androidland is the first android retail store , opened by the carrier telstra on bourke street , melbourne , australia , in december 2011 .

if it proves successful , it may expand within the country and internationally .

the store is themed heavily in green , featuring several android “ green robot “ sculptures . in the store , telstra provides visitors with an interactive spaceship zone that features a flight simulator ( via the google earth software , a liquid galaxy set-up ) , also including a massive screen on which visitors can play angry birds . it features scented areas with gingerbread and grass aromas , called “ android grass “ , to further immerse visitors .

androidland

prediction : people take a ride through androidland , but end up leaving with an iphone .
today we were in melbourne for the opening of androidland , a special android - themed zone in telstra’s flagship store on bourke street .
special cashback promo from android land , 2 - 12 april 2015 . visit android land at 2nd floor . # androidland # samsungid urltoken
androidland is the brainchild of australian operator telstra and operates as a store within a store , delivering smartphones and tablets that run google’s android operating system , all in one place .
telstra appear to have totally embraced the theme with open arms , with androidland looking unashamedly fun . if you’re in australia and fancy visiting a place where gingerbread smells fill the shopping space and gadgets and green robots adorn … well … everywhere , visit androidland in the telstra store 246 bourke street ( cnr swanston & bourke ) melbourne , vic , 3000 .
check out the video below for a peek at the spaceship . really . that ' s what they call it . planning a visit ? androidland is open now , seven days a week .
if you’re an android fan and happen to be local to the australian city of melbourne then you’ll be pleased to know that the world’s first dedicated android store has opened , and it’s called androidland .
designed by telstra in collaboration with google and handset makers samsung , htc , sony ericsson , motorola and lg , androidland features displays and games that will help shoppers learn about android phones and tablets .
telstra has opened its androidland retail store in melbourne , australia . developed in conjunction with google and its hardware vendors , shoppers can get hands - on time with the latest android gadgets in this unique environment .
modi also envisions androidland to become a destination where developers can come and showcase their apps and even host learning sessions for existing as well as potential android users – a concept that sounds inspired from apple stores .
androidland store staff ( spice android gurus ) have been specially trained on the android platform and will be able to help you select the device that’s right for you and then set - up , customize and provide apps recommendations .
here is something pretty cool for the weekend . google has teamed up with telstra in melbourne , australia , and partners htc , lg , motorola , samsung , and sony ericsson to create androidland , the world’s first dedicated android store .
in androidland , htc kept things classy with the beautiful one m8 and samsung kept things plastic with the galaxy s5 . but it was left to lg to offer something new at the start of the year with the lg g3 and its uhd ( translation : very sharp ) screen .
[ . . . ] urltoken they have already one setup in melbourne in collaborate with the telco there…telstra . . androidland : the world’s first android store * | * digital buzz blog again hate to bust the bubble , but singapore is just too small and unimportant for [ . . . ]
australian mobile network operator telstra has overhauled its flagship store in melbourne , turning it into a miniature android theme park just in time for the holidays . the new set of android attractions and displays , which telstra is calling androidland , was created in collaboration with google and various android handset manufacturers .
androidland ( right ) — dark and dimly lit , with a design more evocative of an early 90s chuck e . cheese arcade pit than a high - end retail store . staffed by two disengaged lunkheads , who expertly manage not only to ignore the only customer on the floor , but to be at least fifty feet away from him .
despite its massive growth over the course of the past year one thing android has been lacking when compared against its staunch mobile rival ios is a flagship retail presence and themed shopping experience to compete with the slick and pervasive apple store juggernaut . enter androidland a dedicated 154sqm android shopping space which opened today located within telstra’s bourke street store in melbourne .
the androidland attraction at telstra ' s flagship store looks like a creative attempt at building better awareness of android as an umbrella brand , showcasing the breadth of the platform rather than pushing a specific product . it could help illustrate to customers how android offers a wide range of choice in hardware configurations and software customizations—one of the platform ' s strengths .
androidland which telstra claims is the fruits of google’s first - ever retail partership with a mobile carrier to promote its mobile os is being presented as a big fun and interactive way to explore and discover the android universe with on - site ‘experts’ trained by google ( sound familiar ? ) on hand to help shoppers out with any questions they have and walk them through the software and hardware .
spice also has its own multi - brand retail chain under the hotspot brand and those will continue to exist . “we have a chain of 450 retail stores across the country that will continue to exist . we hope to learn from the first two stores and would look at converting some of our hotspot stores into androidland in the future , ” dilip modi , co - founder and group ceo , spice global told bgr india .
the store will feature the latest android phones and tablets for customers to have a play with and a number of theme - park - esque touches have been designed to elevate androidland above your everyday kmart / dick smith shopping experience : an “interactive spaceship zone” lets shoppers play with google earth and angry birds on a giant screen ; a huge 24 x 9 metre window display incorporates an augmented reality game for curious onlookers ; and a play zone includes skill testers clown games and a google books virtual library .
the nexus 6p is now official , grabbing the phablet banner straight from the hands of last year ' s nexus 6 . still , does the new top phablet in vanilla androidland boast enough improvements and new features to make an upgrade worth it ? do the new design and improved specs sheet mean that nexus 6 should run wild to the google store and order huawei ' s first crack at making a nexus smartphone as fast as they possibly can ? we will try to answer these questions for you in the paragraphs right below .
i went there today and it ' s about half of the top foor that ' s
androidland .
it does seem to be geared towards kids , but that can be good . it ' s hard to get people with kids to stop and talk about something like a phone . in this store the kids were entertained and sales people could make their pitch . i got a steve irwin android pin from the claw machine , and a flash drive thingy . i rather liked it myself , but i have something of a peter pan complex .
mobile carrier telstra , through a joint effort with google and its vendors , has launched what is being dubbed the world ' s first retail presence dedicated solely to android . a store within a store , androidland — in development since july — can be found inside telstra ' s bourke street location in melbourne , australia . the shop serves as an exhibit for the latest and greatest devices utilizing the mobile platform , with employees ( or
experts
) having received their training directly from google so as to provide a level of product familiarity exceeding that of your typical wireless salesperson .
but it ' s the environment that ' s the real story here . themed heavily after the green robot we ' ve all come to know , androidland sets out to offer unique experiences by allowing visitors to play angry birds and navigate google earth on massive displays . there are boardwalk games and occasional free snacks . the store even features scented areas with gingerbread and grass aromas to further encapsulate the senses . while it may at times sound more like a theme park than a retail outlet , the idea here is clearly to form a tangible ( and profitable ) relationship between consumers and android .
no , that ' s not the latest addition to google ' s mountain view campus . that is telstra ' s brand new androidland store , which has just opened its doors in melbourne , australia . the store was built with some degree of co - operation from both google and android handset makers ( including google - trained experts that are available to help customers ) , and it offers a whole range of different android products for sale , along with other google - related attractions like a giant , multi - screen display for exploring google earth . telstra also claims that it ' s the
world ' s first
android store , although there ' s no word on any plans for additional stores ( either from telstra or other carriers ) . head on past the break for a quick video tour . [ thanks , hayden ]
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inside the store , telstra provides customers with a dedicated interactive spaceship zone that features a flight simulator via the search giant’s google earth software , also including an massive screen on which visitors can play angry birds and a dedicated area to ‘androidify’ themselves .
customers are also invited to sit under the pixel tree and play with the android devices on display at the store , which includes handsets and tablets from samsung , htc , sony ericsson , motorola and lg .
google australia has played an important part in opening the new store , helping to train the store’s android experts to assist visitors with devices , help them set up their new handsets and tablets and recommend applications . the store opens at the perfect time to lure in christmas shoppers and help boost the profile of the android platform in the city .
read next : worried carrier iq might be installed on your android device ? detect it with this app .
