You see, the 10mbps connection they sell is not a dedicated one.

Where I live, ADSL is the norm, and VDSL is coming.
But the point is that, yes, it's dedicated.

An XDSL connection is 1 point to 1 point direct connection.
Then, I don't say that the ISP have the bandwith to provide 100% of the througput to every subscribed users at the same time, but I can tell you that having a 5Mb plan, I'm around 590~640Ko/s all the time when I download anything.
Including Linux distro DVD, which can take some hours.

For me, it's what I pay for.

Maybe that the place where I live is to be taken in account too.
I live in Switzerland, near an relatively big city (on a Swiss view, as the whole country is as big as New-York) and I'm connected to the biggest and oldest ISP around, which is the 1st phone carrier too here.

What about ethical side of this issue?

Don’t you thing that feed people with lies and tell them that they may have something that physically impossible speaks about nature and character of Hosting Companies?



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Wait a minute...are you suggesting that people lie on the Internet? If you tell me I can't really make millions with TV infomercials, I'm just gonna pout and never stop pouting.

Seriously, I think overselling is more silly than it is unethical. Sooner or later, cheap pseudo-designers and developers come along and start trying to run the next Fadbook on oversold servers and this is when one of two things happens:

1) Host suspends designer's account for "Excessive CPU Quote Usage" or some other cryptic statement. Designer gets pissed off. Designer trashes host. Designer finds sympathy among those incapable of deductive thought and reasoning. Host gets a bad rep. Host disappears.

2) Host struggles for a brief period to keep up with designer's needs, then shuts down server as designer and others prove to be more trouble than they're worth...then often restarts hosting company a few weeks later under a different name and a whole new Template Monster template and the cycle repeats itself.

Hosting's become so cutthroat that way, and has been for quite some time, that I'm pretty well numb to it. I've found a good host. I've been with them in some form for 6 years. That's good enough for me. Besides, I think every good designer/developer has to go through at least 3 bad hosts...that's part of the journey. Puts hair on your chest.

I don't say that the ISP have the bandwith to provide 100% of the througput to every subscribed users at the same time

Exactly my point. That's the very definition of overselling. It would even be silly not to do it, as its almost a mathematical certainty that not all users will use 100% all the time. The whole trick is the correct management of things, finding that right balance. Overselling != overloading.

Host gets a bad rep. Host disappears.

If only that were true. Plenty of hosts manage to stay alive, despite the bad trep. My bet is that a good number of customers have very simple needs and quality expectations.

start trying to run the next Fadbook on oversold servers

You can see it that way. Or you can see it as them trying to use hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of hosting services, and pay $10 per month.

Puts hair on your chest.

Finally. I know the cause for it!

You see what you learn around here? You see? Now you know how you get a hairy chest.

Ladies, this is probably something you'd want to avoid.

You can see it that way. Or you can see it as them trying to use hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of hosting services, and pay $10 per month.

Isn't that pretty well the same thing? Or am I misreading something?

If only that were true. Plenty of hosts manage to stay alive, despite the bad trep. My bet is that a good number of customers have very simple needs and quality expectations.

I tend to agree with that to some extent. Most customers have very little in terms of needs and as such, their "quality" standards are met. However, I think the hosts that stay alive despite a bad rep are generally the larger hosts that tend to overcharge more than oversell (e.g. Interland).

Isn't that pretty well the same thing? Or am I misreading something?

What I meant was, that we can blame the hosts for featuring numbers that can't be reached in a shared hosting environment, but at the same time we can blame the customers for expecting too much for too little. If someone would come to me and say, "I can give you a trip to the moon for $10000", I'd sure be quite skeptic about it, and would certainly not be very surprised to hear that the trip is scheduled for 28th February 2200 AD. That, or 1st of April, 2008.

Okay...that I get.

Companies that need hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of hosting service a month have probably tried all the cheaper solutions, and have big, but efficient demands. Which is different from somebody who writes a bad script ... that person doesn't need a high end data center, just an education.

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"I can give you a trip to the moon for $10000",

Isn't this what Hosting company is doing by offering 10TB of transfer?





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