tales from the front

[denise]

* On Sunday, I had an apartment full of -- oh, about 20 people, maybe a bit more -- and my phone rings.

"Hello?" says I.

"Hi, this is PayPal account security. We've got a few questions for you," says the guy on the other end of the phone.

Turns out that if you do six figures of business in four days, PayPal gets suspicious even if you warned them ahead of time. We had to fax them all kinds of documents to prove that we really do exist as a business entity, and talk the guy on the phone through the process of "here's who we are, here's what we do, look, here's the website, you can see that we're legit."

Fun times. I guess I should just be glad that they didn't freeze our account entirely. (This is why we've been dumping money out of PayPal as fast as it's coming in.)

* damned_colonial made a really interesting spreadsheet comparing DW and the Archive Of Our Own, OTW's flagship product. It's fasincating to see both the similarities and the differences.

* Things that make me crack up: the Twitter Support Ninja!

* In the past week, we've gotten something like ~20 cards/postcards/etc to Dreamwidth HQ. We need to put them up on the walls and take pictures -- it's fascinating to see where people are coming from!

A few people have also sent gifts, too -- everything from bumper stickers to a five-pound bag of peanuts. Thanks, guys. Y'all rock hardcore. ♥

* Things that make me happy: we overbuilt our open-beta launch by a factor of about four. Why does this make me happy when it means that we overpaid our open-beta launch by a factor of about four? Because it means that we weathered the traffic spike beautifully, and now know exactly where we can scale back to, and have good data in hand for when we move to colocation. (Which we want to do pretty quickly, although Slicehost is awesome.)

I will confess to a certain amount of smugness in the equation, too, given the number of people who said things along the lines of "and what makes us think that their servers will be able to withstand the rush of people when they open?" But we all already knew I'm a horrible person.

* Today's WTF moment: I saw someone saying that they'd never come over to Dreamwidth because it was run by the people who apparently screwed users over at GreatestJournal just before the site went down. Bzuh?

(For the record, neither mark nor I ever even had an account on GreatestJournal.)

* Right after open beta, someone got bitten by mistyping their email address on the account payment process, so they needed the account creation code reissued. I explained to him that we'd overlooked that bit of the payment admin system, so as soon as it got committed, I'd email him his account creation code again. About 18 hours later, Mark finished that and pushed it; I caught his request on my next round through the Account Payments queue.

I later happend upon an entry he made in which he complimented us for our service, and added something along the lines of, "Although, I got a reply at a really weird hour. I wonder if they have day jobs or something?"

I felt like saying: no, sir, I'm just a freak.


[ If you're having a problem with DW, please see this entry for information about how to report it instead of leaving me a comment or an inbox message. Thanks! ]

Comments

[azurelunatic]

Oh, GreatestJournal. Oh dear.

[denise]

Notice how tactful I'm being? Admire my tact, Azz. Admire my tact.

[azurelunatic]

*admires*

[lacey]

We do!

[darkrose]

But we all already knew I'm a horrible person.

Which reminds me: where should we send the kitten entrails?

[denise]

You can send them along with your payments. Although, really, I prefer the blood of human babies, instead. Kittens are cute, and should be protected!

[hatman]

Oh, crap. I'm out of both!

[denise]

Tsk. You run the risk of being dropped from the Most Favored Minions circle, you know.

Although the candy did earn you points. Hrm. I should perhaps draw up a checklist.

[telesilla]

Ooops. Okay then, we'll hit the streets and round up some babies.

[rho]

Please, won't somebody think of the tapirs!

[baggyeyes]

LOL.

[sara]

If he wakes me up at 6:15 again tomorrow, I will send you an entire human baby. In a cat carrier. That way, the blood will be really, really fresh.


(You know, looking at this and my last comment, I think we should add a spec for a tickybox at the bottom of comments that, when clicked would flash, "Means nothing she says," on the bottom of my comments. Now, that's a feature I could use, a little box for "wiseass." It could be right here next to "check spelling.")

