Different Horses for Different Courses – EarthLink’s Rolla Huff Speaks at Bloomberg’s ‘Next Big Thing’ Summit

Posted on June 18, 2013 by Pamela O'Connor

“Different horses for different courses” was the end note on the panel, “How Software is Eating Everything & the Future of the Network” on Monday, June 18, where EarthLink’s Chairman and CEO Rolla P. Huff joined Michael Gregoire, CEO at CA Technologies, and Sanjay Poonen, President and Head of the mobile division of SAP AG, in a fascinating discussion about the outlook for software development, the cloud, mobile technology and the security issues they raise. Special thanks to Bloomberg’s Peter Burrows for moderating the panel.

What’s the next best thing to actually being there?

Throughout his 22 minutes on stage, Rolla’s participation highlights EarthLink’s exciting transformation as he shared advances in cloud and virtualization. He shares that, “We were a consumer ISP and that’s probably now 20% of our business. 80% of our business is serving mid-size business customers in the cloud, infrastructure management, and networking,” to showcase EarthLink’s transformation strategy to IT services and businesses in the cloud. Rolla goes on to state, “I think from a small to mid-size business perspective, we are at the early stages of moving those kinds of business models into the cloud. There is not a lot of skill set in these small businesses to actually move their models to the cloud securely. We are really trying to put together a portfolio of services that allow these companies to variablize their cost structure to consume IT as a service versus going through the cycles of buying hardware and software.”

Rolla Huff also shared his thoughts around IT services, cloud, mobile and security:

Do you think the industry is serving the small and mid-size companies as well? (Jump to video)

“I think it’s at the very beginning stages of serving the industry. There is lot of marketing motion above Fortune 500. But below the Fortune 500 there is not. 80% of the typical IT org is built around production, so a Fortune 500 company would hire the enterprise organization to help them think through how to move more of the business into the cloud. But the gentleman that owns a 200 terminal trucking company in the SE, you just don’t have people to help you think through that. There is a real need there. Everyone understands the fact that they need to get the cost structure up there, but helping them get there is a real tough model. I think people that can bring that to life without hand-holding 24/7 put a control point up there so applications are up there that you don’t need an IT staff to manage – I think there is real promise there and that is where we are focused.” – Rolla Huff

What are the trends in tablet vs laptop? Are the BYOD trends picking up? (Jump to video)

“We like the idea of giving business the ability to let their employees bring whatever device they feel most comfortable into the office and securely putting their desktop no that device. So once again, we think there is a real positive momentum around business saying “I just want to keep my data secure, if people can bring their devices from home, we don’t have to buy them.” They are happier. Otherwise, it’s always a food fight as to which iOS or Android device they will use. And we feel that is where it’s going.” – Rolla Huff

Question from the Audience: Emergence of the cloud – mobile and how these things are coming together. What would be the next technology out there that would be as disruptive as the cloud/mobile? And what is slowing the adoption of the cloud? (Jump to video)

“Security is slowing down adoption in the business market. Everyone is concerned and there is a lot of effort being put into it. But the other cold reality is that if you believe that we’re in a period of flat GDP growth, the cost of technology is going up. There is only one thing that can fix that for most businesses and they need to have their IT organizations part of a federal enterprise-class platform. Even though security scares everyone to death, there is a push to take business into the cloud – no doubt. I hope that security is the next big thing that comes out. Because with everything that’s moving into the cloud, it’s absolutely critical and I think there is huge opportunity there.” – Rolla Huff

Web Hosting Definition – Plus Other Hosting Services

Posted on June 17, 2013 by Tom Sullivan

EarthLink has been a leading Web hosting provider since way back in 1995. So it’s sometimes surprising to hear that people still don’t understand the term web hosting.

But we hear that all the time. And we’ve acted on that information too.

In fact, that’s why our main website navigation that takes visitors to our web hosting services is labeled Web Sites and the first link in that menu say Get a Website instead of just web hosting or web hosting services.

