I'm new to the board, but I thought I would share my experience with this 2bit webhosting company. I've never dealt with any company that would treat a prospective customer this way.
I appologize for the length, but I am including our entire email in this. I think you can judge for yourself.

-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Robertson [mailto:adam@extremesurf.com]
Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 6:34 PM
To: 'Douglas Stieber'
Cc: tenley@extremesurf.com; bob@extremesurf.com
Subject: RE: Question for seller -- Item #2073340860


Douglass,



All the best in looking for a web host. I’m sure you’ll find plenty for $0.16/month per domain for unlimited hosting!! I won’t bother apologizing for Tenley’s tone, she was following up on some of my e-mail; however, we don’t need rude customers such as yourself.



And for YOUR information, Gallery does NOT need safe mode on. I don’t care what the webpage says – we run the countless servers with it OFF, and none of our customers have ever had a problem.



Good luck,



Adam Robertson

adam@extremesurf.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Douglas Stieber
Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 5:19 PM
To: Adam Robertson
Cc: tenley@extremesurf.com
Subject: Re: Question for seller -- Item #2073340860





Personally, I dont like the tone of your email. I asked a simple question. There ARE plenty of web hosting providers that have NO PROBLEM turning off safe mode for their customers. I see you are not one of them.



And for your information gallery DOES need to have safe mode DISABLED:

"

PHP 4
PHP is a web server module that allows you to create applications using an embedded scripting language. If you're on a Unix box, the odds are good that you'll be able to download PHP easily in either source or binary form for your system. As of this writing, Gallery requires PHP version 4.0.4pl1 or more recent. It has been tested on versions of PHP up to 4.2.2



Note: Your PHP installation must not be in safe mode. Gallery is a sophisticated application and must do operations that require extensive privileges. Safe mode prevents Gallery from functioning properly.
"

http://gallery.menalto.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=phpWiki&file=index&pagename=Gallery%20Requirements



Just because you have it installed DOES NOT remove the limitations of safe mode. Your customers will still have problems with uploaded files.



Needless to say, Your company will never see my business.





-Doug



----- Original Message -----

From: "Adam Robertson" <adam@extremesurf.com>

To: XXXXXXXXXXXX

Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 4:55 PM

Subject: RE: Question for seller -- Item #2073340860



> Doug,
>
> We aren't going to turn of SAFE-MODE just for you. Obviously that is a
> security breach, and just because its only 600mb in pictures doesn't
> make it an exception to the rule (sorry).
>
> All you need to do to eliminate this problem is run Gallery, which we
> have installed and does all the same things your program does no doubt.
>
> Secondly, you wanted a customer site to browse for speed. Try:
> www.philipdaly.com - let me know what you think.
>
> Thanks again - we look forward to doing business with you!
>
> Tenley Dallons
> tenley@extremesurf.com
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: decypher1@covad.net [mailto:decypher1@covad.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 9:13 AM
> To: sales@extremesurf.com
> Subject: Question for seller -- Item #2073340860
>
> Hello,
>
> I was browsing your auction and am very interested. However, I have a
> few questions:
>
> 1. I have a personal website that contains about 600MB of pictures
> (vacation mostly, nothing adult of any nature... G rated) that I would
> like to have hosted. I catagorize these using image software that NEEDS
> to have SAFE-MODE disabled for PHP. Is this somthing that you can offer?
> Please keep in mind, you can offer it just for my account, and not the
> whole server.
>
> 2. Is there a current site that I may browse to on the server that I
> would be placed on? This is so I can test speeds.
>
> Please let me know asap. I am very interested. Thank you
>
> Regards
> Douglas Stieber
>
> --------------------
>
>
> Question from: XXXXXX
> Title of item: UNLIMITED web hosting & traffic / 10 domains!
> Seller: extremesurf
> Starts: Nov-18-02 13:19:18 PST
> Ends: Nov-21-02 13:19:18 PST
> Price: Starts at $19.99
> To view the item, go to:
> http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2073340860
>
>



This is what I get for looking for webhosting on ebay....