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india ' s first chain of android focused stores . discover the latest and the widest range of android smartphones and tablets from all the big brands . an engaging store concept especially developed by spice in collaboration with google .
inside these vast stores , you will get a comprehensive , never - before experience of the android platform - products , accessories , apps , helpful assistants , and of course , the gentle green android robots .
explore our spacious stores and experience the latest android technology . learn about the things you can do with mobile internet . interact with the displays and devices at leisure . take photographs with the android robots .
you will find all the top smartphone and tablet brands under one roof - spice , sony , samsung , micromax , karbonn , htc , lg and many more . explore accessories specially designed for your android smartphone .
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technically , it’s a store within a store , but it’s a huge retail experience , complete with massive multi - screen google earth installation powered by an android phone , large screen angry birds gaming , android merchandise galore , skills testers , amusement park style games , spaceship , chill out spaces , a full product range and experts on hand to sell the android dream . has anyone been ?
checked out the store yesterday and it’s pretty cool . worth checking out if you have an adroid or thinking of getting one .
i went last weekend . it looked cool but it won’t persuade me to go back to an android phone . after spending a year on a samsung android phone and disliking the complexity of the experience i’ve recently gone back to iphone ios . much better . and simpler .
snap on tool storage : i finished up creating a case to kind and also sho . . .
jez : so not doesn ' t have valet mode ? worrying . . .
lift : cool installation . hope to see more like that and . . .
themselves , fly through the world with google earth , and play with apps on a giant touchscreen .
and here’s where you can have a look at all the android handsets and tablets that might make a good gift .
australia has gone from lagging to leading the worldwide smartphone revolution in the last year ? we estimate that each month hundreds of thousands of aussies are buying a smartphone - - so chances are they’re on the christmas list of someone you love .
for the record , we’re ok with the “one for me , one for you” school of christmas shopping .
it ' s available now , along with watchos , tvos and homepod versions .
the company will launch an ipo on a ' recognized ' us stock exchange .
it comes with boards , fishing rods , a tent and a solar - powered shower .
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spice mobility has launched india ' s first multi - brand android experience stores in noida and bangalore . the stores that will retail android smartphones , tablets and related accessories will emphasize
spice mobility has launched india’s first multi - brand android experience stores in noida and bangalore . the stores that will retail android smartphones , tablets and related accessories will emphasize on product experience and educating first - time android users about what they can do with an android device . apart from featuring the latest gadgets , these stores will have trained staff that will help users answer their smartphone related queries and also give demos of the latest apps and games .
spice has collaborated with google to launch the stores , which are similar to the ones that have been launched in australia and recently in indonesia . while google has not invested financially in the stores , it is providing analytics data , helping train staff and provide regular updates on the latest apps . google has also assisted spice in designing the stores , which will have devices from global brands like samsung , sony , htc , lg and lenovo as well as local brands like micromax , xolo , karbonn and spice . the stores will have wi - fi access for people to come and check out the devices .
one of the biggest challenges for spice , however , would be to convert footfalls to sales . while such experience stores see good footfalls from people who come and experience the products , a high percentage of those footfalls do not buy from such stores and go hunting for the best deal possible either online or from their friendly neighborhood retailer who gives them a “regular customer” discount from his margin .
modi acknowledges the trend but maintains that androidlands are definitely not a cost centre and they will eventually have to make money . he believes that these are still early days for a concept that has not existed before in india and the company will learn and keep evolving . apart from retailing hardware , spice is also looking at tie - ups with carriers to provide special data plans for its customers .
the 900 square feet store in noida is at the great india place mall whereas the flagship 2 , 300 square feet store in bangalore is in koramangala .
. @ xiaomi may be planning to launch a new brand as # pocophone gets certified by the @ fcc . urltoken urltoken
it was only a matter of time before someone , somewhere thought it would be a great idea to open an android shop , selling android phones , tablets , and paraphernalia . unfortunately , this didn’t happen in the uk , but about as far away as you can get , australia .
telstra , australian telecoms giant launched the new store in melbourne’s cbd . this android haven is spread over 154 square metres , with little green robots everywhere you look and a host of google - centric elements within . these include google earth on a giant screen - matrix , androidify walls so you can make a youdroid , as well as a huge touch - screen for some over - sized angry birds fun .
android one of the most widely adopted mobile os platforms was formed in 2003 , and it was acquired by google in 2005 . from that time it has evolved as a open - source platform which now the most used mobile platform in the world . [ x ] - cube a mobile solutions company , has created an infographic about the complete story of android . its fully explains the path of android evolution .
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to mark the occasion , and to illustrate just how old and wise we are , we’ll be taking a look back at the games , trends , and general happenings for each of the years we’ve been around . ( see
we’re now into a year that you might even remember something of yourself : 2014 . nothing ? then allow us to jog your memory .
if you’ve ever heard anyone spouting that ios gaming has lost its magic since the early years , just show them the 2014 roster . this was a year in which the ingenious
asked us to rejig the panels of a comic book story . meanwhile , modern - day pc classics such as
it was also another year where android tended to get many of the best games at the same time as ios , or soon after .
it wasn’t a particularly great year for ps vita , with evidence of poor sales leading to sony scaling back first party development . but the 3ds had a pretty decent 2014 , with
we were well in tune with apple’s hardware release rhythm by this point , so we weren’t surprised when the iphone 6 rocked up with an all new design . with android sales booming , we weren’t surprised that it came with a much larger 4 . 7 - inch display either , not to mention an even bigger 5 . 5 - inch option in the iphone 6 plus .
showing that it wasn’t impressed with apple’s super - sizing , google got silly at the end of the year with the launch of the nexus 6 – a whopping great lunk of a phone with a 6 - inch display .
early in the year , google announced that lenovo would be buying motorola off it just a few short years after google’s acquisition .
sticking with the subject of acquisitions , this was the year that apple bought beats – not for its overpriced headphones , as it turned out , but for its hardly - used - at - the - time streaming service .
later in the year , google beat apple to market with its android wear smartwatch platform . the first examples hit the market in june , while the apple watch wouldn’t go on sale until 2015 .
this was also the year that google launched android 5 . 0 with a bold new ' material design ' .
in a bit of a first for the team , 2014 saw steel media launch its own game .
of course , we put our own cheeky spin on proceedings , chiefly in the way that the game told a tale of one man’s descent into disappointing handheld console hell .
what were we thinking ? about games , mostly . always with the games .
conference series , with outings in london and helsinki establishing us as a serious player on the conference circuit . even if we say so ourselves .
this sporty year kicked off with the sochi winter olympics in february . despite a fair amount of controversy during the lead - up to the games ( this was putin’s russia , after all ) , they passed without incident .
in the summer we had the football world cup in brazil , which also attracted a fair amount of controversy for how the additional facilities had been constructed and paid for . on the pitch , germany won the prestigious prize .
on a more serious note , this was the year that malaysia airlines flight 370 disappeared , and russia ( them again ) risked war by annexing crimea .
the pocket gamer 10th anniversary is a month - long celebration of the last decade of mobile games running march 10th - april 10th and featuring a stream of retrospective articles and fun stuff , supported by our friends at gram games , gamevil , joycity , rovio , nordeus , and ninja kiwi . head over to the pg 10th anniversary homepage for more information .
jim carrey ' s about to make it really hard to hate dr . robotnik in sonic the hedgehog ' s upcoming film | news
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according to a report on the official google australia blog , the attractions include a mock spaceship in which visitors can experience virtual flight thanks to google earth . the site is decorated extensively with android - themed furnishings and the distinctive green android mascot . of course , it also has plenty of android smartphones and tablets on display for testing and available for purchase .
due to the diversity of the product lineup , the android platform doesn ' t naturally lend itself to the same kind of brand marketing that apple has been able to pursue with its singular iphone product . individual handset manufacturers and carriers tend to have their own distinct imagery and marketing style for their respective android - based products .
ryan is an ars editor emeritus in the field of open source , and and still contributes regularly . he manages developer relations at montage studio .
too bad android is socialistic garbage . what kind of company gives away an os for free ? that ' s right , one that doesn ' t play by the rules of the market . no wonder apple is crushing them in market share .
