it might be a good idea to let your customers know about it.
As for the "kids" claim, oh well, you volunteered Martyn’s age in the last HostCulture topic. I’ve got backups of those threads, I can go dig them up for you if you’re interested.
You also volunteered your birthday in a darkbasicpro.com user profile that still hung around in a Google cache a few weeks ago.
Contrary to your claim, I was never told that Aron called it quits. It’s the first time I have that suspicion confirmed. Thanks for the information.
Neither has anyone ever told me what happened. And, as far as I’m concerned, that’s the core of the matter: all I did on the HostCulture boards was ask for an explanation, and I’ve got the backups to prove that I didn’t do that in an "inappropriate" manner — in fact Martyn congratulated me in an e-mail for being exceptionally "cool" about the whole matter.
Thanks also for the free hosting offer; I’m afraid I’ll have to turn it down. However, I’d still be happy to learn under what circumstances my database and two months’ worth of archives were lost.
14 Brandon Rivers // Oct 3, 2003 at 8:28 am
We understand Rudolf. No hard feelings anywhere towards anyone.
HostCulture members have been informed and matters will be taken care of. Misunderstandings occur on many occasions and we apologize for these.
Lets have this issue cease, deal? We would appreciate it.
Thanks.
15 Brandon Rivers // Oct 3, 2003 at 12:25 pm
Suzanne mentions:
Arguing with the customers has got to be the highest level of "corporate" incompetence.
I’m sorry you all think we are arguing with Michael, but we are not. Having a Website about how our service is "bad" does not help the problems existing. I was directed to this site the other day and was amazed that Michael mentioned our names. Rudolf, we are not HostCulture. We do not own the servers and we do not do billing or anything of the sort.
We are not kids running a corporation. I, for one, am a college graduate who started this company years back. The management team consists of college graduates with Masters and Doctorate degrees. Where is the information stating that Southeast Creations is ran by "kids"?
See our position here. An unhappy customer places in his "blog" our names, and a few rotten statements that is found within the top 10 when you type Southeast Creations in Google. Customers see this, and it is not something we like.
I started coming to the HostCulture forums in January of this year. We didn’t move our files to the servers until January of this year. We gave support of PHP issues, mail, domains, etc. - while everything was flowing smoothly. Then the server move, in which we had no knowledge of. Why? Because Aron does not have to tell us anything. We do not work for him, nor does he work for us. We stayed in the forums and said "Well we gave support before, we might as well stay here and answer some questions since Aron is not here." While we were in the forums, Aron was gone somewhere doing whatever he does. We didn’t think this was fair. ANY one of you here could have offered support if someone asked. IN FACT there were a few who gave their opinions on what to do. Did that make them HostCulture staff members? It made them supporters of the issues. We do not condone Aron’s actions here. We do not run off hiding. I am not one who leaves a defaming post because I am "too professional to defend my company."
What makes an "international business"? Mainly a company that has offices in multiple countries and cities around the globe. We do.
What I want more than anything is for this page to be deleted, everyone FORGET about HostCulture, because it doesn’t exist anymore. We had the operations shutdown because of unfair business practices. I am not defending HostCulture in anyway. When our site went down for a couple of days, I got on the phone and ORDERED Aron to fix the problem.
Michael gave the analogy of a store clerk. Saying "I’m not suppose to be here." - Many times we are in stores, and someone asks us a question like "where can I find a certain thing?"… Should I tell them, "Go ask the workers", or should I help them by telling them?
Why didn’t we leave the forums alone? We have good relationships with the current and past HostCulture members who contacted our Support team for many questions. Should we ignore them when they ask questions? It may keep my company name off of Websites like these, but it’s not ethically right for me, or other members of Southeast Creations to do.
Why did we ban IP’s? I nor Martyn did the banning, because we were only Admins long enough to close the forums and close the Website down. That was the best thing to do. Susanne was correct, Kids should not run businesses. The banning was done mainly because two members were not calm, and their behavior was improper. You go in any forum with that behavior and you get banned. It doesn’t matter if its support forums, entertainment forums, etc., it’s inappropriate.
You also bring up why Aron (a kid) was on the board of directors? Simple. He ran the company (servers) we used for our clients. When we contact the board members or meet with them, we need the major contributing companies to know of our plans, and give information as to any financial assistance they need or such to keep the business flowing smoothly. You don’t have to be a billionaire to serve on the board - just work closely to run the business the way it should.
