Trusting your world to web services: Basecamp outage

In our ever connected lifestyles we put a TON of faith in the availability of these whiz-bang hosted web services being unconditional and forever.  Some businesses rely completely on the functionality of 3rd party hosted applications for the management of their extended teams, clients, projects, and in some cases all aspects of their business.

Today, our project management application, the wildly popular Basecamp from 37signals took a big dump on us and was unavailable for almost 6hrs.  Here is their story:

• Basecamp Outage Explained

It caused us a bit of gas because our standing project meetings had to be conducted manually from memory and we were not able to open new projects as we normally would.  For us, it was a speck of inconvenience, but for others who are more reliant on Basecamp and similar systems, i can imagine today was not fun at all.

I am sure Basecamp will "refund" us , and others who complain for the 6hrs of downtime, but the $150 or so that amounts to, doesn't come close to lost time and productivity. Buried deep in some SLA I am certain there is a limit of 37signals liability, but who reads those? I wonder if this should be a wake up call  to myself and others, that this is always a possibility? Should we have a plan B "at the ready" like we do for backups and file servers? Is this just the nature of the beast?  Thinking about it, there are 20ish web services I use on a daily/weekly basis, some of which I pay for, some of which are free, but I rely on them to keep me organized, billing, working, and enjoying life.  What is a fair expectation of availability of these services?

We'll keep using Basecamp for the time being, but this outage certainly has me looking at alternate solutions, and that is something I would have NEVER considered until today.

WBV

Comments

[JC-OnStage says...]

This is one of the reasons I don't like sites that don't own their own equipment and use managed hosting (like Rackspace, who 37s uses). If something goes down, you are at the mercy of their staff to fix it.

However, if the data you store in these types of applications is that critical, then you should absolutely have a plan B. For example, it is probably even more likely that your business' internet connection will go down, thus wiping out access to all of your online services. And if you are just a small business with only a DSL line, you likely are not a high priority to the phone company.

-John from OnStage

[DHH says...]

I'm really sorry for the trouble the outage caused. Being down for two hours (not six, btw) on a Friday is no good at all. Please do write support for compensation. We don't have an official SLA, but we still want to make sure that customers who were affected are compensated.

[Bryan Landaburu says...]

Good points from JC - I think a lot of small businesses get hammered at one point or another for a lack of proper procedures, backups, redundancy, and disaster planning. I know its hammered us over the years as we have grown up into the [well]oiled machine we are today.

RE: 37signals comment - I have to say that i am MOST impressed that someone from 37signals took even a second to acknowledge a post on my blog about their product and service outage. This exemplifies a company that sincerely cares about their reputation. While i will still say that our multiple Basecamp instances were down for more than 2 hrs, I also clearly acknowledge their willingness to compensate those of us who were down. My honest self would have a hard time saying that i "lost revenue or reputation" as a result of their outage so i will NOT be one of the ones stepping up and expecting to be "paid". Others whose businesses rely more heavily on them for real-time communications Basecamp provides will have a more serious case, and then others will just submit claims for the sake of complaining.

I am interested in the fact that they don't have an SLA...I didn't even know that. Shows you how much we look at what we sign up for. So, if there is no SLA, then their liability is quite limited, which makes their effort to respond to everyone who was hampered by their outage all that more impressive...they certainly don't NEED to do it from a legal standpoint so the fact that they are, is pretty damn cool.

That said, like admirable company 37signals is, they are down in the grass roots battling for their reputation, and willing to do what it takes to keep faith in their systems and products running strong. Very few companies large or small would spend the time at this level fighting for their business. But, they realize the horsepower that word of mouth and referrals have.

Anyway, ever forward, and still a Basecamp customer.

WBV

[GamBoy says...]

I've read so many posts on Basecamp outage already! It should really have been a disaster! I've never experienced this problems with Wrike http://www.wrike.com. Probably you might want to check this too out.

[Sterling says...]

B - we use Creative Manager Pro. Might not suit your needs but it is cost effective and we have had no issues with accessibility.

[Bryan Landaburu says...]

thats a nice product sterling. we have another in mind that we are putting some customization into. We can also host it ourselves. May be cool...may suck. Looks cool for now. Till then...on Basecamp we fly.

B