[OT] YIKES! Bandwidth disaster

MaryL -out-the-litter wrote:

In the meantime, can they give you a different posting link? You would have
to send the new link to anyone you wanted to have access, but it would
prevent all those thousands of hits from strangers.

I'm not sure what you mean. I created the first link, and if I wanted
to, I could create a second one. Nobody else would be providing me with
a link...

Joycd

wrote in message
...
MaryL -out-the-litter wrote:

In the meantime, can they give you a different posting link? You would
have
to send the new link to anyone you wanted to have access, but it would
prevent all those thousands of hits from strangers.

I'm not sure what you mean. I created the first link, and if I wanted
to, I could create a second one. Nobody else would be providing me with
a link...

Joycd

I'm not sure, either, because I don't know how it was set up. However, do
you have a domain and is this a link to the domain? If so, can the domain
be moved or renamed? I don't know how web space is set up, but I assume
there would be some way of changing the name (and therefore the link). I
was only suggesting that you ask your ISP about that and see if there is
someway around the problem you described.

MaryL

MaryL -out-the-litter wrote:

I'm not sure what you mean. I created the first link, and if I wanted
to, I could create a second one. Nobody else would be providing me with
a link...

I'm not sure, either, because I don't know how it was set up. However, do
you have a domain and is this a link to the domain? If so, can the domain
be moved or renamed? I don't know how web space is set up, but I assume
there would be some way of changing the name (and therefore the link). I
was only suggesting that you ask your ISP about that and see if there is
someway around the problem you described.

Well, the homepage on my web space is /blah blah blah/jwermont. I
created a subdirectory under that called "tapeart" and stuck an html
file, "tapeart.html" inside the directory. So the full path was:
/blah blah blah/jwermont/tapeart/tapeart.html

If I wanted to, I could create another directory called "newtapeart",
and move the html file into that directory, and the new link would be
to /blah blah blah/jwermont/newtapeart/tapeart.html

But I'm not going to do that, because I don't want to take the risk
that the new link will also be circulated around and get thousands
more hits. So I'm done exhibiting the tapeart file! Ketzl's Dad saved
the page and has offered to email it to interested parties.

I put in a call to my ISP earlier, and they're supposed to call me
back later today. (I wanted to speak to the same guy who called me
last night.) I'll let you all know how it turns out...

Joyce

wrote in message
...
I got an email from my ISP today saying that I've used 25 *gigabytes*
of bandwidth this month, and at this rate, I will end up owing $193 at
the end of the month. Of course, I assumed this was a mistake, because
I never use anywhere near that much. So I called them, and the guy I
talked to said that it certainly looked like a mistake. I do save a
bunch of files on my home directory and web space, but it comes to
maybe 50 megabytes, including some jpgs and wav files and lots of big
text files. Nowhere near 25 GB.

Tonight I got home and there was a phone message from them saying that
the big usage of bandwidth came from the fact that I got about 400K hits
on my webpage, because of those pictures of the scotch tape sculptures.
My father had sent me an email with the photos, and I'd created a little
HTML file that did nothing but display the pictures, and posted the link
on this newsgroup.

Well, somebody reading it here thought the pictures were extremely cool,
and posted my link onto stumbleonit.com, resulting in thousands and
thousands of people coming to look at the pictures on my site. Hey, it's
flattering, but very, very expensive flattery. All those downloads tap
the resources of the server, and someone's gotta pay for it. But, yikes!

At the end of the phone message, the guy said I should call him back
tomorrow and he'd "see what he could do for me". I really hope they'll
give me a break because this is the first time this has happened with
my site, in my many years of using their service. I was naive and stupid
and didn't realize what might happen. I also didn't realize that I would
be held responsible for all that bandwidth. Duh.

All I can say is, I'm never going to do that again! I'll probably put
stuff on my site, but I'm not going to post it publicly anymore. Too
bad, but I can't take that risk again.

