a.g.r.c

The below comment was posted on the blog post http://www.heartinte.../#comment-16021
 

No, i'm not saying confrontation is the way to spark the right type of debate. That would be ridiculous and flawed logic, especially being in an industry were the best examples are set with happy living and working environments.
 
Nothing lost in translation when I confronted Ben with the whole "wanka", I stand by it. His decisions are inconsiderate, agree or not. I observed the impact and now some of the posts here have confirmed it's not just me.
 
This thread is now a combination of tit for tat and some points worth debating.
 
Maybe my tact could have been a little more fun loving, but why would I want to do that in a community i've given a fair amount to for it only to bite me at first chance?
 
Fully accept that this is not the opinion of all, or even the majority but in a forum environment the feelings are generally heard. Just seems like this feeling fell on deaf ears before it even surfaced.
 
The only problem with the looking to hire section was spam posts.

The "Looking to hire" area of this web site is now completely inactive.
 
Clearly Bens master plan to create a fee paying system here to list jobs has back fired.
 
That, coupled with the shameless advertising for Heart Internet has given me good reason to leave.
 
Clearly the master administrator for this site couldn't give a monkeys about the community who has enabled him to make some money from.
 
On that note, see you all later.
 
Ben, you're a wanka.
 
From one struggling web designer to another.

Have used Heart for a long time and haven't really come across any issues. Domain transfers (in and out) have all been very straightforward and speedy.
 
I did notice the lack of customer support on telephone though. Called them to query a payment as my bank declined the DD last month, yet Heart reckon it was paid. This months went out as normal and checked bank, and yeah, last months never went so I got a free month lol!
 
Anyways, yeah, on the phone they simply were not interested in talking to me unless I wanted to buy something and I was directed back to the support ticket system online.
 
Never really had any downtime issues but am now getting very worried after reading the above as a clients site will be getting a lot of extra traffic (extra few thousand hits per week) between September and the end of November and the last thing I need is for it to get pulled by Heart.
 
IF it does, you can bet your life I will be off lol

I'm with NuBlue. No problems with them, Magento runs smoothly on their shared hosting (!) and their support team are top-notch.
 
My reseller package costs around £35 a month for 10GB space, 100GB bandwidth, up to 50 domains. No overselling there. On the whole I'd have to agree that small companies give better service.

Yeah, I had quite a similar experience over bandwidth. There was also an issue over several domain which I had purchased about a year previous, they had been in use by another user with Heart Internet and they refused to allow hosting of the domains as they were still on their computer system. I'm assuming the previous guy had a problem with Heart Internet too. Tech support is fine so long as you're not complaining and it's impossible to leave. Even after cancellation in writing, they continued the direct debits, so in fact everytime I cancelled the direct debit they set a new one up.
 
Our bandwidth issue was when one of our domains hit 5GB, they pulled it and refused to allow me to host it. Their T & Cs state they have a right to impose a limit of 25GB per month but I know several ex customers who had domains pulled for 3GB. If you do a lot of bandwidth in a short space of time (we did the 5GB in only a week) then they'll pull the domain immediately.
 
Eventually I raised a small claims action for the money the owed, had evidence as my cancellation letter was posted Special Delivery and signed for. Although it was only about £180 it was still worth it as I got awarded my £180 and expenses which covered the costs of my journey from Glasgow to Nottingham. They never bothered to show up in court so it wasn't a problem. Took them another three months to pay up though.
 
Generally I found them very dishonest and on one occasion threatening. What's also interesting, when I was taking them to court I got a report from Companies House, their turnover is exremely small, last accounts for 2010 were showing a turnover of 38K. Also had nightmare experience with EUKHost, again involved court action and even had Sheriff Officers removing property from their offices. They got a slap on the wrist in court as at the time of the court action, they were claiming to companies house that they were a "non trading" company and charging VAT without being VAT registered. One of their directors was eventually prosecuted about the VAT.
 
In case you're interested, I'm now with Clook and have never had any problems with any support tickets being responded to within 10 minutes.

Haha I use both and there is no difference.

It's when you wash and dry ya clothey, open up your boardy, and do the irony....

Yeh sorry not going to troubleshoot a plugin. But in regards to Google webmaster tools, i've not done enough there to see the 301s disapear with the directives. However if you believe you have followed the technical aspects asked of you by Google, ask them to re-index your site. Would take a few days, but it seems as if you went through an overhaul and naturally have these things to contend with.
 
Make sure you have the 301s in place and i'd contact Google.

Hey Sully, welcome aboard. I love your name, not sure why...

You're joking, of course.
 
*sigh* while I'm here: virginity singular, virginities plural. Basically has only one 's'.
 
You're welcome.
 
P.S. I understand there aren't many ways for geeks to get laid, but I don't think you need a whole website to lose yours...

there's a buyer out there although not sure how active he is these days.
 
name: gary glitter

Check the basics, disable all plugins first, check your using the_content() and go.

Hi everyone,
 
I'd like to share my story and experience so far as a freelancer living and working in North London.
 
I didn't go to University after leaving college - I studied Business and Accountancy at A-Level and went shortly after into working for an accountancy firm (this was before the word 'recession' had even hit people's lips).
 
I worked there for 4 years straight, underpaid, undervalued and unappreciated working for damn near minimum wage. And quite honestly for the first three years I didn't mind because it was exciting and I was picking up vital business skills. The last year though, I'd had enough and I made the stupidest decision of my life and quit.
 
I'd always been a computer nerd in every sense of the word. I knew VB.NET, HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP... I drew up a very realistic business plan and acquired some funds. I was capable to say the least. And I wasn't lazy - I figure if anything, these two traits would set me apart in this freelance world.
 
