NOT HOT! Just FYI: Cyberwings - Received an email from DomainsPricedRight.com

[Jdog]

Originally posted by: Cocytus

But it might corrupt me...I'd have to throw it all into the lava of Mount Stupid, where it was forged.

OMG that was too funny, on so many levels.


Am I the only American concerned with 1) the US government colocating where any moron can walk in and out, and 2) that the government now stores sensitve infomation on the outside of computers?!?!?

It is sad to see the chat tonight. People pleading to have their servers restored, being told "Thurs-Sat," most of them knowing what has happened but denying it in the hope that maybe it will be true....

 

[RSG2]

Sounds like I missed a good one tonight - he's right on the edge of meltdown...

...but I'm sure he'll be back to set the hosting community on it's ear...

I just couldn't hold that one in...better break out the nomex again, I can already feel the flames licking at me...

Kwad, any insider insights? Or is he too exhausted from the rigourous retinal scan/anal probe they gave him to have any new clues?

I really didn't pay enough for this - this is priceless. This revolution should have been televised - it's stragley compelling to watch a person break...

 

[iwearnosox]

You killed Shawn! You bastards!

 

[junthin]

Well...I guess I'm the fool having *hoped* for Cyberwings to be restored.

I already put in my request for a refund. I hope I get the money back...

 

[doggyworld]

Is there any way we can request the Police or Government to investigate this issue and maybe just put him in jail or something? It's true this deal was quite amazing.. but isn't this still fraud?

 

[Renovator]

Oh man.

As someone who operates a dedicated server, there are a few basic problems with the current mythology.

While I've seen other small hosting outfits trying to garner biz, make the same remarks; the servers are not 'owned' by the resellers, in the traditional sense. I always thought we leased them.

No one gets into a DC for more than a tour, AFAIK. I mean this story line is the equivalent of going into a teleco and removing switchgear. It ain't gonna happen.

The only folks that touch the hardware, switch out RAM, replace toasted drives, or wipe and reinstall the OS ,are the techs in the rackroom. I know for a fact, that is how it is in the one DC that has been refered to, where some of CW's customers are still on-line. It's the same building that houses our dedicated.

As far as the economics go, you'd have to be the sharpest accountant alive to pull it off. Basically, you have to approach it like bookmaking. For each dedicated box that you split into virtual servers, you could only have a handful of accounts that actually used any BW. The rest would have to be all mom and pop sites with no throughput.

Somewhere back there, is a quote about a 'Virtual server with up to 100 IP's', or something to that effect. This is loony toons. And speaks to an utter lack of understanding of the basic biz. Essentially the statement is backwards. What the host will attempt to do is place 100's of Virtual servers or Vitrual sites under 1 IP. These are known as named-based sites, and that is the direction the market is moving towards.

Up until maybe 6 months ago, some providers were handing out IP's like popcorn. Not any more. There are a finite amount of combinations of digits that will fill the 4 octets of the IP, and we are using them up. So now ICANN is controlling the distribution more tightly, and they are requesting the providers show need, before releasing additional IP's.

Now I suppose, one could say that this fella is trying to imply, that he will resell a dedicated box, and the second 'owner' will then be able to bust it up into a number of virts, each with it's own IP. Who... How... are these IP's coming about ? And why would anyone pay to have someone else involved in the middle ?

There's just no there, there.

 

[overclock]

Originally posted by: Brasscat
WHAT A DIFFERENCE !!!

I just signed up with DixieSys, and the service is excellent. I went into their chatroom and the "CEO Gary" --- who goes by just "GARY" --- is in there and personally helps everyone. Of course, there's only about 8 people in there at a given time.

.... Everyone else is SATISFIED, and UP.

I saw your comment about DixieSys and checked it out. For the month of July they are offering a 2 for 1 special. These guys are awesome. I signed up at 12:11 AM eastern and received my setup e-mail from them at 3:35 AM. That's fast.

Check It Out!

 

[NetworkDad]

Originally posted by: overclock

Originally posted by: Brasscat
WHAT A DIFFERENCE !!!

I just signed up with DixieSys, and the service is excellent. I went into their chatroom and the "CEO Gary" --- who goes by just "GARY" --- is in there and personally helps everyone. Of course, there's only about 8 people in there at a given time.

.... Everyone else is SATISFIED, and UP.