[denise]

I sort of assume that's default from most of you guys anyway. ;)

[solcita]

*cracks up at the tickybox idea*

[hatman]

PayPal sounds fun. :p (But pulling the money out sounds like a good idea. Their money market fund barely pays anything nowadays.)

:p~~~ to the poor fools who would doubt your powers of estimation. And yay for proper engineering buffer! ;)

GJ seems to be a great source of WTFitude. Thanks for sharing.

And hey, appreciation is cool. \o/ for that! :)

[denise]

<3333333 for the candy. Serioulsy, I keep having to stop myself from eating more of it!

[hatman]

Glad you like. Was trying to think what to send. Was wondering if I could get a chocolate sheep from the local place (they're awesome), but there were problems with that idea. And it wasn't until much later that I thought of chocolate spoons....

Anyway, you're welcome. And thanks again for all this. You have no idea the difference it's made, these past few weeks.

So, yes... right choice. For you are sweet and shiny and full of random interesting things and you rock and... I should probably totally stop there.

[denise]

And just think, we know each other because I was trolling the webserver logs again. :) ♥ <3

[helens78]

Chocolate sheep??!?! Tell me more!

[hatman]

Well, I live about half an hour from Birnn Chocolates. They do custom orders. I don't know if they have a sheep mold. It was just a thought. But I was on the wrong sleep schedule to ask. And shipping chocolate (packed so it won't melt before it arrives) isn't cheap.

Basically... I was toying with the idea. But it didn't come to anything. Instead, I went with pebble candy, so I could say "You rock!" :D

[red_trillium]

LOL, I have a chocolate sheep mold but figured that if I sent home-made chocolates to DW from 1/2 way across the world it would be considered suspicious. Not to mention that there are maybe 4 animals on that mold and only 1 sheep so it would be v-e-r-y s-l-o-w going to melt a few buttons, freeze the mold to harden the choc & repeat the process over enough to have a flock ;D

[ratcreature]

I saw someone saying that they'd never come over to Dreamwidth because it was run by the people who apparently screwed users over at GreatestJournal just before the site went down. Bzuh?

Wow, it's like results from a game of telephone, only played with faulty hearing aides as added kink thrown in...

[torachan]

Yeah, that's just what I was thinking. Not terribly surprising, though, considering the ratio of facts to rumor I see in most anti-DW posts.

[denise]

I'm not entirely positive, but I *think* it might be because the username of one of the people who used to volunteer over at GJ was 'cdenise'. But, uh, it isn't like it's an uncommon name ...

[pantswarrior]

Ironically, I remember watching the whole GJ implosion (train wreck syndrome, seriously), and cdenise was the only person who was actually trying to help the users who were upset. Sadly, she wasn't being given enough information to do anything other than repeatedly say things like "This is a known issue, I'm trying to get in touch with someone who can do something about it, but they're not responding, please be patient - I'm very sorry!" I felt so bad for her.

[ai]

No, you must carry the sins of all the "denise"s in the whole Internets!

[copracat]

(This is why we've been dumping money out of PayPal as fast as it's coming in.)

Which, of course, looks like dodgy behaviour! :D Ah, for the good old days when financial services conspired with you rather than against you.

(To which I hurriedly add: I do not for one minute suggest actual dodginess! It sounds like the sensible thing to do under the circumstances.)

[denise]

Yeah, exactly! Our local credit union (SECU of Maryland) is a lot more willing to work with us, which is awesome. Although they're geared more to personal accounts than business accounts, which occasionally causes hilarity. And by hilarity, I mean me having to wheel up to the bank and yell at them again.

(Everyone in the branch knows me. I guess a shaved-headed dyke in a hot pink wheelchair with a tendency to greet everyone by name is memorable.)

[azurelunatic]

Don't forget the knitting.

[princessofgeeks]

i think feeling a little smug now and then when you prove naysayers wrong doesn't really make you a bad person. LOL.

