[IWE] Re: iwethey?

[Ben Tilly]

On 2/13/07, Andrew Grygus <ajg@aaxnet.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Feb 2007 21:41:37 -0800, Ben Tilly wrote:
>
> >If this was Scott's business, I'm sure he would have been working on
> >it full time.  And I'm sure that his wife would be supportive of his
> >working on it because she wants him to make that money.  As things
> >stand, however, it is far lower on his priority list than any
> >business.
> >
> >Plus a sensible business that was self-hosting would devote resources
> >to this that Scott has not.  Resources like a backup system and
> >immediately available replacement hardware.
> >
> >(Disclaimer, every company that I've worked for has successsively
> >self-hosted themselves.  And successfully dealt with all sorts of
> >minor and major hardware disasters.)
>
> None of my clients can devote the staffing you imply, and only
> a few have room and funding for backup servers and the like.
> Simple IT matters are handled part-time by semi-skilled people
> and anything complex is outsourced (to me).

Which is why they are your clients. :-)

> In this sort of situation, typical of at least 75% of businesses in
> the U.S., any problem with the Web server becomes exactly
> what IWeThey is experiencing. Server issues immediately
> become personal issues.
>
> For larger, technically oriented companies such as I suspect
> you have worked for, self hosting may indeed be feasable.
> I do not have any clients like that and not one has a full time
> IT person, not even those with over 100 employees on the
> payroll have an IT person. Again, this is the situation with
> the great majority of businesses.

Actually I've worked for companies at a wide range of sizes.  (~20 to
~10,000.)  And I'm friends with programmers at an even wider range of
sizes.  But all have been technically oriented - at least technically
oriented enough to have dedicated computer programmers like me working
on staff.  Therefore IT resources were not an issue.

The key factor is therefore not size, but competency.  If IT is not a
core competency for your business, then you should probably outsource
it.  Which means get a hosting provider and do not try to self host.
Conversely if IT is a core competency, then you should at least
consider self hosting.  (Similar remarks may be read for any other
type of competency you may or may not possess.)

That said, any company that has Scott working for them can be assumed
to have the technical ability to self-host.

Cheers,
Ben