WOW...

I dont think i have ever seen a webhost be so rude to a customer. :eek:

I think you got the right idea about not looking for a webhost on ebay though :)

Hope you have better luck with your next host...

That's horrible! Better luck next time.

Originally posted by whw
I dont think i have ever seen a webhost be so rude to a customer. :eek:

Stick around - you'll see worse than that believe me :D

Doug, best of luck in your search. You're in good form coming across WHT. There are plenty of businesses around here looking for customers.

Greg Moore

I agree totally with your assesment ...
Just remember that two wrongs don't make a right (You were abrupt in the reply)

Having said that ... I woudln't go with them simply as a support issue.

Hosting companies usually kiss your a*s when you have pre-sale questions and will answer anything u want with 'yes sir' within minutes of your query. The problems only occur once they get your money, then the service drops from 100% to 50% ...
so now if you starting at 50% and well ... then the final reslult would be ... hmm ... ahmmmm ... oooohh .... (counting toes) ...

Well you get the picture.

A bit off topic:

With there being so many hosting companies out there and the ratio of host to hostee being so much in favour of the customer ... why is it that a lot of the hosts treat their customers so badly and really don't care ... what happened to "customer is always right" ....

Another thing is that new customers are much harder to find then keeping exisiting ones, yet so many people mistreat their existing customers and just hunt for new ones. Yet with a little effort your current customer base could be an invitation all by itself.

Originally posted by decypher
From: Adam Robertson

And for YOUR information, Gallery does NOT need safe mode on. I don’t care what the webpage says – we run the countless servers with it OFF, and none of our customers have ever had a problem.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: decypher1@covad.net
I catagorize these using image software that NEEDS
> to have SAFE-MODE disabled for PHP. Is this somthing that you can offer?

Is it me, or did he just NOT understand your request?

no, it's not just you. I read that as well, but assumed I'd skimmed over it too fast :)

Greg Moore

I know I was a little testy in my second reply. 2 wrongs do not make a right. I do know that. I was so taken back by the reply, I got a little peeved. I always thought the customer was right, or atleasted deserved a nicer "no".

As far as safe mode is concerned, I'm still positive they have no idea what I was asking.

Such is life.. Hope someone else benefits from my experience..

D-

Then what could this possibly mean?We aren't going to turn of SAFE-MODE just for you. Obviously that is a
> security breach, and just because its only 600mb in pictures doesn't
> make it an exception to the rule (sorry).

I can't believe they were so rude in their very first email to you before they even had your business!
How can they expect to pick up customers with an attitude like that?

ATST,

I think this is the bit that's confused us:

And for YOUR information, Gallery does NOT need safe mode on. I don’t care what the webpage says – we run the countless servers with it OFF

which is opposite to your quote. I'm presuming it's just a mistake with off and on, in the heat of the moment..

Greg Moore

I understand there was confusion. I'd be willing to bet it may be a language problem and they are interchanging the words "disabled" and "on"
My quote has the correct usage because he used "security risk" in his statement. After that, the exchange careens recklessly downhill.

I just stumbled across WebHosting Talk and was pleased to see that someone else is having problems too with Extremesurf.com. Errr... not that other people are having a bad time so much, as now I don't feel alone.

Over the past month I've been trying to get a refund on my two accounts with them because their service was horrible, they tried to pass me on to another provider who went belly up three days later (and was owned by one of the extremesurf.com people) in an attempt to ditch their responsibility to their lesser paying customers. And eventually they decided to just change all of their name server information for those customers who weren't kicked off by them selling their cheapie accounts to this other business. Later when I tried to get support from them they were willing to help and to upgrade my account if I paid them for it. This after all of the problems that I had had and with my site only being up 50% of the time for the last month.

It's too bad, because for the first 3-4 months they were great. I was being helped by a guy supposedly named Bob and they were quick to respond, but then around January things went downhill fast.