So this post is going to focus on one thing and one thing only: the definition of web hosting.

First, here are some expert definitions…

According to Wikipedia (today, at least), web hosting is defined as:

A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to make their website accessible via the World Wide Web.

According to the PCMag.com Encyclopedia, the definition of web hosting is:

Making a Web site available on the Internet. A Web site contains pages of information stored in a Web server, which is a computer running Web server software connected to the Internet.

According to TechTerms.com, the definition of a Web Host is:

In order to publish a website online, you need a Web host. The Web host stores all the pages of your website and makes them available to computers connected to the Internet.

But to help define web hosting in a way that’s clear for everybody, let’s broaden the context further and talk about hosting in general.

Everybody, I think, understands what it means to host a party – you have the party at your house. But you are more likely to say you are hosting a party if the party isn’t a personal one, like a birthday party.

Recently, friends of ours hosted a fundraising party for a local preschool at their house. It wasn’t their party; it was the preschool’s party. But, by agreeing to host the party, our friends were making the party happen at their home and making sure everything went smoothly – guests could come, eat, have fun, and donate money – for the preschool.

The school could have hosted the party themselves, but that’s not what they’re experts at. And they don’t really have the right space or facilities to host a successful fundraiser. So they turned to someone else to host their party for them.

That’s the same basic idea with web hosting.

With Web hosting or website hosting, a company like EarthLink agrees (for a monthly fee) to host the website of a customer at their web hosting facilities. When we host a website, we are putting all the files for the customer’s website (HTML pages, images, etc.) on our server computers in our data centers and making the website open and available to whoever wants to visit. Of course, our Web Hosting services offer much more – domain names, site-building tools, search engine marketing, email marketing, social media marketing, etc. – but the core web hosting function is keeping other people’s websites publically available on our computers.

The websites we host are not our own websites: they belong to our customers. But our customers – mostly small and medium sized businesses – need someone to put their website online and make sure it is readily available to visitors.

It’s technically possible for someone to build and host their own website. But to do it well and have the site perform properly and be easily available, you need to have the right (expensive) equipment and expertise. Most individuals or businesses don’t have that expertise, so they turn to an expert in web hosting to host their website.

It is also possible for a business to have a webpage for their business on a 3^rd-party site like Facebook. But that’s not web hosting, because Facebook is letting you promote your business on their website rather than hosting a website that belongs to you. The web address for your business on Facebook would be something like www.Facebook.com/YourBusiness because it is Facebook’s website, not yours. When you are a web hosting customer, your website is hosted at its own domain name; something more like www.YourBusiness.com. That’s why, when you decide to host your website with EarthLink, we offer a free domain name with most plans, and your first step will typically be to choose a domain name for your website.

Some of the confusion about the definition of web hosting probably arises because for most small businesses, they don’t initially turn to a web hosting provider to host a website they have. They don’t, in essence, say, “Here, take my website and put it on your computers so everyone can see it on the Web.” Because they don’t have a website yet, what they actually say is more like, “I finally decided I need a website” or “I want to get a website for my business.” They don’t necessarily know they need web hosting – just that they need a website. So we help with that too. We make it simple for people to build a website (or arrange for one of our professional website designers to build it for them) and then we host the website for them.

Here are some real world scenarios (from least common to most common) for how people get started with web hosting that may further clarify what web hosting is.

A business has a website already (they built it themselves or had someone else build it) and has already registered a domain name. When they sign up with EarthLink Web Hosting, they transfer the domain name for the site to us and then they use an FTP program to upload the HTML files for their website to our web servers (we give them the settings to do this). We then host their webpages so their site is available online.
A business has a domain name already but hasn’t built a website. When they sign up, they transfer their domain name to EarthLink Web Hosting; then they either use our free Site Builder to build a website (Site Builder uploads it automatically to their webspace) or have one our professional website designers take care of everything for them. We then host the site that they build.
A business has a website already but has not registered a domain name. When they sign up with EarthLink Web Hosting, they choose a free domain name for their website. Then they use an FTP program to upload the HTML files for their website to our web servers. We then host their website.
A business doesn’t have a website or domain. When they sign up with EarthLink Web Hosting, they choose a free domain name for their website. Then they either use our free Site Builder to build a website or have a professional website designer do it for them. We then host the website that they build.