⇒ please read our policy on trolling . questions about this moderation must be directed to our moderation team .
when i looked quickly at the image , i thought it has something to do with xbox . . . lulz
google should implement standards so store designs can not look like this . the chuck e cheese ' s aesthetic isnt going to help anyone .
this is what android needs , current marketing is atrocious . different vendors marketing in different ways just confuses the customer .
in canada one of the carriers ( i think rogers ) has been running the
androids everywhere
campaign for a while with city buses decorated into android imagery .
first post , first troll . wear it like a badge , apple guy .
here at ars . i ' m surprised the ars staff even lets him complete a dns lookup , let alone continue to access the site .
well , it is australia , mate . they ' ve got a different sensibility . within the asian sphere of influence , they are . a trip to hong kong , for instance , brings a new definition of the word
gaudy
.
so apple fills its stores with its products for people to play with and try out . android needs some sort of fun - park ? what does that have to do with the user experience on the phone ? being an australian , i have had to sit through months of television ads from telstra about how something
wonderful
,
beautiful
,
[ add hyperbole here ]
is coming , only to find that it ended up being just a marketing campaign for android phones . here i was thinking they would be introducing something isp related , or actually doing something about their atrocious customer service , etc . greenhousegeorge , go easy with the racial stereotyping will you ?
first , i ' d like to point out it was tongue - in - cheek . sorry you didn ' t pick up on that .
telstra ' s greatest challenge now is that its sales force in 2007 , 2008 , 2009 went out and got themselves a handset with a closed operating system and struggle to provide customers with effective advice on the android alternative and are not taking the opportunity to discuss with customers the less expensive and vastly more flexible android system when they come in asking for an iphone . what the customers are requiring at this point is a discussion that starts something like this . . . .
sure , we can provide you with the iphone , before you make a 24 month decision lets show you the android alternative which is less expensive and more flexible with more features
.
lucky you , i had to get a vacuum cleaner to collect the glass pieces from mine . . . .
no , that would be scott adams . double ' t ' and single ' d ' .
plus , spelling aside , this is the internet . anyone can create an account with whatever name they want .
of course telstra are promoting android , it ' s the only platform that will let them install their mammoth amounts of crapware on the phone . one of my workmates who picked up an android phone from them found it came pre - loaded with 60 apps they couldn ' t remove without rooting . telstra are cheering for android at every step . i would be completely unsurprised if all telstra phones come with carrieriq as well .
or you could all do what wise people do and ignore the troll and concentrate on the article . instead you are filling up the comments with useless words and undermining the value of ars for the rest of us .
a butt ugly store concept ( you have to see it to believe it ) by an ugly couple of companies . you cannot expect more from a monopolist and a data and patent thief can you . and don ' t you just love the hemeroid fanboys . only they are allowed to have an opinion . what a sad bunch . oh and for all you sincerely patriotic americans that buy completely foreign products ( samdung and htc . . . laughing loudly whilst taking money to the bank ) keep buying your toy imitation wannabe phones you do your country proud .
if you are american or australian you probably are foreign to the land you live in , within the last couple of 100 years so just get over it . unless you ' re a shareholder i don ' t see how large companies listed
locally
on your stock exchange help ( or have ever ) helped you much ?
ok , so where can an adult smartphone user and semi - enthusiast go to discuss this stuff without it devolving into childishness ? i don ' t know what it is about the subject , but every freaking time and every freaking where . wow .
hope their subtitle is : google want all of your info and wants to make huge money off it . the majority of people are ignorant to this fact .
of course telstra are promoting android , it ' s the only platform that will let them install their mammoth amounts of crapware on the phone .
this is correct . and , as the remnants of the old government - owned monopoly , telstra has a very bad reputation in australia . the only good thing about it is a superior network . the t - store has always been s bit of a joke . at least they might get some people through the door now and the new display ( it ' s not the whole store as the headline erroneously suggests ) cleans up the riot of android devices . the kiddie attraction also gives some of us even more reason to avoid android .
the devices will continue as before . telstra are just clasping at straws trying to save a struggling store in one of the most expensive retail spots in australia . heck , even nike , who had the store before telstra , couldn ' t make it work .
telstra couldn ' t give a damn which phones they sell , as long as they make their cut . so either the cuts on android are better than the iphone or someone else is paying for this display . most likely both . ps : - die die die !
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in melbourne , a place to hawk android tablets and phones made by various manufacturers . so how’s it stand up against the apple store ? let’s see ! ( click to enlarge )
( left ) — brightly lit , thronged with customers , tastefully designed with the finest materials and well - staffed with bright , enthusiastic employees at the top of their field who are constantly moving to help people with questions .
posted : 29 sep 2015 , 16 : 34 , posted by peter k .
the two devices come with vastly different exterior looks . the nexus 6 employs an arched plastic casing at the back and a metal frame on the sides . in the meantime , the nexus 6p employs a svelte all - metal exterior that features aircraft - grade aluminum . favoring one over the other judging by the exterior design will be mostly a matter of one ' s personal preference . personally , we feel like that the nexus 6p might have a more premium feel than its predecessor . if design and design alone is of utmost importance to you , then the nexus 6p could easily score a point over its predecessor .
in terms of size , the nexus 6p is a smidgen taller than the nexus 6 , yet not as wide and a bit thinner . however , the nexus 6p has worse screen - to - body ratio - 71 . 77 % vs 74 . 03 % . this means that the older android champ is more efficient in terms of utilizing that front real estate . additionally , both are not that much different in terms of weight . in this category , we feel like the two are pretty much tied .
additionally , the nexus 6p comes with a usb type - c connector at the bottom . a suitable cable is supplied in the box . bottom line : тhe aluminum nexus 6p comes with arguably better design than the nexus 6 ; it ' s also narrower , thinner , and lighter . also - usb type - c aboard .
the nexus 6p has a 5 . 7 - inch amoled display with a resolution of 1440 x 2560 pixels , while the nexus 6 is equipped with a 6 - inch screen boasting the same resolution , which is also of the amoled kind . of course , this means that the new nexus has a sharper display than its predecessor ( 518ppi vs 493ppi ) , which is a differentiating feature that might not be easily discernible by the untrained , naked eye , but still deserves a mention . both displays are protected by gorilla glass , but the nexus 6p boasts gorilla glass 4 , while the nexus 6 - gorilla glass 3 . that said , if the screen estate is important to you , you will probably be reluctant to switch to the 6p .
