27 Jun 2008 18 Comments
Firstgiving is upgrading its infrastructure… we are moving to Qube
** update July 3, 9am: updates complete and propagating across the internet. See http://getsatisfaction.com/firstgiving/topics/firstgiving_site_update for the latest. **
Hello All,
Due to the growing level of traffic on our site we have undergone an upgrade of not only hardware, but collocation facilities, too. We have invested a significant amount on new hardware, software and human power to provide our users with a better platform to raise money online.
So what does this mean to you:
- faster page loads
- less errors
- a more reliable interaction with our site.
The move to Qube will also help us more rapidly release bug fixes, upgrades and new features. This being said please contact support@firstgiving.com with reports of bugs or features you would like to see on the site. We love hearing from folks and are always looking for input.
Thanks & Happy fundraising…
Firstgiving
Tech Team
tel 617 591 2121
48 Grove Street #106, Somerville, MA 02144
Lori Faith Dake
Jul 02, 2008 @ 01:44:06
It is 11:00p.m. Tuesday, July 1st and we have just received word from numerous people that were trying to donate money to our fundraiser, as well as inform them when we are having our first sale (this saturday & Sunday) when will the site be up and running?
We are a bit frustrated as we just got it up and e-mailed TONIGHT!!!!
Lori
Sandra McGuire
Jul 02, 2008 @ 10:05:41
Why the heck are we raising money if people can’t get in to donate? This is super frustrating as it has taken me a lot of effort to get people to agree to donate in these hard economic times. Asking them twice is not something I want to do. My brother’s wife is trying to donate $100 … so I say my fundraising goal is now $400 instead of $500.
This is not cool.
john j tolka
Jul 02, 2008 @ 11:30:30
A very stupid move to shut down a fund raising for a cancer research . The cancer walk for the NSMC only being held on June 22 and you shut down the
giving site eight days later ? what are you people thinking of ?
Will not ever raise nor contribute to NSMC again and I AM A CANCER SURVIVOR
Beth Schock
Jul 02, 2008 @ 11:49:31
Hi Sandra,
Thanks for getting in touch with us.
Our site has been switched to the Qube environement, and while this is a vast improvement in many areas, there have been a few hiccups in the past 24 hours. It sounds like the error you experienced on your page was related to this.
Please email us directly so we can get this fixed ASAP for you (if it’s not already). Contact our team at support@firstgiving.com. We will do everything we can to make this right for you.
Thank you for letting us know about this,
Support Team
Firstgiving
Margaret Berwind-Dart
Jul 02, 2008 @ 12:07:54
Hi, John,
Thank you for your candor. We truly appreciate your feedback.
Our move to a new server happened overnight; by early this morning the vast majority of Firstgiving pages were back up & running.
Some ISP’s take a little longer to update new server addresses. It sounds as though that happened for you.
Please accept our sincere apologies for the inconvenience. Should you wish to speak with someone directly, please don’t hesitate to contact us, support@firstgiving.com
Support Team
Firstgiving
Nancy
Jul 02, 2008 @ 13:28:55
When will our friends and family be able to donate money towards my son’s fundraiser? We couldn’t get on today! Please let us know a timeframe on how long.Nancy
The Online Fundraising Blog » New fridge, infrastructure, and enhancements
Jul 02, 2008 @ 14:12:13
[...] our techie Victor told you last week, we migrated to a new infrastructure around 7:30am (EDT) – Qube, which makes Firstgiving [...]
helen
Jul 02, 2008 @ 14:17:47
it would be great if “monthly scheduled maintenance” didn’t take more than a couple hours. or it could be done in the middle of the night like many other internet companies. or perhaps i could get an email letting me know about the maintenance in advnce so i wouldn’t have *just* sent an email reminder to my friends. having the site continue to be down in the middle of the day is unacceptable. like many others – i am trying to reach my goal and you are making this extremely difficult.
Vivian Herren
Jul 02, 2008 @ 16:18:01
I am with Team Alabama and did my firstgiving page yesterday. I have not been able to send it out at all. How long is this going to take? I need to get it out if I am going to reach my goal. Can you at least give a time frame on when I may get to send my page out?