I saw your comment about DixieSys and checked it out. For the month of July they are offering a 2 for 1 special. These guys are awesome. I signed up at 12:11 AM eastern and received my setup e-mail from them at 3:35 AM. That's fast.

Check It Out!

You won't regret dixiesys one bit! Make sure you check out their forums too, @ forums.dixiesys.com - Their are lots of helpful users to get your site up and running.

 

[RobsTV]

At cwstatus, there is a Q&A session with Shawn from the 15th.
july15qa
Here's a couple interesting ones:

Q. Are the emails posted at Anandtech are false, aren't they?
A. I have not spent ANY time reading ANY postings - and I will not do so.

Q. Is CW currently processing refunds?
A. Yes, I have processed over 20 refunds in the past 3 days, we are processing them in order.

Q. SHAWN - what about the plesks in RACKSHACK will they eventually move also? or are they permanantly located in Texas?
A. Yes,they will be moved, in fact, I'd rather move them IMMEDIATELY
NOTE - CUSTOMERS ON THE RACKSHACK SERVERS - PLEASE START DOING YOUR BACKUPS NOW - NO ETA ON WHEN THAT MOVE MIGHT HAPPEN, BUT IT VERY WELL COULD BE *SOON*!

Q. Are the relations with Rackshack going badly?
A. No, not at all, it's just time to move on and consolidate everything into ONE.

Only 20 refunds processed so far in 3 days.
Good relations with Rackshack, but instead of using them for ALL the accounts until they get DC up and running,
seems as though he is warning those on Rackshack that they too may be SOL at any moment. If things are well
with Rackshack, what difference does it make if customers back up data, as they should have no problem with a
paying customer like CW moving the data currently there?

 

[jaybert]

At the Datacenter my webserver is at, you are allowed to gain access to your own rackspace and I own the actual boxes. It really depends on your contract I suppose. Each of the rackspaces are locked so just because you are in there and have access to your own box, you cannot access anyone else's. They are stored in cabinets.

Originally posted by: Renovator
Oh man.

As someone who operates a dedicated server, there are a few basic problems with the current mythology.

While I've seen other small hosting outfits trying to garner biz, make the same remarks; the servers are not 'owned' by the resellers, in the traditional sense. I always thought we leased them.

No one gets into a DC for more than a tour, AFAIK. I mean this story line is the equivalent of going into a teleco and removing switchgear. It ain't gonna happen.

The only folks that touch the hardware, switch out RAM, replace toasted drives, or wipe and reinstall the OS ,are the techs in the rackroom. I know for a fact, that is how it is in the one DC that has been refered to, where some of CW's customers are still on-line. It's the same building that houses our dedicated.

As far as the economics go, you'd have to be the sharpest accountant alive to pull it off. Basically, you have to approach it like bookmaking. For each dedicated box that you split into virtual servers, you could only have a handful of accounts that actually used any BW. The rest would have to be all mom and pop sites with no throughput.

Somewhere back there, is a quote about a 'Virtual server with up to 100 IP's', or something to that effect. This is loony toons. And speaks to an utter lack of understanding of the basic biz. Essentially the statement is backwards. What the host will attempt to do is place 100's of Virtual servers or Vitrual sites under 1 IP. These are known as named-based sites, and that is the direction the market is moving towards.

Up until maybe 6 months ago, some providers were handing out IP's like popcorn. Not any more. There are a finite amount of combinations of digits that will fill the 4 octets of the IP, and we are using them up. So now ICANN is controlling the distribution more tightly, and they are requesting the providers show need, before releasing additional IP's.

Now I suppose, one could say that this fella is trying to imply, that he will resell a dedicated box, and the second 'owner' will then be able to bust it up into a number of virts, each with it's own IP. Who... How... are these IP's coming about ? And why would anyone pay to have someone else involved in the middle ?

There's just no there, there.

 

[DavidO]

This whole situation is becoming more and more ridiculas. It is sad that our best source of info is posting from here of info from chats. It is very lame of Cyberwings not to send out status e-mails to all users at least daily no matter what, even if nothing too new has transpired.

I can see it now. Finally Shawn will say that he had every intention of coming back up with new servers but since everyone is leaving him he does not feel that people want that and he won't go on without peoples support. So then the downfall of Cyberwings is OUR fault, not his <lol>.

