Website down on Saturday
Sun, 03/28/2010 - 21:54
I am a big fan of FiveSprockets and I am sure it will be my application of choice even if you decide to start charging for this great service.
This is why I was shocked when I found that your website was down for the whole Saturday.
But what really disappointed me was that you didn't explain what happened during the weekend or what steps you are taking to remedy the situation.
As I said, FiveSprockets has become my favorite screenwriting application and I almost can't write a script without it. This means that on Saturday I had to switch to Celtx to get some writing done. I even paid for their $5 studio accounts. Needless to say, free FiveSprockets is ten times better than paid for Celtx.
You guys have some amazing piece of software in your hands, but you need one of two things: paid for (reliable) accounts and offline access (via google gears like zhura) for days when the database is down.
And one last thing: would you mind writing a blog entry on what happened on Saturday March 27, 2010? Are you taking any steps to iron the final details? Are you in financial trouble? Would love to hear your take on the issue.
Mon, 03/29/2010 - 14:44
#2
Thanks for your reply!
I am
Thanks for your reply!
I am glad to hear you addressing the issue.
Tue, 03/30/2010 - 06:59
#3
Not the frist time this year...
--> Hello,
I agree with what Luis wrote. I have a deadline to turn in a script for a film, low budget indie but none the less, I HAVE to turn it in and this has happened twice this year and the last time this happened, it was down for almost 3 days. It was the worse three day nightmare experience and it happened again this past week.
Needless to say, I was able to show my producer I had been working on it, or I would have been essentially fired. I completely agree that maybe we should be able to donate or something to ensure you're staffed accordingly and so that this awesome site (still my favorite from the rest despite the issues) remains a float and efficient. I didn’t even want to bother commenting anymore since I’m sure you’re aware of the current issues that still haven’t been fixed (spell check, style menu issue, server crashes and finally: a new issue I found out my partner had with her laptop and the bizarre spacing/ moving of text five sprockets does incorrectly, but my writing partner advised me to just do so. Please let us know how we can help you so in turn, you can help us.
Thank you very much.
Tue, 03/30/2010 - 09:45
#4
Thanks, guys
Hi Kevin & Luis,
As the founder of FiveSprockets, let me jump in an apologize for the downtime we have occasionally -- and relatively rarely (in our opinion) -- experienced (think of Twitter in its first few years!). We do know exactly what the problem is and are addressing it ... it is minor and can be fixed with a procedural solution.
We are also planning some updates to the site in April/May to fix some of the issues that arose last Fall (which happened as a result of switching hosting providers). And we have some improvements to the service planned as well.
It's passionate users like you that inspire us! What you see on FiveSprockets today represents about 25% of our overall product roadmap that I envisioned more than three years ago (as a screenwriter and filmmaker myself). We are in fine shape and are excited to add more services to our platform later this year.
Regards, Randy Ullrich
Founder & CEO, FiveSprockets
Hi Luis,
We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience of our site being down on Saturday (and early Sunday morning). This is a VERY rare occurrence in the nearly two years we've been providing this service and two factors lead to it- (1) a server issue; and (2) being short staffed over the weekend.
We know exactly what the server issue is (a simple short-term goof) and are taking measures to prevent this from happening in the future. We do use a Tier-1 hosting provider, which allows us to (almost always) provide an efficient and zippy user experience.
And we apologize for not communicating better on this issue. We were simply short staffed over the weekend.
Your suggestions for how to improve our service are welcome, and we do plan on making some updates to the service over the next several months. We're not going anywhere and our core, online screenwriting software will always be free!
-FiveSprockets