Joyce - poorer but wiser

Do you have a contract with your ISP? If so, read it carefully. My ISP is
responsible for dealing with overage in bandwidth issues (as in shutting
down the page is it goes over the limit outlined in my contract). It is
almost impossible for a user to limit bandwidth to his/her site since the
user has no control (as in your case) of who or how many view his/her site -
but the ISP can easily close down the page in cases like this.

Anyway, purrs that this gets resolved in your favor!

Hugs,

CatNipped

Do you have a contract with your ISP? If so, read it carefully. My ISP
is
responsible for dealing with overage in bandwidth issues (as in shutting
down the page is it goes over the limit outlined in my contract).

Piggybacking on Lori's post here, my ISP, Comcast, will also shut down my
ability to download stuff or my going over my bandwidth issues if that ever
happens. I cannot go beyond a certain amount of bandwidth and I cannot
download beyond a certain amount of gigabytes. They will notify me if any
of these 2 things happen so I will know why I can't do certain things, and
at
the same time I don't accrue unwanted bills. Maybe you could look around
for such an ISP so this would never happen to you again.
Hope everything turns out for the best for you.

Lily & her mama

--
Irulan
from the stars we come
to the stars we return
from now until the end of time.

"CatNipped" wrote in message
...
wrote in message
...
I got an email from my ISP today saying that I've used 25 *gigabytes*
of bandwidth this month, and at this rate, I will end up owing $193 at
the end of the month. Of course, I assumed this was a mistake, because
I never use anywhere near that much. So I called them, and the guy I
talked to said that it certainly looked like a mistake. I do save a
bunch of files on my home directory and web space, but it comes to
maybe 50 megabytes, including some jpgs and wav files and lots of big
text files. Nowhere near 25 GB.

Tonight I got home and there was a phone message from them saying that
the big usage of bandwidth came from the fact that I got about 400K hits
on my webpage, because of those pictures of the scotch tape sculptures.
My father had sent me an email with the photos, and I'd created a little
HTML file that did nothing but display the pictures, and posted the link
on this newsgroup.

Well, somebody reading it here thought the pictures were extremely cool,
and posted my link onto stumbleonit.com, resulting in thousands and
thousands of people coming to look at the pictures on my site. Hey, it's
flattering, but very, very expensive flattery. All those downloads tap
the resources of the server, and someone's gotta pay for it. But, yikes!

At the end of the phone message, the guy said I should call him back
tomorrow and he'd "see what he could do for me". I really hope they'll
give me a break because this is the first time this has happened with
my site, in my many years of using their service. I was naive and stupid
and didn't realize what might happen. I also didn't realize that I would
be held responsible for all that bandwidth. Duh.

All I can say is, I'm never going to do that again! I'll probably put
stuff on my site, but I'm not going to post it publicly anymore. Too
bad, but I can't take that risk again.

Joyce - poorer but wiser

Do you have a contract with your ISP? If so, read it carefully. My ISP
is responsible for dealing with overage in bandwidth issues (as in
shutting down the page is it goes over the limit outlined in my contract).
It is almost impossible for a user to limit bandwidth to his/her site
since the user has no control (as in your case) of who or how many view
his/her site - but the ISP can easily close down the page in cases like
this.

Anyway, purrs that this gets resolved in your favor!

Hugs,

CatNipped

CatNipped wrote:

Do you have a contract with your ISP? If so, read it carefully. My ISP is
responsible for dealing with overage in bandwidth issues (as in shutting
down the page is it goes over the limit outlined in my contract). It is
almost impossible for a user to limit bandwidth to his/her site since the
user has no control (as in your case) of who or how many view his/her site -
but the ISP can easily close down the page in cases like this.

They do have a bandwidth-protection mode, but apparently the average user
doesn't know about it, or else I was just not paying enough attention. It
wasn't set when this happened, obviously, but it is now in place, in case
something I post on my site is ever that popular again. (Apparently, my
site was the #2 site visited on May 18, according to Google. Wow! Too bad
I didn't have advertising on it, as Kathy had suggested. Too bad I'm not
the artist trying to get a little publicity!)