I have not filed for a refund yet because I did not feel too confident I had much of a chance of receiving it, but now.........

Does anyone actually know of a real person who has received a refund yet? Anyone have experience with Pay Pal and refunds or has heard from Pay Pal about this situation with Cyberwings????

 

[MontyBurns]

Wolfgang, where are you? HELP! People keep posting all these "facts" and I feel so confused.

Tell me how it really is!

 

[MontyBurns]

By the way: Wolfgang keeps making excuses for shawn along the lines of "he's not a techie." It appears the people in the chats, talking about hard drives that don't exist, aren't techies either. So one wonders: Who ARE the "techies" in this high-tech venture? And if CEO is no techie, why is he spending 13 hours a day at the datacenter?

 

[DealLurker]

 

[MontyBurns]

Yeah, threatening customers with legal action is a great way to drum up business.

 

[Wolfgang]

Did I say 5 steps forward and 4.5 steps back?

Been a dozen steps back in the last few days, so far as Shawn's handling of this goes.

BTW, the article that Aiko recommended, the Cyberwings Story, is fascinating. One thing that jumped out at me was the claim, presumably true, that Shawn asked for donations during a previous mini-crisis (down over a weekend)--this prima facie conflicts with his claims of independent wealth, though maybe not ultima facie, since presumably Cyberwings accounts and his personal accounts are rather insulated from each other (unless he's very foolish, they are).

While the "it's all a scam" talk is still baseless IMHO (though emotionally very understandable, given the pathetic performance of Cyberwings lately, and even rationally understandable if folks treat hype as simple lies), a couple people have expressed my greatest concern: (1) that Shawn will simply get tired of this and hang it up. That is something that seems all too plausible, given his track record of impulsiveness, reversals, and hype.

That's my first greatest concern, because that's a short run issue.

The second greatest concern is just about as obvious: (2) is there the competence in Cyberwings to make this work, not in the heart, not as a dream, not as a passionate and noble goal, but in fact, by the numbers (revenue and expense numbers, and then reliability and performance numbers)? The key variable here is, again, Shawn--and that's scary at this point.

If (1) is avoided, CW will pull through for now. And while there are some hopeful signs regarding (2) (namely, substantially increased prices), Shawn's self-inflicted radically diminished credibility (not just via hype without results, but also just his demeanor when he's under attack) make (2) more of an issue than ever.

As usual, only time will tell.

 

[theloneraven]

Just FYI, for anyone who hasn't requested a refund yet, here's the email address for CW refund process, cwrefunds@cwstatus.com. Mr. Almighty CEO has also claimed that he has "authorized" Paypal to give refunds to anyone who asks for it. I'd suggest that you go to Paypal directly. If my refunds are not processed by CW soon, I am gonna file for direct Paypal refund too.

 

[mccall]

Here is the latest. The quotes re direct from the webchat or the CW status page.

He is implying that people questioning him and his company on the IRC chat could be faced with legal action. This was his opening statement:
"CEO-Shawn is very disappointed & fed up with the community talking here right now. Please know that our legal counsel IS present and is logging all names, netmasks and everything SAID in these rooms presently. Those of you against CW, please state your position and take your side, those of you with us, do the same, and those of you against us, I am about to raise hell with those of you aginst us immediately."

He's now saying that he obtained a court order to get his servers back from LightShip:
"I 've already contacted the US Marshalls and they will be enforcing our court order to retrieve our servers from LS."

On the issue of refunds via Paypal and the CW Paypal account being closed:
"When our servers died and things started to run amuck, our PayPal account received TONS of Buyer Complaints. We resolved as many as we can as quickly as we could, then paypal DID restrict our account. I talked to them voice - we are working with a REP there personally to REFUND any complaints, work them out, and then be fine again. I have a long list of PayPal Transaction ID's to fax over to our rep and get her to reverse them all - and those are being sent in daily and worked on - We're not avoiding that situation, we're dealing with it, as quickly as we can. We are tracking EVERY REFUND and NO ACCOUNTS that were setup before will be setup again if they are refunded."

The promised pictures from the new DC are not going to materialize:
"I asked permission to get PICTURES of the new DC and was denied since we are sharing facilities with certain government servers that are under government rule. Sorry."