Thankfully it was a small investment on my part and my web sites aren't very critical to my business. It still doesn't negate how Leu Chung is treating me when I try to get a refund for service that I didn't use after they broke my contract with them.

If anyone is thinking about dealing with them, know that their servers have serious issues with stability and that they moderate their forums heavily. They've even removed posts of mine that were supportive of them (during my time of disallusionment). In the end, I got what I paid for. Nothing for nothing.

-Uncle Bex

I too had a run-in with extremesurf.com.

Mine was so bad that the have simply blocked my IP from even accessing their website.

I suggest that you stay away from them. They just happened to steal over $700 from me in one setting! Opppsss! Ben is a liar, thief and a cheat..... That's all I have to say!

Well, if you check their whois they have two nameservers on the same box (rackshack):
ns3.extremesurf.com 216.40.245.213
ns4.extremesurf.com 216.40.245.234
But, digging for them only one works (this is asking for trouble):
Dig extremesurf.com@ns3.extremesurf.com (216.40.245.213) ...
Authoritative Answer
Recursive queries supported by this server
Query for extremesurf.com type=255 class=1
extremesurf.com SOA (Zone of Authority)
Primary NS: ns3.extremesurf.com
Responsible person: support@extremesurf.com
serial:18
refresh:3600s (60 minutes)
retry:600s (10 minutes)
expire:86400s (24 hours)
minimum-ttl:3600s (60 minutes)
extremesurf.com NS (Nameserver) ns3.extremesurf.com
extremesurf.com A (Address) 216.12.214.27
ns3.extremesurf.com A (Address) 216.40.245.213
Dig extremesurf.com@195.235.113.3 ...
Non-authoritative answer
Recursive queries supported by this server
Query for extremesurf.com type=255 class=1
extremesurf.com NS (Nameserver) ns3.extremesurf.com
extremesurf.com NS (Nameserver) ns3.extremesurf.com
ns3.extremesurf.com A (Address) 216.40.245.213

I have a feeling that it won't be too long before I'm in the same position. How did they manage to take that much money from you? Thankfully, I was PayPal-ing them their fees and only planned on using them as a temporary host until I found something better (like this forum as a resource for people like us).

I had completely forgotten about Ben, but it is true that he was too nice to me in the beginning while the accounts were getting setup. Over the last few months it seems like their business has moved from Texas to Canada too and most of the people working for them have changed as well. Either way, I'd rather attempt to work with Ben or Bob over Leu Chung.

-Uncle Bex

Originally posted by kickmybutt
I too had a run-in with extremesurf.com.

Mine was so bad that the have simply blocked my IP from even accessing their website.

I suggest that you stay away from them. They just happened to steal over $700 from me in one setting! Opppsss! Ben is a liar, thief and a cheat..... That's all I have to say!

Well.

I think you walked right into it. If you want good service, you are gonna have to pay for it.

And why on gods' green earth would you go to a company calling themselves "extremesmurf"???

8-)

Branding and name is everything. Next time use the grey matter. Do a "whois" look when the domain was registered and check out the news groups..becuase if a hosting company has been around that long..they'll be in there.

Look for older companies (some not around) like Tabnet, Best.com, Hiway technologies, Webhosting.com, olm.net etc...

Extreme Smurf! :stickout:

Most net company names look silly after the fact. And this was a part of the learning curve for me. Up until this point, I had only had service with local companies so that I could go and visit them if things were not working out quite how I expected them to. I didn't know about this website until last week when a friend told me about it. If I only knew then what I knew now... oh well.

-Uncle Bex

Originally posted by poisonrevers
Well.

I think you walked right into it. If you want good service, you are gonna have to pay for it.

And why on gods' green earth would you go to a company calling themselves "extremesmurf"???

8-)

Branding and name is everything. Next time use the grey matter. Do a "whois" look when the domain was registered and check out the news groups..becuase if a hosting company has been around that long..they'll be in there.

Look for older companies (some not around) like Tabnet, Best.com, Hiway technologies, Webhosting.com, olm.net etc...