Host terminated acct for Spam Unfairly, I need a new host !

[cgchris99]

Please I don't need another lecture about Spam but here are the details

I was trying to promote my website. I used a piece of software to scan
websites for email addresses for people who would be interested in my
website. I should have known I would get some email addresses that
would not be valid for my targeted audience. I quit using the scanning
software right after the first time.

My website is for informational purposes so not-for-profit clubs can
list their tournament information. I have been getting great praise
and thanks from these same clubs for providing this service. My
service makes these clubs money. I do not make any money by doing
this.

Yes, I am still contacting clubs that I have not contacted yet. I
lookup these sites individually and get their info@ email address to
send to. This is the only way for them to find out about my website.

However, the host was not pleased that I had sent out "spam". Now
they have deactivated my account and want $700 to reactivate it. No
discussion, No warning, No nothing. They will not talk to me via
telephone and email responses from them have been very terse. I have
emailed them asking many questions and have been nothing but polite
trying to get this issue resolved.

I have never sent my email message to the same person more than once.
I did put an unsubscribe on the email but since they are only going to
receive one message, this really doesn't matter. Again, I wasn't
selling anything, or advertising some get rich quick scheme, just
notifiying clubs that my service is available to them for free.

Here's what I need.

A host that will host me.
telephone support
MySql
PHP
Webmail capabilities
multiple email accounts
And of couse I need my site back up and running soon.
I had about 22000+ page views last month.

I believe bandwidth usage was about 200-500mb/month

I am not looking for super budget hosting . Just good reliable uptime
and good support at a reasonable price.

Thanks for any recommendations

[korkus2000]

Welcome to WMW cgchris99,

I believe Bretts host does all that for a reasonable price. Click the link at the bottom of the page that says hosted by.

You need to stop the spam or no host will let you stay.

[cgchris99]

I looked at the bottom of the page. I dont' see anything that says bretts host.

Do you have a url?

Thanks

[korkus2000]

Try this [westhost.com...]

[brotherhood of LAN]

westhost.com for that host, though you best check TOS's of hosts before you delve into anything...

I hope yer robot has a User Agent that I can ban ;) ..... I try to avoid plain email links because of these spiders that scan for email addresses.......

[Crazy_Fool]

doesn't sound unfair to me. if one of my customers spammed like that, i'd shut them down too, only i wouldnt take them back at all - just not worth the hassle.

>Yes, I am still contacting clubs that I have not contacted yet. I lookup these sites
>individually and get their info@ email address to send to. This is the only way for
>them to find out about my website.

no it isn't. build your site properly, optimise it for the right keywords etc, and they could find your site on search engines. do it right and your site could beat their sites for all of their keywords.

ask the sites that you already link to if they will pass the message on for you. a club that doesn't already know about you may not appreciate your emails (as you've already found out to your cost), but they may appreciate hearing your message from someone they know and trust.

[dcheney]

I've had a web presence for over 5 years and have received thousands of "one-time only" spams (usually multiple times). I report them regularly and hope they also are booted by their ISP. FYI, of all those thousands of spam _never once_ have I received one that was appropriate to the content of my site. (Just because the word "Florida" appears in an address on my page doesn't mean I want to take a trip there, etc.)

[john316]

"Please I don't need another lecture about Spam"

Sounds like ya got one, and maybe you should take it to heart or you can keep playing "musical hosts".

[cgchris99]

Lets look at it like this.

Lets say you are the president of a
Classic Car Club. And a new website appears with information about
listing Classic Car Shows all over the country. You received an EMAIL
that said you could list your all you Classic Car Shows on this
website for free and people all over the country could view it. Would
you find this email offensive spam or would you think, "maybe I should
list our car shows there, it doesn't cost me anything, maybe we would
have a bigger turn out?"

I have been contacted by numerous people I have "target" my email
message to. They are very greatfull for me creating this site for
them. The Complaints came because I was stupid enough to scan and got
emails that were not related to the topic.

I know you all will tell me I am wrong. But it seems the sentence is
the Electric Chair and the crime was removing the mattress tag from my
bed.

[martinibuster]

I live in a popular neighborhood in San Francisco. On the weekends we get a lot of trust fund types who come here to get tipsy, and they like to ring doorbells after 2am. I'm sure they think, "Oh it's only once."

I caught one of these "people" once, and...

[heini]

Well, OK folks. So Chris has used a mail harvester, he got smacked by his hoster, he stopped doing it.

Now - personally visiting sites and individually writing to the mail addresses given on that site, inviting siteowners to list their sites on his - I don't see the problem here.

On a magazine I'm running this happens all the time. People visit my site and write to ask for links, to ask if I'm interested in their (related) sites etc.

If I'd feel I couldn't handle that I'd just not give out any e-mail address.

[msr986]

BTW cgchris99,

Welcome to WmW.

You won't get pounded all the time around here.

EVERYONE at WmW is really pretty nice actually! :)