He's also saying he underwent an extensive background check before being allowed into the new Virginia DC. (And this "extensive" investigation lasted less than a week?)
"CEO-Shawn will ALSO announce that he had to undergo a VERY intensive background check (Criminal, etc.) before he was allowed to have his hand biometrically scanned for our new data center."

His new date for being up and running is July 18 - 20:
"we have a GUARANTEE from them to have the last of our pending issues worked out by Saturday at the LATEST - Thursday at the earliest. Does that help everyone?"

Shawn denies the newsgroup postings about weight loss schemes and beating speeding tickets are from him or his account. Check the headers and judge for yourself. They are old enough (before cyberwings hit the radar) that I seriously doubt they are fakes:
"The following postings are false: The GOLDEN FLEECE Posting in the newsgroups and ANY newsgroup postings from me - I have not been near a newsgroup in a LONG LONG TIME."

He said on July 15 at 2 pm that a "user questionaire" would be available within 24 - 48 hours. He also said he was creating a special site with this questionaire and "ETA's, progress, etc" and that he had a dedicated person who would update this site hourly. He is now saying the questionaire will be avialable "Thu - Sat" (that's july 18 - 20) and there was no mention of the special site with the hourly updates.

He would not estimate how long it would take for account recreations after they get up & running:
Q: How long will it take to set the accounts back up?
A: I just don't dare guess - I can say with 24/7 shifts and additional staff PLUS myself, VERY swiftly.


I know some of this was posted piecemeal over the last few hours. I just thought it would help to be here, in this thread, in one message.

 

[schuang74]

Yeah, I've been to several Datacenters, and customers are allowed to access their own equipment. That's why for the most part, all servers are locked up in seperate cabinates, usually involving keyed entry and 2 levels of biometric locks (one to get access to the raised floor, the other for the subsection of gated servers). For commercial servers, the most that Datacenter techs can do is reboot the server and generally that can be done remotely outside the cage. You will be hard pressed to find a data center that will take responsibility of all of your data and equipment, especially if they don't own it. If they do, then you must be paying them a lot of $$. I don't think you will find many Datacenters that reload privately owned severs. Even though the actual server may reside within their walls, the legal implicatoins of botching up a companies privately held server is huge. Generally they just provide the space and take 2 steps back.

Also as far as the IP situation goes, you really don't need that many. It is a distinct possibility that shawn doesn't understand his own business. Anyone can connect up a server, however I have a feeling that a lot of his IP's are super sub netteded within his own complex. Chances are he may only need a handful of actual class C's. Everything else will be resolved internally. A lot of other providers do this, it's called a "Shared" IP.

Originally posted by: jaybert
At the Datacenter my webserver is at, you are allowed to gain access to your own rackspace and I own the actual boxes. It really depends on your contract I suppose. Each of the rackspaces are locked so just because you are in there and have access to your own box, you cannot access anyone else's. They are stored in cabinets.

Originally posted by: Renovator
Oh man.

As someone who operates a dedicated server, there are a few basic problems with the current mythology.

While I've seen other small hosting outfits trying to garner biz, make the same remarks; the servers are not 'owned' by the resellers, in the traditional sense. I always thought we leased them.

No one gets into a DC for more than a tour, AFAIK. I mean this story line is the equivalent of going into a teleco and removing switchgear. It ain't gonna happen.

The only folks that touch the hardware, switch out RAM, replace toasted drives, or wipe and reinstall the OS ,are the techs in the rackroom. I know for a fact, that is how it is in the one DC that has been refered to, where some of CW's customers are still on-line. It's the same building that houses our dedicated.

As far as the economics go, you'd have to be the sharpest accountant alive to pull it off. Basically, you have to approach it like bookmaking. For each dedicated box that you split into virtual servers, you could only have a handful of accounts that actually used any BW. The rest would have to be all mom and pop sites with no throughput.

Somewhere back there, is a quote about a 'Virtual server with up to 100 IP's', or something to that effect. This is loony toons. And speaks to an utter lack of understanding of the basic biz. Essentially the statement is backwards. What the host will attempt to do is place 100's of Virtual servers or Vitrual sites under 1 IP. These are known as named-based sites, and that is the direction the market is moving towards.

Up until maybe 6 months ago, some providers were handing out IP's like popcorn. Not any more. There are a finite amount of combinations of digits that will fill the 4 octets of the IP, and we are using them up. So now ICANN is controlling the distribution more tightly, and they are requesting the providers show need, before releasing additional IP's.

