Attention Homestead website members!

[Madness]

You all probably got the e-mail but if not, they are going to start charging somewhere around 10.00 a month pretty soon--in about a month.(If you're already a member, you get a 60 day grace period) You get to choose from a free version, which is limited or the 10.00 a month one. You know, I haven't touched my site in a year and a half over there but decided 5 days ago to try it again. And now this! It figures. Why do I even try?!lol

If you don't get the e-mail and are a member, let me know and I'll post all the details here.

[Devastation26]

I don't know a thing about this. Anyway, homestead already offers the pay service (professional), and then the limited personal version.. No way on earth a company would be stupid enough to have 2 diffrent pay services which offer the exact same thing.

[Madness]

It's true. I don't make these things up. Here's the letter:
_______________________

This is the most important message you have received since you joined the Homestead community, so I ask that you please take a few minutes to read it carefully and fill out the attached feedback form.

I am disheartened when companies fail to communicate directly with their customers about major changes in their business. Therefore, I want to tell you personally about an important change we are making: we will soon be asking you to pay for your current version of Homestead Personal.

I know that Homestead could never have gone from an idea in my living room to a vibrant community of millions without your amazing support. In this spirit, we are asking for your feedback before we set the price -- more about this in a minute.

We will still have a free version
You will still be able to build and maintain a site for free, with a new service called Homestead Personal Preview. Sites built with the Preview version will be restricted to: three pages, limited customer support, 8 MB of storage space, no use of the offline SiteBuilder, and no option to remove Homestead branding.

Why are we charging?
Based on our recent success with Homestead Professional, we are convinced that subscription is a vastly superior way to keep Homestead Personal an innovative, world-class service for years to come. Due to the collapse of the sponsorship market, free Internet services are becoming impossible to sustain unless they are severely restricted or neglected. We refuse to let Homestead Personal become a second-rate service.

Homestead Personal will be better than ever!
Here are a few improvements you will see initially with the new Homestead Personal: a brand new version of our popular offline SiteBuilder, an option for removing Homestead branding from your pages, a new graphics library of more than 800,000 images, 25 MB of storage space, and priority turnaround time on e-mail requests. Best of all, we will be able to add advanced features to Homestead Personal that we have been unable to justify with a free service.

When will this happen?
These changes will go into effect in about a month. However, current Homestead Personal members, like you, will have an additional 60-day grace period to choose between paying for the new Homestead Personal or downgrading to the Preview version.

How much will it cost?
Here is where I will need your help. I want to make sure we charge existing members a fair price for Homestead Personal. We estimate that we will need to charge new members about ten dollars per month to cover our costs. However, if a high percentage of you indicate interest, we can offer existing members a meaningful discount. Thus, your feedback on the attached form is essential to ensuring the lowest price possible for everybody in the Homestead Personal community.

We will take the next week to read and incorporate all of your feedback. At the end of June we will send you an update with final pricing and timing.

Finally, thank you for being such an integral part of the Homestead community, and for your incredible support over the years. On behalf of the entire Homestead team, I look forward to serving you as we continue to realize our vision of bringing the power of the Internet to everyone.

Click here to fill out the short feedback form now!


All the best,

Justin Kitch
Homestead Founder and CEO

[Devastation26]

I'm sorry, but something about this still sounds fishy, but still, I'm starting to be glad I created that Tripod account. At least IF IT IS TURE (which I doubt), FActs of Life world (my site) will still have a web home.

[Devastation26]

Unfortunately, I just checked one of my other e-mails. It's true http://www.sitcomsonline.com/ubb/frown.gif

I'm packing up my sites and going over to Tripod/Fortune City/Geocities. I have 3 key sites and will probably divide them up among the 3.


MY new TPiR site (under constructionn soon)------->Adddress unavailable---Fortune City

DrAirplane HEat Car Shop------>http://members.tripod.com/king_31hcda---Tripod

Facts of Life World------->address unavailable-------Geocities.

[Madness]

Glad to see you know now.
I mean was there any reason not to believe me? I have never posted false news here and I wasn't going to start now. :-)

It's a shame Homestead had to do this but luckily there's still some free ones out there!



[This message has been edited by Madness (edited 06-12-2001).]

[vienna waits]

I got the same email. They wait until I spent hours working on my site and after I've uploaded 111 pictures to tell me this. I don't think anyone's gonna pay for it so maybe it might stay free.

------------------
-Jeff-

Check out my site @
http://jeffsfactsoflife.homestead.com/jeffsfactsoflife.html

[Madness]

I think there's a way to upload your Homestead site to another like Geocities or Tripod. I'll see if I can find out for you.

[Devastation26]

If ya mean telling them how to uload to another serveer, I'll help.

If ya mean me, I already know how. Just gotta create an account

[Madness]

Ok Devastation26, thanks. I appreciate it. I meant for tootieismyfav.

One question for you if you have a minute. If I wanted to upload my Homestead site to geocities and I already have an account there, how would I go about doing it? I thought there used to be somewhere you'd click and it would send it there.
Thanks a lot.

[Warner520]

Oh my gosh...okay, I have a Geocities account, but about 2 weeks ago, this idea popped into my head, and I'm like, why don't I start a new account as well with Homestead ? So I spent hours creating pages, and now I hear this...there's no way I'm paying money to use a "free website provider". Now I have to transfer my Homestead files to my Geocities account. How exactly do I do that ?

I totally agree with you Devastation26. Even though the letter is for real, it seemed fishy to me too...maybe it's just the way it was written.

[Cheryl Harrell]

I do have a big problem tho... I asked on a HOMESTEAD WEBSITES message board how to transfer the pagers of the site & someone responded with the info. Works good except...

If ya try to edit the page it goofs up & says JAVASCRIPT error. Yikes! I need the ability to edit the pages ccuz I am gonna want to add links to them later on like adding another page to a section & linking the last page of the old section to it. Sigh... WHen I try to edit a page I transferred to GEOCITIES, it gives a JAVSCRIPT error & won't let me edit it.

Does anyone know how I can copy text & insert it on a GEOCITES site? I tried to do that & it won't let me.

Also does anyone using TRIPOD OR FORTUNE CITY or CITY SLIDE know if I were to do a site on any of those can links to my pages be listed in the links thing on the top or side of the page or do the links have to be to CITY SLIDE or TRIPOD or whatever pages? Also can text be copied & then inserted on CITY SLIDE.TRIP, FORTUNE CITY pages? If I could do all this on City Slide or whatever , the I could have some of my pages on CITY SLIDE & the rest of GEOCITES...

Thanks for any info! I am desperate LOL!

[Devastation26]

I know the ffollowing is true with Tripod and Fortune City cause I have sites with both. You can link to anything, anywhere, at anyplace. (unless doing so would violate that host's ToS.)