this category is a pretty tricky one . google decided that qualcomm ' s top - tier
810 v2 . 1 should make the cut inside the nexus 6p . by this time , you ' re probably familiar with all the fuzz around this chipset , which has been plagued by a host of overheating issues , but we digress . the 64 - bit octa - core chip on the nexus 6p is clocked at 2 . 0ghz and has an adreno 430 gpu on board .
being the revised v2 . 1 version , the chipset inside should theoretically be putting the kibosh on all overheating issues , but we can ' t say whether this is true or not just yet . the nexus 6 , on the other hand , comes forth with a snapdragon 805 , which is not the creme de la creme anymore , but is still a potent chipset that performs well if you don ' t push it just too hard . the one in the nexus 6 is a quad - core one clocked at 2 . 7ghz .
what ' s our verdict in this category ? all things considered , we are inclined to go for the snapdragon 810 due to the future - proof haze flowing around it .
there ' s a 3 , 450mah battery unit inside the nexus 6p , which is bigger than the 3 , 220mah one at the rear of the nexus 6 . is this a reason for upgrading ? well , most probably yes , but we will need to put the new entrant through our battery benchmark test in order to see how it stacks up against its predecessor . as a refresher , the nexus 6 endured for 7 hours and 53 minutes in our battery life test , which is a solid achievement . this result keeps our hopes for the nexux 6p high .
yet , do have in mind that the nexus 6p doesn ' t come with wireless charging on board , while the nexus 6 does .
let us throw some raw specs at you : the nexus 6p comes with a 12 . 3mp camera at the back that is most likely toting a 1 / 2 . 3
sony imx377 sensor that has
lens and 1 . 55 - micron pixels that . interestingly enough , it seems that this sensor is intended for compact point - and - shoot cameras . it shoots 4k videos and 240fps slo - mo videos , which are pretty compelling functionalities that heavily tip the scales in favor of the device . the camera also comes with laser - assisted auto - focus . all things considered , we have pretty high expectations for the shooter on the nexus 6p . the nexus 6 , which comes with a 13mp camera that has an aperture of
performed very good , but it seems that the nexus 6p will give it a pretty serious run for the money .
it ' s also important to note that the nexus 6 comes with optical image stabilization , whereas the nexus 6p doesn ' t , so have that in mind .
at the front , the situation is rather different - the nexus 6p has an 8mp selfie shooter , while the older nexus phablet merely a 2mp one . naturally , this warrants more detailed selfies . in case you are a selfie addict , this is a pretty solid reason for upgrade . although we can ' t give a clear verdict whether you should upgrade if you ' re looking for a nexus phone with a better camera , it seems that the nexus 6p might end up pleasantly surprising us .
тhe nexus 6p has a killer feature that the nexus 6 is devoid of - a fingerprint scanner at the rear that is always in standby mode . thanks to it , you can unlock and wake your phone by simply placing your finger on the scanner , without having to press the power button or do anything else . of course , this is not the sole purpose of the reader - it ' s also going to open the gates before android pay , google ' s mobile payment system .
as usual , it largely depends . if the looks of the nexus 6p , its slimmer aluminum design , improved front and rear cameras , fingerprint scanner , and larger battery are successfully grabbing your attention , then you should probably consider upgrading from your nexus 6 . still , the latter is a rather adequate device even in this day and age - hence , it ' s perfectly normal to not feel any need to upgrade just yet .
yet , we feel like the nexus 6p has enough compelling new features to successfully succeed the nexus 6 . if you feel the same way , prices start from $ 499 for the 32gb version , while the 64 and 128gb version will cost you $ 549 and $ 649 , respectively .
nexus 6 receives another android 7 . 1 . 1 nougat update to fix a major issue
no , i will not upgrade . . . bcoz i dont have nexus 6 : p i will purchase 6p right away
if i were a
nexus boy
i ' d upgrade . . 6p has significant and major upgrade from 6 . . and 128gb price worthy . .
nexus killer
what u talkin biut nexus killer . . huawei 6p is fkin nexus , mento
reasons i ' m upgrading : 1 : better screen ( should atleast be the same as note 4 ) 2 : longer battery life ( smaller more efficient screen plus larger capacity battery ) 3 : fingerprint security ( mostly only care for android pay ) 4 : better camera ( faster focusing , low - light performance , slow motion 240 fps ) 5 : 128gb option and all i lose is wireless charging , not a bad deal .
sony has managed to chill it on the z5 family , maybe the huawei has done the same .
the verdict is not out yet , let ' s wait for some hands on review and temp measurements for extended periods of time to see if sony had managed to cool off the dragon or not . . .
i heard from the ballads of straight sony that they added dual pipes to cool the chipset . thus why in some cases like 4k video recording it doesn ' t shut off .
ok , even it does not shut down during 4k video recording ( though even that is to be tested in a consumer unit ) does not necessarily mean that it does not get uncomfortably hot in such heavy usage scenarios . this heating will reduce the life of phone components in long term , such as the display an the battery . i really do hope sony has managed to keep it cool an the
dual pipe
is enough to keep the heat in check and i would be the first to clap if they did . . . . . but have they ?
if it did not have that hump at the top i would consider the 6p . but it looks like i will wait for the sony z5 premium or ultra .
wait for the premium to get the 4k screen and snapdragon 820 . . . not because of the
hump
.
i found my nexus 6 to be almost as good as my blackberry passport in signal reception . many reviews do not even seem to test reception these days . but this will be critical in my choice to switch .
taller than the nexus 6 yet with a smaller display ? ? ! ! this excessive size is a deal breaker for me , i prefer large displays with minimal bezels top , bottom and sides . must have been a google design decision because the huawei ascend mate 7 has an ideal screen to body ratio with very minimal bezels all around , so we know that huawei can make phones with great screen to body ratios . too bad .
i was actually looking at the mate 8plus 6 . 8
screen . . . really big , but my eye ' s like the extra screen and i don ' t care if iphone hipsters judge it unstylish . i wish huawei had used a 2k screen instead of a 1080p . it would be great to see the 9plus with a large 4k screen , now that sony has
broken
the 4k barrier .
not upgrading . but i would of had the screen size increased instead of decreased . 5 . 7
is on the high side of
mainstream
these days , and if you ' re releasing a grande and venti device at the same time you should have the venti one actually be big . it would have been nice to have a 6 . 2
zero bezel option , and a 5 . 5
mainstream option . holding back on size and incorrectly surmising that people like smaller screens because they ' re buying iphones with smaller screens is foolish . new flash : people buying apple products are doing it for the appliness , not to get away from our oppressively easy to read and type on larger screens . hopefully they ' ll get it right next year . but until then , or until i can afford to buy my own phone manufacturer and tell them to use a bigger screen , i ' m going to stick with my nexus 6 .