For more context about hosting, consider some of the other types of hosting services offered by our EarthLink Business division:

Cloud Hosting – Rather than a business buying, storing, and managing server computers at their own facilities, we help them create virtual or cloud servers that we host in our secure data centers. They get secure remote access to their hosted cloud servers and use them as they would physical servers at their business — to host applications, databases, etc.
Hosted Voice – Rather than a business buying and managing a complex and expensive PBX phone system on their premises, we offer a fully featured IP PBX system that we host for them. So the business gets all the advanced phone functionality without the hardware costs and maintenance headaches.
Hosted Network Security – Rather than a business buying and managing complex and expensive security devices at each location, we offer a fully redundant network security solution that we host to give all business locations the same level of protection.
Hosted Exchange Email – Rather than a business buying email servers and managing Microsoft Exchange for all their users, we offer a hosted Exchange solution. Businesses avoid costs for hardware, licenses, backups, antivirus protection, and ongoing maintenance. They also get added security since their email is hosted in an EarthLink Business SSAE 16-compliant data center.

Apple News from the WWDC: What You Can Expect

Posted on June 13, 2013 by Tom Sullivan

Apple OS X Mavericks

Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) – the conference of 6,000 that sold out in just 71 seconds – kicked off on Monday this week. From the keynote (click here for a live blog of the keynote on WSJ.com) that day we learned quite a few things about what’s coming from Apple (keep in mind, most things are not coming now and not everything is coming at the same time).

Here are some of the highlights from the first day at the WWDC:

Two new Apple Operating Systems:

iOS 7: iOS is Apple’s mobile operating system, the operating system for iPhones and iPads. The coming iOS7 is supposed to provide users with a cleaner, simpler design – and it looks to be a significant departure from previous releases. New iOS7 features include AirDrop, a peer-to-peer networking and file sharing feature that uses Wi-Fi and Bluetooth; iTunes Radio (details below); multitasking (to catch up and perhaps surpass Android’s capabilities); auto-updating of apps; new camera features, including Instagram-like filters; a Control Center that puts your most-used settings in one place; FaceTime audio; and more. You can’t get iOS 7 just yet; it will go immediately to developers. The rest of us will need to wait until the next iPhone comes out, which is expected to be the fall. USAToday.com has a nice summary of iOS7 features with comparisons to Android.

OS X Mavericks: OSX is Apple’s desktop and laptop computer operating system. Previously named after wild cats (Lion, Leopard, etc.), OS X is now switching to a “California” theme (Mavericks is a popular surfing destination). Mavericks is supposed to deliver faster ways to multitask with Finder tabs. It will also let you put full screen apps on multiple monitors. Mavericks should deliver superior performance with a compressed memory capability. There will be a new iCloud Keychain to store all your passwords (for all Apple devices) online for security and convenient access. The Calendar, Notifications, and Maps are also getting an overhaul. For more details about the new OS X, see Wired.com. Like iOS 7, Mavericks is being delivered to developers this week but won’t reach consumers until the fall.

Two New Apple Computers:

MacBook Air: The laptop that ushered in the ultrabook craze (ultra-think, ultra-light, ultra-portable), is getting updated with faster chips and significantly longer battery life (reportedly 9 hours for the 11-inch model and 12 hours for the 13-inch). Graphics are also supposed to render faster, which is a big plus for gamers. Some were hoping for a new Retina display, which was not one of the upgrades. You can read a comparison of the Air and Retina Macbook Pro here on PCMag.com.