Rudolf, we were never a reseller of HostCulture. Martyn’s intention months ago, before these problems, was to take control of the servers from Aron. If that had been done, there would be no problem.
So again, I am here not ARGUING, but simply explaining our role here. I see two unhappy customers i remember from the forums and their last words I remembered was "we will tell everyone about HostCulture in forums." I hoped you would. You deserve to do that. You were given unfair business and no one else should receive it.
But why us? Because we were there "trying" to help? We do not know everything about HostCulture, but we know how to call Aron and the server suppliers to get on the ball. When you asked a question, we answered some. Then the atmosphere changed from "questions" to other inappropriate things. Sure we stepped in to try and work things out, but why stay there and take all the heat for HostCulture. We went back to our work, told Aron to answer the questions you all had, and that was that. We came back later in the week and saw that Aron did not answer… so we closed the forums and his site down. Directed many to our Support Center. Many got help.
Where is HostCulture? and Does Southeast Creations own HostCulture? are two important questions. HostCulture no longer exists and Southeast Creations is not a part of HostCulture. Our business relationship has been severed. The servers are still running because we are paying and keeping them up so that the current customers sites will not go down.
I take time to explain this KNOWING that a lot of people will still post about how we are the causes of the problem for stepping in. We are not. We hope you all realize that.
Again we are sorry for what happened, but that is all we can do. Your real aim is to the guy who is running free right now. You want your hosting back on the servers? Hey, give us your information and you get a free year hosting. Nothing to lose there. Just giving you what HostCulture owes you.
So please stop the rumors that Southeast Creations is ran by kids. I’ve seen it posted a few times, and it’s really sad that it had to come to this.
The Southeast Creations name should not be on this site - it is very misleading. Not because our services to you were bad, but because we could not do HostCulture support. Also no more posts quoting my words and proving how we are at fault. Your money is in the pockets of Aron and HostCulture. We did not get a dime of your money, nor want any.
And for many who wonder why a professional posts on a blog, it is because explanations have to be made on our part. We are sorry we could not help you. We did not argue with HostCulture customers. Disagreements are not the main factor of arguments.
One final note:
I got my IP address banned by SouthEastCreations for a) wanting to know where Aron was b) insisting on an explanation of what exactly happened and c) reminding them of the fact that customers do not like to be put in their place by the people they pay for a service.
Our Response: (a)We mentioned many times that Aron was gone. He left everyone there to vanish. (b) We mentioned what exactly happened, and you were aware of what happened. So there was not much more to say on that. (c) You cannot remind us that "paying" customers were put in a place when you never paid us. You paid HostCulture, and we received no part of the payment. Our role was as a volunteer. This was not our service. Southeast Creations services are done through our Websites. You also say "with Aron gone, they *are* HostCulture." Not actually. With Aron gone, HostCulture is gone, so we tried to save over 100 accounts he left behind. Let’s say you called Microsoft because your version of XP kept crashing. They say "support is $100", so you decide to leave them alone. You call someone at ‘Pete’s PC Consulting’, and ask them for help. They give you the wrong answer… would you say they are at fault? Or is Microsoft the one for (1) having a bad product, and (2) not giving you the help you looked for. Our role was as "Pete".
It would not make my business Microsoft because I was the only one available. Show me one bad Southeast Creations service toward you other than answering support question in the HostCulture forums, and we will allow you to continue defaming us. But this topic started as bad hosts. We are not your host, not part of your host. We were just there in the forums. No matter how rude we appeared, we are still forum members. I don’t know if you would picture me as a 50 year old CEO, because I am not. I am much older than a "kid". And I work very hard at doing what I do.
So please a new topic would be a good idea. And it would also be nice to remove the Southeast Creations name from here, or delete this entry. You have gotten your point across, and now it is getting a little more on the "legal" side of matters, since opinions should be expressed when there is valid reasons for expressing such.
Thank you.
16 michael // Oct 3, 2003 at 12:33 pm
Since everyone has made their points, stated their respective opinions, positions, and rebuttals, in the interest of not letting this decay into an impromptu platform for bickering, I will be closing this thread to further comments. Thank you all for your input.
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