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urltoken
google recently announced the launch of android instant apps , a new technology which allows just the bare minumum of an app to be downloaded from links , bypassing the play store . this sounds cool enough on its own , but the implications of this reach far deeper than at first appears , and could end up changing the entire internet .
arriving in good time for the christmas festivities is an update to drinkminder for android - and this time things get social . yes , you can now set up a twitter account and automatically tweet each drink so that even those without drinkminder can now keep an eye on things ; - ) the full drinkminder write up is here , but there are some other minor improvements relating to usability , performance and compatibility . drinkminder is a free android app which will keep you informed with its instant unit / calorie reckoner or its drink session recorder , where with a carefully designed 1 - tap drink logger you can track your sessions over time . get it from the android market now !
the android reader wars are here in earnest now - barnes & noble just released their amazon fire rival with what ' s claimed a better spec in the battery and screen resolution department . offering free wifi at all its stores , the tablet will be widely available at the end of november 2011at a cost of $ 249 . the spec compares well to the kindle fire with a 7 - inch tablet , a 1024x600 pixel touch screen , 1g ram an a dual core 1ghz omap4 cpu . this move is the next logical one for b & n who announced in the summer that the were selleing 3 times as many digital books through its websites as physical ones , and so pretty much had to do this to stand a chance of competing with amazon , apple etc .
a tv remote with a tv screen which runs android apps ? where do i sign up ! motorola turn up their boundary - pushing machine to the max as the distinction between a tablet , a tv remote and a media player gets totally blurred with the announcement of the corvair . said to be a dedicated tv remote running android gingerbread ( 2 . 3 ) , it has a 6 - inch touchscreen , wifi , infra - red and even a zigbee variant known as rf4ce for all those home automation goodies . you can only wonder how well this works with google tv from , err , motorola since google ' s buyout seems all over bar the shouting . now all it needs is a dedicated app to stop any particular family member hogging it . . .
to mark the launch of its android - based vx - 100 epos system , casio is inviting developers to find out more about the device in exchange for prizes and the chance of having their app feature on the device .
the vx - 100 is a compact epos terminal equipped with a colour main display with full - touch screen operation , a sub - display that is great for showing information to customers , and a built - in thermal printer to generate receipts . the vx - 100 is designed for use in sme retail stores , and works as both a standalone system or as part of a networked system . casio has provided a software development kit that supports the vx - 100 hardware .


joyent was founded in 2004 under the name textdrive by the canadian typographer , art director , designer , writer and programmer dean allen , the creator of textile markup , who was looking to create an ideal hosting environment for the content management system he was developing , textpattern .

textdrive was incorporated in california in may 2004 with allen as chief executive officer and jason hoffman as president and chief operating officer .

textdrive was positioned as " a hosting company run by and for people who love publishing on the web . "

textdrive

dean allen , who agreed to take over the new incarnation of textdrive , has more or less gone awol where it concerns the current customers of textdrive .
added : sometime around feb . 16th , the textdrive wiki became password protected .
dean allen hasn ' t posted to the official textdrive forum since november of 2012 .
the textdrive forum has a bit of activity , mostly in the thread discussing alternative hosting options .
so as you can see , textdrive is just kind of sitting there with seemingly no one in charge .
i was told different , by support . i could chose between the 5 year offer , or textdrive .
correction 5 : 47 est 03 / 04 / 14 : an earlier version of this story incorrectly identified jason hoffman as the co - founder of both joyent and textdrive . he is only the co - founder of textdrive .
i choose to give them the benefit of the doubt . both textdrive and joyent cloud have been highly productive enterprises . i hated to see textdrive fall by the wayside but i still trust them more than a run - of - the - mill exit - seeking startup . i hope the new textdrive makes money and is around for a long time .
in 2004 , jason hoffman and dean allen co - founded textdrive . that year , hoffman and his textdrive co - founder offered lifetime subscriptions to textdrive for $ 200 , pitching the idea as a way to ensure the company ' s future . although the customers weren ' t formal investors , they always thought of themselves as a part of the company , even after joyent acquired textdrive in 2005 . the subscriptions were honored after the merger , and joyent continued to offer new lifetime subscriptions until at least 2006 .
also , for anyone looking to relocate from textdrive ( or just looking for a new web host ) you could try out kaizen garden . they ' re a new host put together by jacques ( a . k . a . the reliable one ) from textdrive .
here’s what’s going on : joyent acquired a web hosting company called textdrive back in 2005 . textdrive was founded in 2004 by dean allen , creator of the content management systems textile and textpattern , and jason hoffman . as watts martin explains , textdrive sold lifetime subscriptions to customers to fund the company rather than raise venture capital . customers felt like investors in the company . drew mclellan wrote on hacker news :
as techcrunch noted , a company called textdrive had offered lifetime hosting plans as a way to bring in money and avoid seeking venture capital .
as anyone looking for decent support or even useful information over the past few months can attest , the revival of textdrive has not been a success .
joyent shifted its focus over the years from cheap , commodity web hosting packages to more complex cloud infrastructure offerings that compete with amazon web services . then , in august 2012 , joyent announced that it would shut down textdrive because the old textdrive servers had become too expensive to maintain . allen , who had left the company , then resurfaced to create a new textdrive hosting service that ran on joyent ' s infrastructure , throwing those early investors a lifeline .
in 2005 a company named textdrive - - which had affiliations with joyent at the time - - offered beginning customers lifetime access to web hosting services for an initial invest of $ 499 . textdrive eventually folded into joynet and yesterday joyent informed select users that the lifetime web hosting offer would be coming to an end .
the twitter search for
textdrive
has several variations of
what is going on ?
and
where is my site ?
in recent tweets .
remember that the key wording was
as long as the company exists
. once the spinoff is complete , textdrive can be shut down while joyent continues on .
thank you for posting that link , it adds a lot more depth to this story - - anyone not familiar with the textdrive lifetime subscription needs to read this .
so , anyone with anything left on the textdrive servers has less than two weeks to get their content off ( and switch dns , transfer email , etc . ) .
if we haven ' t met , i ' m dean allen , a founder of textdrive , the shared hosting company started by jason hoffman and me in 2004 . i ' m also a founder and erstwhile president of joyent , which some time ago merged with textdrive , though i haven ' t been active with that company for a while .
joyent followed that tradition and continued to offer lifetime accounts after it acquired textdrive , including the above mentioned offer that said the services would be available “as long as we exist . ”
what began in mid - 2012 as an exciting challenge fueled by good intentions and lean resources quickly turned into a cleanup project with almost no resources ,
the announcement on the company ' s website says .
it is disappointing to report that after a year and a half of uphill battles and unimagined setbacks , after several costly efforts to regroup and find another way , options to keep textdrive growing have run out .
foltz says many textdrive customers are moving their sites to kaizen garden , a new hosting service marneweck started after leaving textdrive .
so why make this decision then ? joyent’s business has fundamentally changed since the textdrive days . today it sells higher end cloud hosting services , not commodity shared web hosting . hoffman writes :
at the moment , dean allen ' s own website seems to be down . i wonder if it happens to be on one of the textdrive servers that can ' t seem to stay online .
although most customers feel that they got more than their money ' s worth out of the service , many are disappointed with the way the situation was handled by the founders of textdrive and joyent , which used the lifetime memberships to stay afloat during its early years . the demise of textdrive is a cautionary tale for anyone who puts their money into kickstarter campaigns or other efforts to crowdsource venture funding .
i’d like to announce that on november 1st , 2012 , textdrive will relaunch anew as a separate hosting company , staffed and funded , run by me . please consider the recently announced end - of - life for joyent’s shared hosting customers now revised to be a continuation - of - life , to be carried out in the same friendly , creative , publishing - centered spirit of textdrive’s early days .
textdrive support was unresponsive to the problems , foltz says , until the announcement this week that the service will be shut down on march 14 . allen hasn ' t posted to the support forum since november 2012 , and his personal website is now offline , and his twitter account hasn ' t been updated since june . according to marneweck , textdrive have not paid his salary since it was spun out of joyent in february 2013 .
we are sorry for the inconvenience our change in plans has caused . this is the only option available . we will continue to honor your original lifetime purchase , and you will continue to receive hosting services from textdrive .