WRONG!
 
Over the past year I've come to discover that 'web designer' basically means 'charity case' to a LOT of people. The title simply doesn't denote a position of respect and responsibility. I didn't like the term 'junior' but at least I could accept it, it's what I was.
 
I've networked exclusively in north and east London and found that, as most business owners here are foreign, they tend to employ web designers and developers within their social and cultural circles. Usually a family member or someone their family member knows, regardless of their experience or return.
 
I've also noticed that 70% - 80% of business owners here in North London are impatient, impractical and perceive a freelancer looking for work as 'a cockroach looking for scraps'. Basically (right now at least) their doors are open to customers, NOT people looking for work.
 
Another thing I've picked up on is, not so much that business owners don't understand the value a website can give to their business, but that they just don't care. This is what has surprised me the most. The absolute lack of interest and enthusiasm on business owners' behalves.
 
I have also noticed that a lot of businesses here in north London (a shameful amount actually) are operating on a ridiculously small profit margin and are barely surviving. With the way things are, I can't really blame them for not wanting to pay for a website.
 
Perhaps things are different in other parts. I've been looking about and it seems there is more outlook in places like Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire, not so much because there is more work, but because living expenses are much cheaper. Is London simply not feasible anymore?
 
Anyway, that's me in a nutshell. I'm just feeling extremely disillusioned and perhaps I'm looking for someone to cheer me up, to convince me there's hope here, that I'm not wasting my time and years. Anyone in London maybe? Hope you guys are doing okay!

Good to meet you Markeh. Introductions are futile, good to see you pitching in.
 
See you around the boards.

Well since window is only my secondary operating system I wouldn't go out to buy it. It if comes out within the next year I should be able to get it on MSDN for free. Otherwise Windows 7 is a great OS as it is.

O and go for a solid state drive

I recon you should get a better core and then add windows 7 and then the screens, you'll get used to it and then it will be a beauti

For the most part clients are pretty good, but every once in a while you get one that has trouble written all over them. Don't ever feel ashamed asking for payment or from pointing out that until they pay then all your work still belongs to you. This should be made clear in the contract between you and the client along with penalties for non or late payment. Personally I ask for a deposit up front and this tends to weed out those who want something for nothing.
 
A particulary useful safeguard is to serve the sites CSS file from a web hosting domain under your complete control until final payment has been made. It's amazing how fast they find the money when the site stops looking right.

It's good to see people willing to help others out, nice design btw!

I think you need to ask yourself the basic questions: What are you trying to convey with this logo? What essence/feeling are you trying to capture? What do you want the viewer to understand from this logo?
 
Right now I see a lot of disconnect. You talk about the art of wine, but the font you chose is rather unrefined and ugly. The illustration you have is poorly positioned and way too detailed to be of any use as a logo.
 
If you are going to use it for the website AND in print, on labels, etc. then you will need something that scales well. It looks like you created this in Photoshop or another raster image editor. I don't see the sharpness that vector graphics produces.
 
Choose a font that is artsy, classic, elegant, refined, etc. The suggestion of Georgia is a pretty solid one, though it really doesn't stand up in print as well as it does digitally. If this were my project I'd look towards some of the more common classic fonts: Caslon Pro, Garamond Pro, Palatino Linotype, Minion, Jenson, etc. The Q is such a fascinating letter (and it's not too often you get to work with awesome letters in logos), so find a font with a great Q glyph. If you are going for a more Roman/Greek feel you could look into Trajan Pro.
 
Colorwise, pick another gold/yellow color. The current one lacks some life, and with wine I think of life and energy right away. If you want to stick with the desaturated yellows, pick one that has a metallic feel to it. I like the red and yellow combination, the red is a pretty good shade.
 
Grapes and vines make decent imagery for the logo, but render something a little less literal in illustrator.
 
I hate sublines in logos, but in this case it's appropriate and you could probably use some good typography skills to turn this into something really beautiful.
 
I'd probably start over so you aren't distracted by your current version, but if you feel like you must revise what you have, be very critical and make sure you are making your decisions for a reason.

Thanks for your attention. U know the colors in my logo are the colors of red and white wines. I'm confused with the white background, as I'm afraid it won't be nice on the wine label and neither at the website.

My web designing daughter.

In a way I say do this - these ******* clients have to learn. I've got a client at the moment who's 4 1/2 weeks overdue. First I sent my invoice, then two weeks later they wanted my IBAN and SWIFT codes - ok - apprently they "changed their account system" in the meantime - then I sent those about two weeks ago, 1 week ago they said they were incorrect, phoned my bank, they were correct. One week later still no money. And it's a corporate company too.
 
Compared to another client I've got who pays £300 chunks UP FRONT, knows how to work a PC properly, and to bot....drum roll..... uses Firefox. That's a private client.
 
Is it me or are the corporate companies worse payers? Ok they may pay more, but that's if you can crowbar it out of them.
 
If all freelancers push to get their debts then hopefully eventually clients will learn that they can't dick us about.
 
There are others on here however that might say write it off and move on. Your choice.
 
Sorry I know that doesn't help yo umuch with the technicalities, just chipping in a general opinion.

You can chase a bad debt for as long as you need to. Don't forget to add statutory interest - that's your right whether it was specifically stated in the contract or not, and if a contract specifically excludes charging interest (shouldn't do, if you're freelancing it's YOUR contracts you should be using) and the client reneges on a payment, you've got a good chance of challenging it as an unfair contractual term.
 
Best thing to do is send a new invoice to each client for the amount plus statutory interest, specifying 7 day terms. Explain in the covering letter that you're charging interest under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts Act. If they haven't paid after the 7 days, get a solicitor to send a Letter before Action.