Our Web Host recently suspended our account.
They did this because they say we are resourse hoarding Bandwidth hogs. We moved to this server for multiple reason. One it wasn't in the USA so the insane record keeping laws of 2257 didn't have to be followed and 2 our last host suspended us for being resource hoarding bandwidth hogs Needless to say, our current host offered us unlimited bandwidth , but apparently unlimited has limits and we have reached them.

A large portions of the site have now been takin offline for the majority of members here. also large sections of this site have been completely removed for everyone.

for those in the lurker majority, yes we know the members gallery probably isn't visible to you at this time, there is no need to make a dozen new topics about the subject.

As we determine what is causing this bandwidth issue and work it out with our host or find a replacement host and move this tubby bitch of a site to it. things will remain mostly like there currently are.

sorry for the Open site being cut short for you all.

Have a Nice Day

What, if anything, do you need us to do to help?

Wow...do what ya have to guys. This site is just too cool, and I enjoy being here every day. You've got my support.

Winter e-mail me if you need me. I can change the domain if needed. My wife has surgery tomorrow but I will be checking e-mail throughout the day.

WOW I knew it - i posted one too many BG manips! Sorry for the problems it causes for you and the mods. Only consolation; we just got too big for our bra cups / jock straps. good luck.
LOL
msvee

ahhhh man, that does suck. my only suggestion would be to make the 3d downloads either seperate, not a part of the main site, maybe get rid of it altogether, and to maybe reduce the allowed max resolution from 2200x2200 to 1200x1200.

oh well, hope this works out for you

Quote:

Great point indeed!!!! I agree 100%, if it means keeping the site up and runnin', let's reduce pic sizes!!!!
I Love this place!!! And I would hate to see the worst happen...
Good luck fellas and bellas...

Hmmm, I was wondering when this would happen again since I started having trouble accessing the site a few weeks ago. Making the site popular with a heavy emphasis on images will always require masses of bandwidth.

At my old company we used to have marketing staff come in every day with some new thing that they wanted added to the company website. The problem was that they wanted each new thing to be front and centre on the home page. Fortunately we didn't do it for them as 1) it would have overloaded the home page and 2) these things would usually only affect less than 1% of customers so they didn't deserve such positioning.

I have noticed HM doing the same recently. On entering the site I see new images, random images and the most popular images from each gallery plus weekly top 10. Plus all the Smackdown images. On the recent change someone put the shoutbox on every page. Is anyone really interested in the top 10 posters? The HP points seem to have no purpose other than counting. It all adds up.

The difference is 'host-push' (the user has to download a lot of imformation, whether they want it or not) versus 'user-pull' (the user seeks out what they want and that is all they download).

I agree a size limit on images would be a good thing, but a file size rather than a resolution size limit would seem to make more sense.
I don't suppose there is anyway to monitor if external sites are hotlinking to images?
The popular images could be a significant problem, I get the feeling some users don't save images but instead come back to view them over and over. Has anyone considerd taking popular images and moving them into a members/gold gallery? Non-members could see a random few each day (like the random picture box). People who post variations of images already up (before and after etc) could be encouraged to upload them elsewhere and link to them in an art thread instead

Apologies for my ramblings, it's late and it was a hard day at work. Of course these ideas may help or may not... I'm sure somebody has the stats, like what galleries use the most bandwidth. That would enable a more focused approach to the problem.

Quote:

i think that this would be a good idea, as it would foster a bit more community, while lessening bandwith. i would suggest that only random pics would visible to non-members, and raise the member age limit(do those things even work?)

the only problem with these things...is well, they are a bit restrictive to those who just want superhero ideas or who aren't old enough...and while things like this are always started with good intentions, they have a habit of spiraling out of control.

about the little things like the hp readouts; i really thought it was a neat idea, but i can see that it doesn't really serve a true purpose. perhaps if it was indicitive of post count or something...i dunno, i just liked the hp thing.