the beginning of the end started when textdrive became joyent , we kind of knew that the lifetime hosting would come to an end at some point and to be honest i’m surprised it lasted as long as it did . when textdrive re - emerged ( spat out ) from joyent late in 2012 in a brave move to support the lifetime hosting accounts everyone was happy , although there was a sense of something fighting a brave retreat with no direction .
what started to seem like a promising rebirth of textdrive , after the bungled jettison of customers from joyent , has once again turned sour . really sour . in fact , it appears that no one is minding the store anymore .
suffice it to say that his view , and the offer , whether tongue - in - cheek or not , to send t - shirts that read
i bought a lifetime hosting account at textdrive and all i got is this lousy t - shirt ,
fell woefully short , further antagonizing many and creating a neat package of negative pr that will likely follow the company for some time . joyent and textdrive made some critical mistakes that entrepreneurs should learn from :
dean allen resurfaced after a year awol to post a message about the end of service in march 2014 . textdrive legend jacques marneweck @ txdjm started a new hosting company called kaizen garden , which already looks like being a huge success .
i believe the issue at hand was that textdrive sold
lifetime
hosting packages , was then subsumed by joyent , who then ( about a decade later ) reneged on the lifetime hosting packages , scheduling them for cancellation later this year .
update march 3 , 2014 : well , it looks like we have our answer . the textdrive home page was wiped of any real content , and this message was posted to the urltoken domain ( taking down the forums in the process ) :
but the experiment didn ' t quite pan out – at least not for the mini - vcs . on march 14 , according to a message posted to its website , textdrive will shut down , after months of unreliable service and no technical support .
the
lifetime hosting
deal i signed up for years ago looks like it is finally going belly up . i ' ve moved anything hosted on textdrive elsewhere . right now , i ' m more an observer of this mess than anything else .
it ' s a sour note for textdrive to end on , even though foltz and other customers did get several hundred dollars worth of hosting out of joyent and textdrive over the years . mostly , they feel like they ' re not being properly appreciated by joyent , which went on to raise over $ 100 million in venture capital from more traditional sources .
if you look at it from the perspective of making an investment and believing in someone , then , yeah , i think we were given the cold shoulder ,
he says .
is the new textdrive supposed to be financially self - sufficient ? that doesn ' t seem possibly . even if joyent gives them all the hardware and bandwidth for free , who is going to pay for the support and maintenance ? the handful of paying shared hosting customers ?
it is disappointing to report that after a year and a half of uphill battles and unimagined setbacks , after several costly efforts to regroup and find another way , options to keep textdrive growing have run out , and we will cease operations on the 14th of march , 2014 .
many affected users seem particularly upset because they viewed their initial investment in the web hosting services as a sort of crowd - sourced venture investment to help get textdrive off the ground . in response for taking a chance on the company and investing in it , they were promised the lifetime of services .
i was one of the original 200 to back textdrive in with the vc200 accounts . the risk , of course , was that the venture wouldn’t be successful and we’d be laying out $ 200 for less than $ 200 worth of hosting . if they were successful , $ 200 would buy a reasonable shared hosting account for life .
it showed an inventive approach to running a business . there are always more sources for money than vcs , and textdrive ' s management dean allen calculated that the cost of carrying some people perpetually would be more than offset by the advantages of not having to sell part of the company and getting enough cash to start the business .
the end of the road for textdrive has been on the cards for a number of months . tickets have gone unanswered , dean allen , the saviour of all things td has been awol since the split from joyent and the entire infrastructure was bravely supported by jacques marneweck , a single engineer in south africa who as it turned out , wasn’t getting paid .
image from joyent website . according to this archive posted on the community forum , the initial offer cost $ 499 and included 15 top - level domains , 20gb of bandwidth per month and 2gb of storage space from textdrive , along with a
complete hosted application suite
from joyent for up to five users that is good for
as long as we exist .
and so it ended . many are still bitter at joyent turning its back on its initial investors , but in reality usd 200 for ten years hosting represents astonishing value for money at usd 1 . 5 per month . technology continues to move at a blistering pace and is incredibly fickle , so with that in mind we’d have been fools to think that textdrive could have lasted forever .
in 2006 , textdrive became part of cloud computing company joyent . both companies shared a co - founder in common and had complementary services and products . initially joyent promised to continue to support the lifetime accounts
for as long as we exist .
but it didn ' t last . joyent ultimately decided to stop offering lifetime hosted accounts , not only for new customers , but also for those who had previously held them .
created in 2004 , the web hosting service offered lifetime subscriptions for a mere $ 200 , and those who signed up and paid their money were billed as
mini - vcs
– mini - venture capitalists – who would help feed the progress of the company and receive a life ' s worth of service in return . cloud computing company joyent honored these subscriptions after acquiring textdrive in 2005 , and even continued selling these mini - vc packages .
i intend to have all current paying and lifetime shared hosting customers moved from our old data centers to new , modern and efficient infrastructure by november 1 . we ' ll be doing all we can to automate the migration process and keep discomfort at bay . more communications and instructions on the migration process will follow . for now , know that joyent shared hosting customers , whether paid or lifetime , are now textdrive customers and that service will not be interrupted .
jacques marneweck , former director of operations for the new incarnation of textdrive , says in an e - mail that the new venture was initially part of joyent , but was then spun - out as a separate company . everything was fine until last year , when the service became increasingly unreliable .
people were complaining about their servers going down for a week or so ,
says foltz .
i think mine was down for about three days in november .
i no longer trust them to offer a similar shared hosting service a ) reliably and b ) actually lifetime . it was probably never a good idea to finance a company this way and it ' s certainly not a good idea to spin this off into a new company with zero paying customers but actual real life costs that can no longer be written off as a cost of doing business . how long before this new textdrive folds ? 5 years , 6 months ?
a story of corporate communication amateur hour ; so i have to read on hn that my textdrive / joyent hosting is stopping . bit pissed i write an email to support that i ' d like more time to move stuff and that a refund would be nice . i get a canned reply with a repeat of the email mentioned on hn . then on their support forums the joyent president suddenly is all helpful and grants everyone refunds . we ' ll have to ask / haggle with support about it though . so i email support again quoting their fearless leader . this time the support staff promptly grants me a refund ( which i haven ' t heard or seen anything about since i should add ) . i ' m happy enough with that outcome for now though and start moving all my sites to other hosting options . fast forward to today ( about a week later ) . again on hn ( still not on that mailing list it seems ) i have to read that textdrive is restarting after all ( tada ! ) and we can keep our precious hosting accounts running . wow , thanks good timing as well . can i still get my refund and get the f out though ?
far from being naive and “falling” for the pricing model , my assessment was that 1 ) 200 shared hosting accounts ( one server ? ) is a completely plausible lifetime offering for a successful hosting company , 2 ) $ 200 is a low risk punt , and 3 ) these are good guys and i think they can realistically make a go of it textdrive was a success , now continues to be a success as joyent , and 200 shared hosting accounts ( the state of play when i signed up ) should be trivial for them to provide – even if they outsource that obligation to another provider .