Margaret Berwind-Dart
Jul 02, 2008 @ 16:34:39
Dear Nancy & Helen,
Thank you for your respective posts.
Please note that the site has not been down since early this morning. The great majority of fundraisers & donors have been able to access the site; for a few folks, this hasn’t been the case & for that we sincerely apologize.
A very basic explanation for the few people who can’t view pages:
In order to move traffic to our new servers we need to notify the ISP’s (AOL, Comcast, Verizon) of our new server address. Some ISP’s are better than others at updating this address information, since each ISP can configure their DNS servers to get updates at different intervals.
So if someone is getting the under construction page or having difficulty getting to our site it’s because their ISP has not updated our new servers’ address.
I hope this helps shed a little light. Apologies again for any inconvenience.
Firstgiving Support Team
Margaret Berwind-Dart
Jul 02, 2008 @ 16:56:43
Hi, Vivian,
Thank you for your post.
Please see my reply to Nancy & Helen (post #10, I believe) for an ‘technical’ explanation.
As to a timeline, I don’t have one to quote. As mentioned in earlier posts, the great majority if site visitors have no issue viewing & supporting Firstgiving pages.
The timeline for resolution in instances where the site continues to give an error depends on the individual ISPs’ DNS configuration.
I wish I could give a more definitive answer. Certainly, it shouldn’t be much longer for those still getting an error.
Margaret
Firstgiving Support Team
Vicki Keifer
Jul 02, 2008 @ 17:08:24
I would like information on how to post information on this site for our events and annual campaigns. Would love to hear more!
Thanks!
colum mcnabb
Jul 02, 2008 @ 18:53:52
how long are you going to be fixing the site? I have lost one full days donations already.
Rebecca Dufek
Jul 02, 2008 @ 19:57:38
I complelely agree with Helen! I was surprised to learn from a friend last night that my page was under construction. Puzzled I visited my page and sure enough it was down! I read what was going on and told my friend maybe it was just due to maintanance during late hours and would be back up today. I also wondered why I had not recieved an email notification of this happening. I have gotton other first giving emails which said nothing about the change. So I thought maybe an email from first giving was directed to my spam folder. I checked there and found nothing! This is very poor service by not informing your clients who are working so hard to support important causes. It also reflects badly on our organizations at a time when it is more challenging to encourage people to donate. When we finally do get people to go to our fundraising page to donate it is closed and we look foolish not knowing anything about it!
I too was hopeful that this was just a one time or monthly thing which happened at a late hour. I expected the page to be up and running today and it is not. Who knows how many donors I just lost to our cause which I have really had to work hard at as there is not alot of awareness about it yet. I am a brain tumor patient awaiting a second brain surgery and working my butt off to convince people to donate to research to stop these tumors from growing. I need things as simple and easy as possible for my donors and you have put up a major obstacle for me and others to do so.
Again…very poor communication and disappointing service.
Rebecca Dufek
Jul 02, 2008 @ 21:57:25
Thanks! This evening it appears to be working. If something like this happens again, please send us a notice so we can adjust and let our potential sponors know.
Nancy Adams
Jul 02, 2008 @ 22:52:49
The site is down again. This is the 3rd evening in a row that I haven’t been able to access the edit function for a webpage that I’ve been trying to complete for 3 nights. We have 16 mountain climbers that have trained every day for 6 months to Summit Mount Rainier for this fundraising event & now our donors can’t donate? Not good… please press on to get this fixed soon.
Barry Swindon
Jul 03, 2008 @ 01:17:26
The Seattle to Portland cycling event is in two weeks time and a thirty strong team for a nonprofit is raising money using your site. This is in danger of failing if we cannot have donors access our websites. This is your problem… please put some pressure on the ISP’s… especially Comcast!!!!
Nancy
Jul 03, 2008 @ 07:18:35
This is the second day that I cannot access my son’s fundraising page.what is going on? I have AOL . Is there anything we can do on our end.Otherwise can’t you put pressure on them.I am very disappointed.Please reply.Nancy