One of the tech-support people told me that there is a term for what
happened to me - I got "slashdotted". Apparently stumbleupon.com
(where my link was posted) is small potatoes compared to slashdot.com,
in terms of reaching huge numbers of people. I had 866K hits in 3 days.
Aside from worrying about having to pay for that, I think that's kind
of cool!

Thanks for the purrs,
Joyce

Here's a link to the tape art online if anyone wants to see it again:

http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/outside.html

The artist is Mark Jenkins. He has other stuff at his site too. :^)

http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/index.html





Renee

ReneeM wrote:

Here's a link to the tape art online if anyone wants to see it again:
http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/outside.html

The artist is Mark Jenkins. He has other stuff at his site too. :^)
http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/index.html

I had no idea where the pictures came from. My dad just sent me a bunch
of jpgs. I'm glad you posted the artist's real name and link to his site.

I've put up a single page saying "This site taken down due to exceeded
bandwidth", with a link to Mark Jenkins's site so people could still see
the artwork. (And he can get the credit!)

This whole experience has been quite a lesson for me in more ways than
one.

Joyce

ReneeM wrote:
Here's a link to the tape art online if anyone wants to see it again:

http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/outside.html

The artist is Mark Jenkins. He has other stuff at his site too. :^)

http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/index.html





Renee

I see there are some there that wern't in joyce's post.
--
Adrian (Owned by Snoopy and Bagheera)
Cats leave pawprints on your heart.
http://community.webshots.com/user/clowderuk

Yikes, that sux! What is your monthly download limit? Funny because I
always thought in the US it's unlimited. Over here in Australia I have
a $49/month package that gives me 7Gb during the day and another 14Gb
from 10pm-10am. I always download my 21Gb every month because I'll be
damned if I waste it ;-)
Of course, I download all my TV shows so that's why it's so high. If I
didn't do that I doubt I would ever get over 2Gb/month.
I hope you figure out a solution to your problem with your ISP. You
know, I was tempted to send your link to a friend of mine that I know
would really love those pics. But I thought she would send them on and
who knows where that would lead and I did see in your link that it was
from your private domain. So I didn't.
--
Britta
Purring is an automatic safety valve device for dealing with happiness
overflow.
Check out pictures of Vino at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/badwilson


wrote:
I got an email from my ISP today saying that I've used 25 *gigabytes*
of bandwidth this month, and at this rate, I will end up owing $193 at
the end of the month. Of course, I assumed this was a mistake, because
I never use anywhere near that much. So I called them, and the guy I
talked to said that it certainly looked like a mistake. I do save a
bunch of files on my home directory and web space, but it comes to
maybe 50 megabytes, including some jpgs and wav files and lots of big
text files. Nowhere near 25 GB.

Tonight I got home and there was a phone message from them saying that
the big usage of bandwidth came from the fact that I got about 400K
hits on my webpage, because of those pictures of the scotch tape
sculptures. My father had sent me an email with the photos, and I'd
created a little HTML file that did nothing but display the pictures,
and posted the link on this newsgroup.

Well, somebody reading it here thought the pictures were extremely
cool, and posted my link onto stumbleonit.com, resulting in thousands
and thousands of people coming to look at the pictures on my site.
Hey, it's flattering, but very, very expensive flattery. All those
downloads tap the resources of the server, and someone's gotta pay
for it. But, yikes!

At the end of the phone message, the guy said I should call him back
tomorrow and he'd "see what he could do for me". I really hope they'll
give me a break because this is the first time this has happened with
my site, in my many years of using their service. I was naive and
stupid and didn't realize what might happen. I also didn't realize
that I would be held responsible for all that bandwidth. Duh.

All I can say is, I'm never going to do that again! I'll probably put
stuff on my site, but I'm not going to post it publicly anymore. Too
bad, but I can't take that risk again.

Joyce - poorer but wiser