Damn!!! This sucks...
But I agree with most of the suggestions made here, like the size limit and encourage people to post a link to some before/after pics and maybe if they want to show a larger version of the image they've post as well.
To remove the latest pics submited from the front page, I think that's a good ideia. After all, there is a link to them already at the bottom of the front page, anyway...
The HP things, that I like but if needed to go, no problem.
In my opinion, I think if sacrifices need to be made in order to keep the site running, then let's make them.
If that means remove some things from the lurkers and encourage them to become members, that's not such a bad ideia.
I really love this place and I don't want to see it lost.
Just hope we can work our way around this problem and keep being one of the best places in the web.
Just don't want to be scared again like when tried to log in last nigth and get a message "Site Not Found".
Keep up the great work, guys. And if help needed, just ask.
I'm sure i'm not the only one that thinks that.

What ever it takes. Chilly said something about the content loaded per page. That makes good sense. For me, it takes a long time to load the main page so I avoided it. About the only time was to login (maybe the login option could be standard on most pages?). I hate to think that alot of the really great art and hard work that goes into making the site look so good might have to be removed. I do agree that a lot should be like Chilly suggested.

An idea that just occured to me, for lurkers would it be possible to have it so they could only see the pictures at a reduced size, and for regular members have it at a better size? Then some parts of the site to be a premium that has to be paid to be seen? Not loads, but enough to generate the money to get better hosting?

Yeah... what Chilly said...

In website hosting, the term "bandwidth" is generally used to describe the amount of data that can be transferred to or from the website or server, measured in bytes transferred over a prescribed period of time, usually referred to as "Monthly Data Transfer."

Sites pay for a monthly bandwidth amount, for example 100 gigabytes per month. If visitors to the site download a total greater than 100 gigabytes in one month, the bandwidth limit will have been exceeded.

Duh...

Obviously, since this site is so image intensive, and images = lots of bytes, it is expected that HM's monthly bandwith usage would be rather high. As already mentioned, perhaps the size limits of all contributed images should be lowered.

Another duh...

So I got to wondering about our avatars: perhaps these should all be limited to a set size (width, height, bytes). Maybe we should eliminate all animated GIF's as avatars since these by definition are larger files. I looked at my own avatar, currently an animated TARDIS with a blinking light... it's 31 kb in it's animated form, but would only be 8 if it was simply a static image of the same length and width, a savings of 75%. Not much maybe, but every little bit helps.

Think of it this way -- I recently posted an image of Fairchild. Naturally, I want to see comments. So far there are 4 comments on it. The 4 avatars from the posters add up to 208 kilobytes. If I visit this image 5 times today, each time the server will push these 208 kb to my browser, a total of 1,040 kb for the day just for avatars (not to mention the image itself which I'm not counting here). If 25 regular posters are doing the same kind of thing (checking their images) and have similar comments, then 26,000 kb are being pushed just for checking their images. In a month this would amount to 806,000 kb. A few more visitors, and we are talking a gigabyte for just 25 regular posters. Add the lurkers and it increases the users of the monthly bandwidth pool greatly. Just for avatars.

These figures are estimates -- your actual mileage may vary.

I also found an artcle on the web that might be of some use to the Heromorph web guys (you know who you are)...

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000807.html

Hope you all don't mind my 2 or 3 cent's worth.

-W

the problem is we paid for 3000 gb and so far this month have used 54 gb we have not hit our limit. So they are offering one thing and then giving a completely different thing.
also It appears the server has banned my home address as I cannot access this site, my own site, or Biohaz's site from my home.
So send all e-mails to bikerbot he will ignore them promptly.

Well that is a different thing indeed. Glad to see it isn't the site, but the folks hosting it. In short they are thieves. I wonder how much of the 3000GB was used in the past months.

on average we use 150 - 200 gb per month.
The account we have with the server says 3000 gb/month. when we ask them about this we are told that we are fragrantly abusing our user agreement with bandwidth over usage. soooo go figure. 1 + 1 = 94

They are thieves. What a load of shit. Any other hosting companies up there that might like to take on the coolest site on the Interweb?

I'm curious; how, and who with, does Worth100.com handle their band width? That site is even more graphic intense than Heromorph and they do, as previously suggested, display a lower res version to non-members to view.

Use the USA method:
"SUE YOUR PROVIDERS ASS FOR BREACH OF CONTRACT!!!
(get BIG punative damages )

Well, I don't know what I can do to help. but if there is anything I can do then let me know. I love this site and do not want it to go away.

Other than posting smaller images and keeping our inboxes empty what kinds of things can we do to help?

buy JR and I vodka. Lots of vodka. We need to fill a tub.