Just a warning to anyone researching Titanize online data backup service by Opelin, Inc. — DO NOT give them your business, your money or your good faith.

They have you prepay for one year by PayPal, which I’ve found out means that when their software quits working and they won’t answer your emails or calls for support, you’re screwed, since PayPal won’t help you either.

I’m pasting below a copy of the dispute I tried to file with PayPal, but they said didn’t meet the eligibility for dispute. Basically, I’m out my money, Titanize by Opelin, Inc. has it, and they care nothing about their customers. Thank God I know a thing or two about SEO and can hopefully get this warning posted out on the internet to be found by their potential customers.
== My Dispute Attempt Via PayPal ==

I have called and left messages at the (408) 404 - 9470 number on your website. I’ve sent emails to your support address  support@Titanize.com. The software quit working a couple of weeks ago and will not track my watched files or does not even realize that I already have almost 5 GB uploaded. My account settings shows I’m using this space, but the software will not show the files or retain watched file locations. I uninstalled, redownloaded the software and reinstalled, and it did not help. Nothing in your help files addresses this.

This obviously makes the software USELESS. It did this before and then started working after a few days, and the email I sent support back then was not answered for a couple of weeks. The nature of needing file backup REQUIRES dependable connection, which your product does not supply. Furthermore, I cannot get support at all. You had me prepay one year for a software that DOES NOT WORK. I want a refund, prorated is fine, but I want my money back for the rest of the year’s prepayment. I don’t even want support, as I have ZERO faith in your product or your ability to offer any kind of support.

I’m doing a little test tonight simply to see the outcome of ranking for the keyword phrase “Roketa Bermuda MC-11 150cc Scooter.” I’ll have to set my Outlook to remind me to come back to those search results in a few days and see how it goes!

Actually, the reason I’m looking at this is that my hubby is considering getting scooter to go back and forth to work on since gas prices are so high and we all just tired to being subjegated to the oil companies!

Hum… I’m very curious to see how this goes…

Today I saw something else that frightened me on another website. It was a copyright infringement notice on the top, most prominent part of their home page. Instead of telling their visitors why they would benefit from their services, they were, in essence, saying:

“We hate you and think you are a thief!
We’ve got the law on our side,
screw with us and you’re dead!

Oh, but welcome to our website.”

Folks, don’t make your main message hateful! Sure, there are lots of folks that ignore copyrights, but don’t make the mistake of treating all your site visitors like criminals. Always look at your message through the eyes of the customer you want to have.

Or another title for this post is: Scary Stuff on your website

Yesterday we received an email from a client who had discovered an extremely creepy image down on the sidebar of their blog that we built for them. When I went to check it out, I had quite a shock, and honestly am amazed that I did not have nightmares last night as a result of seeing the scary image.

The image was displaying where an icon for del.icio.us should have been. That icon was an image that did not live on the client’s website but was being called in from another site. Obviously, this other site had gotten hacked, and the hackers had replaced an image they knew was being used by sites all over the internet with one designed to startle unsuspecting web surfers.

I immediately change the link and fixed the problem, and then went about checking each blog site we’ve developed to make sure no others were effected. Only one was, and I promptly fixed it too. This second client never even knew there was a problem.

So, crap happens. There are bad people on the internet, looking to create havoc. Sometimes servers that host websites have problems. The internet’s not a perfect place and it never will be. Sometimes, crap happens.

This makes it even more critical for website owners to have a dependable and responsive web design company that they can count on. I hear far too many horror stories about folks who call themselves web developers but do not have an actual, viable business. Some are just trying to earn an extra buck by building websites on the side, the way a high school kid cuts grass on Saturdays. Others are making a go of having their own business, but don’t make it. (And let’s face it, most businesses that are started don’t last.)

But the people that are hurt by these folks are the people who buy websites from them. Later, when they need help, their “developer” is out of business, or has disappeared completely.

We’re proud to be an eight year old healthy and growing company, that’s very good for us.

BUT, it’s also very good for our clients.

We’ll be around in the years to come, to fix any problems that do come up, and hey - we”ll even fix problems our clients don’t even know about.

Now that’s not too scary.