textdrive pro easy to use & configure phone automation app / auto responder that can be used for various purposes . can be used for safe driving , meetings , good sleeping , etc . just turn text auto responder on and it will run in the background and auto reply to calls and texts . features : ✔ able to read incoming sms text messages and auto reply with a custom message ✔ automatic activation via familiar bluetooth device ✔ able to decline calls and let the frequent callers come through ( urgent calls ) ✔ reads the caller ' s and the sender ' s name ✔ able to setup a separate response to calls and sms ✔ set text auto responder to send only one auto reply to the same person during activation ✔ reply to the same contact once again after a predefined amount of time ✔ set text auto responder only to auto reply to your contacts ✔ set sms autoresponder to auto reply only to calls or only to texts ✔ set presets with different configurations for different purposes , such as driving or meetings ✔ reads messages from popular messaging apps and email clients ✔ set the text to speech ( tts ) language and speed from the available options on your device ✔ much more to come . . . ☆ this is an ad free version of textdrive , ad supported version can be downloaded here : ☆ urltoken
it’s not that customers haven’t gotten their money’s worth . textdrive shared hosting service was priced at $ 12 a month in 2006 . that means five years of that service alone would be worth $ 720 . joyent went back on its word to offer the lifetime service “as long as we exist , ” but that’s not the only issue here . the real issue is that the customers felt like investors , even if they didn’t have a formal investment relationship . joyent has gone from a small hosting company to one of the big names in cloud computing and just closed $ 85 million round of funding last year . the people who helped them get to that point by putting up cash feel like they’re being left out in the cold .
back in 2006 , cloud computing company joyent offered a lifetime subscription to bundle of hosting services for a one time fee of $ 500 . now , according to an e - mail sent to customers , joyent is pulling the plug on those lifetime accounts . customers are predictably upset , but not for the reasons you might expect .
i asked joyent for comment and their representative pointed me to a forum post by hoffman , who is now cto of joyent . “it’s ironic that our biggest advocates are the ones most affected by this and i know many of you are disappointed in me , ” he wrote . and : “we’re only here because of the initial community that trusted us , and i’m genuinely grateful for the support . i’m sorry that i’ve lost that trust and i’ve upset you . you have a right to be upset . ”
making the decision to discontinue the service was extremely difficult . it was driven by some simple things : the hardware is simply old ( 6 - 8 years old ) , it’s failing , there isn’t an upgrade path from it , there’s more than many of you likely realize and oddly enough it’s more expensive with time ( while not being used much ) . the rest of the joyent’s business has been paying for that , and i can’t make the argument as to why it can continue .
what lessons can be learned from this ? instapaper creator marco arment writes : “anyone who bought this should be annoyed , but buyers should also blame themselves for casting insufficient skepticism on the deal in the first place . nothing in this business is ever truly ‘unlimited’ , and ‘lifetime’ never means your lifetime . ” ( instapaper sells a mobile app for a one time fee , but also runs ads on the web version to make money . )
but again , the real issue isn’t the money . the users got their money’s worth . it’s the fact that they were used as investors and are now being left out in the cold . companies eying kickstarter and other alternative ways of raising money should look at this situation and be careful what they promise or risk alienating the very supporters that got you off the ground . and customers should be wary of investing in for - profit companies that will only offer cheap , commodity services as a pay off .
locking in long - term customers could mean a steady source of revenue . but at a start - up , very little is steady .
for a consumer , there ' s nothing like a lifetime guarantee - - until you find that the company has gone out of business and you have a problem . but there is something worse : a lifetime guarantee - - until it ' s revoked .
that ' s what one tech company decided to do recently and the aftermath wasn ' t pretty .
and then the dark rain of customer kickback began . the more understanding customers complained about the mass email the company had sent , with comments like ,
i really hate that you chose an approach that showed us we were never more than customers , and suckers at that .
others ratcheted up the displeasure , saying that being offered fewer than 80 days to move to some other service was an unreasonably short amount of time and others demanding an immediate refund . ( according to joyent ' s pr agency the company
is not currently commenting on the end of life decision [ but ] will be making a statement in the next week or so .
)
making the decision to discontinue the service was extremely difficult . it was driven by some simple things : the hardware is simply old ( 6 - 8 years old ) , it ' s failing , there isn ' t an upgrade path from it , there ' s more than many of you likely realize and oddly enough it ' s more expensive with time ( while not being used much ) . the rest of the joyent ' s business has been paying for that , and i can ' t make the argument as to why it can continue .
it ' s fine to offer something like lifetime service or guarantees , but be sure that your business can actually afford to provide them . if not , you ' re lying to customers , and that ' s never a good idea .
there is little you can offer customers if you can ' t keep your word . everything rides on that .
everything has its price . if customers fund your start - up , then don ' t assume you can back out when things are inconvenient . pretend they are venture capitalists and treat them with the same respect - - because , after all , they are and you owe it .
to be fair , conditions change and sometimes you might find that you can literally no longer provide what you had wanted to . if you do need to change a long - standing expectation for more than just convenience or the desire to pull in a few extra dollars , bring customers into the process and get them to help fashion a resolution . people are far more understanding ( and less vengeful ) if they feel like you ' re addressing their concerns .
update on 8 / 30 : joyent just announced that it will extend its lifetime service offer to customers who had originally paid for it . a predictable move just late enough to make people suspicious going forward .
cloud computing company joyent informed customers this week that a
lifetime
web hosting offer that it promised more than six years ago would be coming to the end of its life this fall .
for many business reasons , including infrastructure performance , service quality and manageability , these early products are nearing their end of life . we plan to sunset these services on october 31 , 2012 ,
joyent officials informed select customers , according to an email user ken mckinney posted on his google + profile . similar letters were posted by other joyent customers , all noting that users receiving the email were
one of the few customer still on our early product .
as consolation , joyent is offering customers the free use of one of the company ' s smartmachines for one year . that wasn ' t enough for user nick carroll , who posted on his blog that
joyent conned me with a lifetime hosting deal .
lifetime means a lifetime ,
said member odinsdream .
in describing the end - of - life announcement on the joyent community forum , joyent cto jason hoffman apologized , saying that the company ' s business has changed and the hardware to support the web hosting was
too old ,
is not worth replacing and is costing the rest of the business money .
i ' m sorry that i ' ve lost that trust and i ' ve upset you . you have a right to be upset . this was a tough decision with some nuance to it and none of this is lost on me ,
hoffman wrote . he adds ,
it ' s ironic that our biggest advocates are the ones most affected by this ,
but overall , he says ,
i can ' t make the argument as to why it can continue .
joyent offers a series of high - performance cloud computing , analytics , storage and networking features and is one of a crop of infrastructure - as - a - service ( iaas ) companies looking to gain market share in the industry . earlier this year , joyent announced a new round of $ 85 million in venture capital funding .
others didn ' t seem as surprised by the news . responding on mckinney ' s google + post of the news from joyent , another user , mike greenberg , noted ,
are you surprised that ' lifetime ' was just marketing ? such claims should always be taken with a grain of salt .
network world staff writer brandon butler covers cloud computing and social collaboration . he can be reached at bbutler @ urltoken and found on twitter at @ bbutlernww .
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a place where you could host a website . it was an experiment in venture funding , a means of bootstrapping a much larger company .
i ' m not disgruntled or anything ,
says david foltz , a user experience architect who used the service to host personal projects . but he does point out that joyent is apparently still thriving , in part of because of the
investments
from him and others .
i knew fully well . . . that one day it wouldn’t be possible to support lifetime subscriptions anymore , and i knew , when the day came that it was no longer possible , i would step back in and take care of those people , ” allen told gigaom at the time .
foltz thinks a classier move by joyent would have been to fully refund all of its customers back in 2012 .
that would have been more appropriate thing for a company with deep pockets like joyent to do ,
he says .