YOU ROCK.

so glad it's going so well. everything looks great from where i'm sitting. it's amazing.

[denise]

Sometimes I think that the entirety of human advancements over recorded history have happened just so someone could turn to someone else and yell "SUCK THAT, FUCKFACE!"

[princessofgeeks]

I CAN TOO DO IT BETTER I"LL SHOW YOU NYAH.

the emotion that launched a thousand ships.

rock on. all of ya.

[lacey]

I like this version of history!

[wenchpixie]

ooh, address... I've got some spare airmail stamps and some Scotland p/c kicking about. Where can I find the info?

Paypal are... yeah, getting the money out of the account with reasonable speed seems like a reasonable plan, given their propensity to ringfence funds for chargeback and things of that nature without notice. They're a bit of a neccessary evil.

Smugness sounds entirely warranted (hell, I've been smug about people who were naysaying during the closed beta now getting invites and entirely changing their tune and I'm nothing to do with anything)

[denise]

It's the same address for if you're paying by check/money order -- you can just set up a check/money order payment, get the address, and then let the cart expire in 30 days :)

I was amused at a friend of mine who, during closed beta, was persuaded to accept an invite to set up her username early (she has a demonstrated aversion to pre-beta software and does not deal well with the kind of rapid release cycle we were in at that point). She'd intended to just set up her name and come back when we were a little more stable. Then she started poking at a few things just out of curiosity. She says that the FWOMP sound with which she got sucked in was remarkably akin to the noise that happens when people get lured into TVTropes. :)

[shippen_stand]

I will confess to a certain amount of smugness in the equation, too, given the number of people who said things along the lines of "and what makes us think that their servers will be able to withstand the rush of people when they open?"

Er, it was being run by professionals with a clue? Smugness deserved, at least for the short term.

[denise]

Yeah, I'm not saying there'll never be slowness or downtime, that's totally an unrealistic statement for anybody to make, but, well. mark either wrote or maintained half of the tools that LJ uses to keep the site from falling over! And our two backup sysadmins (well, one backup sysadmin and one whom we're talking with to see if she wants to work with us) both worked on LJ for years and years.

So yeah, we kinda know what we're doing. ;)

[baggyeyes]

The naysayers apparently didn't pay attention to your credentials, did they? It isn't smugness when you're right, you know.

[ignaz]

Girl, be smug. Even I feel smug about your success, and I didn't even do anything.

[bossymarmalade]

ahahah! Cosigned. *g* All the naysayers can suck it.

[wishfulclicking]

The smugness is warranted; not only did you guys create a great service, you (and those associated with you) conducted yourselves with class in the face of a good amount of aggressive negativity.

[denise]

My momma always told me that the best revenge is living well. My momma is a very smart woman.

(I'll also point out that my momma has a DW account -- ellenp -- and a few days before open beta, she called me up. "So, what do I have to do to pay you for my account?" she asks. I start to explain, get about two sentences in, and she says "How about I just send you a check and you do what you need to do on your end." Sure thing, Mom. Sure thing.)

[luludi]

That sounds like my Dad... the one finger typist ;)

I think it's awesome your Mom has an account ~ she sounds like a cool lady!

[iadorespike]

Feeling smug is, frankly, justified. :) Y'all are just amazing! Also? I really love reading these posts. :D

[jjhunter]

In the mood of general DW-promotion, HiveFive is asking readers to post their votes about the 'best journaling tool'. I know what immediately came to my mind. :o)

[luludi]

"A few people have also sent gifts, too.."

Aw, sh#t, I didn't even think about that! Any requests from the Portland, OR area? =)

Sending gifts

[cesy]

Are there any good shops that deliver near you where we can order over the internet?

[animeshon]

Congrats guys you've done a great job.

And good idea not leaving stuff with paypal, sounds like they're not altogether there.

[artemis_rising]

I had a similar reaction from someone over on LJ that said DW was only created by people who were bitter about LJ just like G/DJ and it would fail within the year.

Amazing the related fear that comes from the unknown LOL