Now I suppose, one could say that this fella is trying to imply, that he will resell a dedicated box, and the second 'owner' will then be able to bust it up into a number of virts, each with it's own IP. Who... How... are these IP's coming about ? And why would anyone pay to have someone else involved in the middle ?

There's just no there, there.

 

[MontyBurns]

Well, again, I've never implied the company was a scam, though I appreciate the assertions others have made (what do you call it when you pay for something and the business doesn't deliver?) Still, my criticism remains what it has always been: This company appeared to have a very narrow focus on ONLY one thing: Signing up as many people as possible, period. They offered prices that seemed (and now seem) unsustainable in a profitable business model. But even more than that, they must have been receiving so many signups that I can't imagine there was much time for anything else. Indeed, there were dozens of complaints here that e-mails went unanswered for weeks.

So do I believe this was a scam? No. There are far easier ways to scam money. (And if it were a scam, I think he really would've packed up and headed for hte border, as many have joked.) No, I believe this was a company that was simply focused on getting your money, and as much of it as possible, and little else. Web hosting is not an easy business. Support is by far the key component, and it doesn't appear that CyberWings offered much in that department. Now, we're seeing nothing but conspiracy theories -- they've been ripped off, all these secret agreements, criminal background checks before biometric hand scans (give me a friggin break). The company has an excuse for EVERYTHING. This is hardly a professional way to do business.

 

[TekDemon]

just as an answer to labgeek's question about 120GB scsi drives...

Seagate DOES make these, they are not yet listed on their site because they're that new...I know because my friend was going to get them and they are available to be purchased...not listed on their site though, who knows why lol...

As to whether CW actually uhhh has these drives, that is a different question...

And although I have no stake in this(always stayed away...although it was tempting there was no need for me, since I have plenty of web server access for my own use....and unlimited bandwidth from my college to go with it lol =) I don't believe the 2 WEEKS since this post started counts as 2-3 days of downtime. 2 weeks is atrocious downtime for ANY company, and I highly doubt CW would ever be able to reclaim any sort of credibility after this. Oh well, I feel bad for everybody involved lol.

 

[MontyBurns]

So shawn claims he had nothing to do with the newsgroup spam postings?

Uhhh, he should have consulted the "techies" first. Because Archive.org certainly seems to remember him.

You'll remember Shawn was promoting MyUltimateDiet.com in several newsgroups. Well, this certainly looks like a connection to CyberWings to me:

Web archive link

 

[TekDemon]

Here's a good anagram:
What Hew Sin!
"hew

\Hew\, n. Destruction by cutting down. [Obs.]

Of whom he makes such havoc and such hew. --Spenser.
Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
"

Ah indeed!

 

[Brasscat]

It's always intersting what's on Cyberwing's Status Page.

How many days has it been now since his wires were "lit" in the new datacenter, and he STILL cyberwings.com is down and he's using his rented servers in Houston to dish out the "status" site.... which is really a site Shawn uses to announce delay excuses.

There's no proof of any 30 server purchase, no proof of any new DC.

I really doubt any DC a government would "rent computers from" (doesn't the military have their own secure datacenters???) would want or need to rent space out to Shawn. And CERTAINLY they wouldn't let him come and go as he pleases. All server setup and maintenance would be remote.

Nothing adds up when reading Shawn's e-mails. I'm suprised he still has employees working for him.... How could anyone work for that guy? He's so imbalanced!

I've requested my refund, but still nothing. There is/has been NO AUTO REFUND FROM PAYPAL for me yet! (Shawn claimed that was setup)

 

[Aceman]

Brasscat,
I work with/for people that run the datacenters with the miltary. The government NEVER colos with civilians. I need a security clearance to just go in the room to talk to my coworkers.

Let's look at some of the other agencies that might colo with civilian computers in Washington D.C.:
State Dept: I don't think so! They have their own entire DC
Justice Dept: Right, they have their own building.
Health and Human Services: I don't think so!
Ag Dept: Doubt it, but my father does work with the County extension agent that has to go through the county servers to get to his USDA info. And he did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
Defense: Stated that one before
Dept of the Interior: doubt it.

In this day and age I hoghly doubt ANY gov't agency in Washington DC would colo any server with a civilian firm!!!! Too many people to do background checks on and issue security clearances to.