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update march 31 , 2014 : the march 14th date came and went without much happening . the servers seemed to still be up , thanks to jacques . but then sometime in the last few days ( maybe the 28th ) , the remaining servers finally went dark . throughout all that time , before and after the 14th , there was never a notice from dean allen about the pending shutdown . there were only two ways you could have found out about the shutdown : 1 ) you tried to visit the forums and saw the announcement , or 2 ) you happened to see it mentioned on twitter .
speaking of twitter , there are now loads of messages from those just now finding out that their websites are gone and their email no longer works .
throughout all of this , jacques marneweck has been a saint , and he ' s doing what he can to recover whatever data he can for those who hadn ' t migrated off in time ( mainly because they had no idea ) . there ' s a quickly - growing list of folks hoping that their data can be recovered over on the kaizen garden forums .
what began in mid - 2012 as an exciting challenge fuelled by good intentions and lean resources quickly turned into a cleanup project with almost no resources .
for those who wish to know , details of what went wrong will be made available once shutdown operations have completed .
you can still read the details below , although any links to the forums are no longer working . for discussion , there ' s still a post at hacker news open , and also the ex - joyeurs google group .
the one employee that was actually doing any work , jacques , is no longer being paid . i believe he ' s since taken a new job , but will occasionally pop in to try and help keep servers online .
the @ txd twitter handle hasn ' t been updated since august of last year .
the @ textdrivestatus twitter handle has been a bit more active , but most recently from jacques ' attempts to revive servers . again , without being paid .
his own twitter handle , @ textism , hasn ' t been updated since june of last year .
added : the forum banner text
hey . nothing will be deleted or shut down until migration is complete .
was removed sometime around feb . 17th .
at this point , it is safe to assume that no one is handling incoming support issues , and as of yet , there is no one else to take over keeping things running .
there ' s also an
ex - joyeurs
google group that sprung up when we were initially getting the boot from joyent .
@ davidspeed no clue . still waiting for an answer on that from dean .
auto reply to texts sms / calls . silent mode , black list . emergency . 1touch on / off
easy to use dice roller app , simply shake your phone to roll the dice .
by purchasing this item , you are transacting with google payments and agreeing to the google payments terms of service and privacy notice .
it was a fairly sad demise for a community project that was created with the best intentions over a decade ago , offering a lifetime of hosting to small time venture capitalists attracted to the fairly unorthodox start up mentality . i was into it from the start , i loved the chat on the forums and being part of something different than what i was used to with traditional hosting . we all felt a bit special , part of a larger picture , kind of a digital community for free thinking developers .
github is home to over 28 million developers working together to host and review code , manage projects , and build software together .
if nothing happens , download the github extension for visual studio and try again .
recompile all coffee script code ( unit tests + mocks ) in test / unit / .
recompile all less files in app / less / and create css files in app / css / .
capture chrome canary , start watching all the source files and run unit tests on change .
create build / package - * . zip / package , ready for uploading to chrome web store .
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i requested that they honor the refund offer ( as i ' d already started migrating away , and as they ' ve destroyed any remaining trust i had in them . ) i just received the reply :
so , no , we can ' t get our refunds and get the f out . i ' m deeply unhappy with how they ' ve handled this , start to end . ( i too failed to receive any of the mass mail - outs . )
based on the history of the last 8 years , i have to assume that this is purely based on dean allen having been out of the picture for years , but now feeling some sense of duty to try to straighten things out based on his involvement in the original pitches way back when .
i ' m wondering this as well . but the bigger question on my mind is whether i want to stay with them . i am almost finished migrating my data off of the hosts and onto google apps . i ' m not going to undo what i just did , so i don ' t see any reason to keep my lifetime accounts .
someone please correct me if i am wrong , but by relaunching as a separate company from joyent , it opens up the ability to truly shut down the service and avoid all of the lawsuits .
perhaps i am too cynical , but i see no other reason to jump through all of these hoops and separate .
i don ' t think this was ever about joyent wanting to escape their lifetime hosting obligation . it was more about them not wanting to be in the shared hosting business - they don ' t want to do that work . they still don ' t want to be in that business , but they old founder has offered to come back and do it . all it will cost them is a little money , which is not so much when they think of all the damage this publicity could cause their business in years to come .
sure , but all it was really costing them in the first place was infrastructure and support costs .
this is one of my main concerns too . what ' s the business plan here ? how can i trust
lifetime
will mean something more than a year or two ? as much as i appreciate dean stepping in , it may be too late .
obviously they will have to build a real business . they will have the incentive to do it this way though .
fair enough , but it seems like it would be hard to build a shared hosting business even without having to support a bunch of non - paying customers from day 1 .
i think you are being too cynical . imho , i don ' t think the lawsuits were a serious threat or a factor in this decision . they ( obviously ) believe they have the right to shut down the service regardless of who owns it .
i already finished migrating off of my td lifetime account and onto webfaction . i don ' t see why i should put my sites back on td . so i guess my td lifetime account is a spare , for now . i ' m sort of glad to hear they ' re doing the right thing , but they did it the wrong way .
i wonder what this means to the 5 - year hosting or full refund offer given to lifetime account holders .
it means those offers have been withdrawn . they are no longer an available option . ( i just heard back from support . )
been withdrawn - which is a really crappy thing to do to the people who had already accepted that offer .
while i would like to beleive that they will fix all the problems , my previouse experience with joyent tells me that this may be an attempt to try to get away from the a lawsuit .
i posted a coment here two weeks ago [ 1 ] and i received dozens of responses - if anyone would like to join the class action to ensure our rights are not lost please conact me . i am not really interested in lawyers - i hope we can work something out .
a couple of weeks ago i received , at the same time as joyent’s shared hosting customers , a message announcing an end to support for shared hosting , affecting customers who’ve been with us for years , some of whom invested in accounts we had intended to support for the rest of the life of the company . the announcement struck many as abrupt . some took it to be an abandonment of , if not an insult to , your good faith , written in marketing and lawyer speak .
i soon spoke with my friend jason , who by then was deluged with abusive emails and imaginative threats . after i rubbed some salt in his wounds , we began imagining what it would take to continue providing what we ' d intended all along to those who put their faith in us . after some wrangling , we’ve found a way to make it work .
no matter its humble beginnings , joyent now operates in a very big arena , producing heavy artillery for the armies of cloud computing , and it ' s been years since the company has been structured to service the retail hosting customer . moreover , the servers on which your accounts still reside are old , slow , inefficient , and they go down on occasion . everyone deserves better .
current shared hosting customers can expect to have at least double the resources provisioned have now , running on vastly more stable and efficient infrastructure . running , in fact , on the very heavy artillery mentioned above .
for updates and resources click here [ the page linked by the op ] .
i wish i had received this email , i think i missed out on one of the migrations at some point and i dropped off the list , but i re - added myself now .
it really makes me feel happy to see dean to come out of the woodwork and handle this . i ' m sure there ' s a million things he ' d rather do than be involved in web hosting anymore , but he obviously felt some obligation to all of us who believed in his vision 8 years ago , and that more than makes up for a thousand what ' d - you - expect - from - shared - hosting - you - idiot comments on hn and elsewhere .
the lifetime package subscribers ( and the community at large ) were up in arms about it . here ' s the earlier yc thread :
iirc it was originally a shared web host . i think they also had a gimmicky lifetime subscription if you pre - paid for a year ' s worth of service .
google ' s really good for those sorts of questions . but yes , they were a shared hosting provider that was one of the early leaders in supporting rails application deployment .
we ' re in the process of moving radar to the new oreilly . com .
clearly , this signals the beginning of the ruby - on - rails mania reaching the financial markets ! next year : 37signals ‘ ipo pops 300 points on its first day… .