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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

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. 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. Perhaps I am too cynical, but I see no other reason to jump through all of these hoops and separate.

jeremyjh 14y ago
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.
- eli 14y ago
  Sure, but all it was really costing them in the first place was infrastructure and support costs. 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?
  - jeremyjh 14y ago
    Obviously they will have to build a real business. They will have the incentive to do it this way though.
    - eli 14y ago
      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.
  - jaaron 14y ago
    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.
eli 14y ago
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.
rsync 14y ago
ding!

jeremyjh 14y ago

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.

eli 14y ago
Sure, but all it was really costing them in the first place was infrastructure and support costs. 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?
- jeremyjh 14y ago
  Obviously they will have to build a real business. They will have the incentive to do it this way though.
  - eli 14y ago
    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.
- jaaron 14y ago
  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.

eli 14y ago

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.

rsync 14y ago

ding!