Mac Pro: The black, cylindrical, futuristic design of the new Mac Pro (not to be confused with the Macbook Pro laptop) is sure to draw a lot of attention. But as a “professional” desktop/workstation computer, it’s a more of a niche product than most of the other new Apple products announced. So we won’t to a spec-by-spec review here. But Roger Scoble of the Pursuitist website wrote that it was “possibly the most amazing workstation ever. And the stunning design of the new Mac Pro had Gizmodo gushing about Apple’s “Brilliant Insanity.” Read the review here.

Two New Apple Services

iTunes Radio: As we predicted on the EarthLink Blog last week, Apple did indeed announce a customizable, free streaming music service, called iTunes Radio. The new ad-supported service, which will be included as a feature of iOS7 and iTunes for Windows and Mac desktops, gives users access to 35 million songs (compared to Spotify’s approximately 20 million) with unlimited free streaming on multiple devices (Spotify Free is limited after 6 months and doesn’t include mobile devices). Another cool feature: you can control iTunes Radio with your voice, via Siri on your mobile devices. On the downside, iTunes Radio doesn’t let you chose exactly which tracks or artists will play; you can only specify music similar to a specified artist, listen to one of the more than 200 genre-based stations, or listen to what’s trending on Twitter. Read a review of iTunes Radio on Lifhacker.com here.

Siri: The famous voice control feature of iOS, called Siri, is getting a makeover in iOS7. One of the most noticed changes is likely to be the voice of Siri: not only is it going to be more natural sounding, but you’ll get to choose a male or female voice in multiple languages. The new Siri will also be more helpful, searching the Web (via Bing) and your photos for you, reading you content from Wikipedia and Twitter, adjusting controls on your device, and allowing you to hear voicemails. Here’s what Apple has to say about Siri.

There were quite a few other announcements that we won’t go into detail about here. You can click to read more about updates to the Safari Web browser, iCloud, iWork for iCloud, and more. To catch up on everything, CNET has a great roundup of articles related to the Apple WWDC.

Sharing Your Email Marketing with Social Media

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Tom Sullivan

To help EarthLink Web Hosting customers grow their businesses and keep current customers engaged with email marketing, we’ve previously posted about how to create your first marketing emails and how to track your email marketing results with Announcer Pro.

Announcer Pro is an easy-to-use email marketing tool that’s integrated into the EarthLink Web Hosting Control Center. It is free with all our EarthLink web hosting, ecommerce hosting, and professional website design and hosting plans.

Today we’ll show you how easy it is to integrate your Announcer Pro email marketing with your social media marketing on Twitter and Facebook.

The good news is that once you’re ready to share your email marketing on social media, you’ve really already done all the work: setting up your company info, creating the subject line, choosing an email template, entering your content into the template and, lastly, scheduling and sending out the email.

One reminder when it comes to social media. Today’s post will go over how to share your emails on your company or personal Twitter and Facebook accounts. But don’t forget, it’s ideal if you can also get some of your recipients to share the email on their social networks.

In our first Announcer Pro post, we mentioned that, when you are creating your email, you will have the opportunity to click the checkboxes in the Social Networking section of the Edit Details page (bottom-right) to have Twitter and Facebook icons included with your email. These icons will make it easy for the recipients of your emails share them with their friends and followers.

Here’s how to share your company’s marketing emails with your social networks:

Make sure you are signed into your Facebook and Twitter accounts.
Sign in to your EarthLink Web Hosting Control Center at control.earthlink.net with your email address and password.
Click on the Email tab and then the icon for Announcer Pro.
From the Main Menu tab, you can either click the Social Networking tab at the top of the page or click Try it out under Social Networking on the right side of the page (seen on the screenshot above).
You’ll see a list of all the emails you have created. Click on one that you want to share (both sent and unsent emails are listed, so make sure you choose one that is finished).
Click the Share It button with the F to share on Facebook.
Customize your message for Facebook, choose what group you want to share with (Public, Friends, Close Friends, etc.) and click the Share Link button.
Click the Share It button with the T to share on Twitter.
Write your Twitter message (under 140 characters) and click the Tweet button.

That’s all there is to it. Good luck spreading the word.