Tourism Argument

Web Hosting Concerns

The fees are outrageous and this was done quietly. When a Web site paid for by taxes coming into the city, no matter where they come from, is moved to a private company’s servers that in itself is reason to see a zillion red lights going off. There is much that can be done on a private server that the public has no means of knowing about and I’m sure you realize that government is for the people. It is our right to know what is being done and how things are being used and monies are being spent. Being that this Web site is now on a private server, it in essence is no longer a public service, nor is it open to public scrutiny via the means of the open records laws in the state of Wisconsin.

I have the receipts necessary should you wish to see them, so I will give you a break down that includes a comparison of two hosting packages so you can see how just this matter is wasteful.

For 2 years of hosting AND domain registration I paid $162.58 and that includes private domain registration. The domain registration for me for two years came to $28.38 and the hosting came to $134.20. That’s 2 YEARS -- NOTE THAT, PLEASE. They paid Excel $435.00 for hosting and they paid Network Solutions $104.97 in 2006 to register 3 domain names -- visitsheboygan.com, visitsheboygan.org and visitsheboygan.net for a total of $539.97. AND THEIR COSTS ARE ONLY FOR ONE YEAR!!! Times that by 2 and you’ve got $1079.94 compared to my $162.58. If you add two more domains onto MY cost, just for the sake of argument, my costs are still under $200.00 FOR TWO YEARS!

There's absolutely NO excuse for this excessive waste. They say it was in the best interest of the city to go with an outside host -- well, did they even bother to check other options? NO -- it was handed right to Excel, where Mike Swisher worked at the time of the switch.

Now also note, with this cost I get 100 GB of disk space and 1000 GIGABYTES Monthly Data Transfer AND I can have up to 1000 e-mail addresses if I wish. (They have 3).

THEY ARE GETTING 20 MBs -- that's Megabytes -- from Excel for this over-priced plan.

Here's a breakdown of MG's and Gigabytes in for an idea:

Exact Conversion
1,024 Byte = 1 Kilobyte (KB)
1,024 Kilobyte (KB) = 1 Megabyte (MB)
1,073,741,824 Bytes = 1 Gigabyte (GB)
1 Gigabyte (GB) = 1,024 Megabyte (MB) -- Now times that by 100!!!!

And that's just the hosting.

They've also been paying Excel Net for an outsourced "Web Trends" report. Now if you wish, Google offers extensive statistics for free via what they call "Google Analytics". It’s breaks down Web site stats in great detail. Far better detail, I might add, then Web Trends.

Web Trends Report May -- Dec. 2007
Paid to: Excel Net, Inc.
COST: $105.00

In addition, they are contracting out for their PPC campaign. The total yearly fee for this company is OVER $14,000.00! Firstly, it's easy to manage your own PPC campaign. The company they use for PPC is using Google, which I use. It is a snap to set up and manage your own PPC campaign. You don't need to pay ANY ONE for that. I spend maybe an hour every week day on my PPC -- sometimes much less if it's running smoothly and doesn't appear to be in need of tweaking. With them having a much targeted subject and area, this would be far easier than what my work involves. Surely you can understand my horror at all this frivolous waste when I know for a fact and from experience that it is totally uncalled for.

Now, this same company is also supplying a "Video Shoot and Production" (included in that outrageous fee), which is priced at $6000.00 dollars. But they don't state just what this video shoot is for. They then only state "Account Services" for the remainder of their fees.

Note: With a camcorder, you can get some great video's, compile them into harmless flash and have great videos for far, FAR less, if you insist on going that route.

In short, the MONTHLY payment to this Pilch and Barnet is $1234.00 for a total of $14808.00 a year. Totally unnecessary. Total waste. There are far more cost-effective means of achieving similar results that are much more user friendly. Pictures say a thousand words. A well-done picture gallery would be a wonderful asset, cost a mere fraction of the price, would need no maintenance once completed, and if desired, some video's could be embedded in flash of activities down at the lake where people gave permission to have themselves exposed to the entire world, which is precisely what public web cams do -- or anything placed on a web site for that matter. (More on that subject coming). If this measure was taken, once completed there would be no on-going expense involved and no fear of any complaints (or worse).

Here is the break down for Pilch and Barnet as shown via the open records request documentation:

June '07 Keyword Advertising Costs
Paid to Pilch and Barnet
COST: $56.22

July '07 Keyword Advertising Costs
Paid to Pilch and Barnet
COST: $159.42

08/01/07 -- Video Shoot and Production
Paid to Pilch and Barnet
COST: $6000.00

*****NOTE: Full year fees listed at $14808.00 for contracted services. No other explanation given other than keyword and this mysterious Video Shoot along with "Account Services".

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