Message To All Of The Readers/Users

Hey it's Roger Yip, the News Editor here at DVDTOWN.com. (I'm the guy who writes about the upcoming DVD releases.) You have been frequently asking when the site will be at 100% & on the behalf of the staff here at DVDTOWN, I would like to apologize for not being able to give you a straight answer. So, here it is:

We are aware of ALL of the delays and are sometimes asking ourselves literally the same questions you have been asking. Believe me, we are just as frustrated as you are. As you are reading this, our Editor-in-Chief Henning Molbaek and company are working around the clock going through sleepless nights tightening every screw in the system. Because of their hard work, we are now able to update the DVD database again so keep an eye out on the DVD release calender for updates. Several January, February, & March titles have just been added. Now, we just need to get My Town up and running again. When you ask? I don't know. When we know, you will know. Just keep in mind that we are not sitting around a pool relaxing. In the meantime, we hope you enjoy our DVD/hardware reviews, news articles, message board, and the newly updated movie database. Plus, we hope to bring you new features in the future.

We at DVDTOWN cannot express how much we appreciate your loyalty and patience. You are the reason why we enjoy our jobs here and we hope that you will ride this one out and continue to stay with us.

Feel free to continue psoting any of your questions/suggestions/recommendations.

On the behalf of the staff here at DVDTOWN, Thank You.

Best Regards,

-Roger Yip, News Editor )

Well, Rodger, not to be the thorn in the side or any trouble making, but why in the world would the technical staff post a live site without proper QA? What I mean is they should have had all the bells & whistles that go with the site properly tested on a staging server before going live. In fact, everything that is supposed to be on the site should be there and working before ever going live.

In my experience in the IT industry, you develop your site on a development server then you test it on a staging server to make sure all things function properly. Once everything is a 100% through the staging QA process, then you post the site live to a production server which is what everyone in the world sees. It would appear that the new site was half-way done and then posted with half-way problems. I hate to say it but it makes DVDTOWN look unprofessional and unorganized.

Nevertheless, I’ve been a faithful member here and always will be. I don’t plan on giving up due to the consistent problems the site has been facing and I am well aware that no one is sitting around a pool soaking up the sun. The site obviously has a very good technical staff but perhaps they just need a good director to guide them. Someone who could create a flow process of proper procedures for them to follow so the problems the site is facing now never happen again. Well, that would be my suggestion and I can only hope they diligently look into it.

Well, I can only hope things get fixed soon and everything is up and running the way it used to. I have a ton of patients, but like it or not, you need to realize some other people don’t.

Best of luck.

Tim =)

We wish we could have done it the way you described Tim. Financial constraints as well as a entirely rewritten site did not allow this.

Henning,

If I lived in your part of the world I'd certainly drop by to give you a lending hand. I'm very interested to know more about the financial constraints and why the site went live in the condition it is in. I know this is something you would not like to discuss in public, so if you still have my email address drop me a message sometime. If you don't have my email address you can get it from John.

Tim =)

I concur with Tim. In my experience, you never release a software to client or the outside world unless all the problems have been identified and fixed. It does not matter how many features are released. But what matters is the overall quality of the software. I understand that there has been lot of pressure from our readers to release new version of the site.

I think the main problem is the architecture and the overall process followed in the software development of this website than the financial problem. Of course one needs to account money used in for developers time and software platform used for the development of the new website. With the advent of the open source community (very active in last 5 years or so), I am sure Henning lot of people here at DVDtown can help in the development. You can contact me if you want and I can help you hash out your architecture and process of your present website needs as well as for the future.

Good luck!
--Ranjan

I agree with all the above but what's done is done. I'm just glad they are talking to us and letting us know what's going on. That's all I really wanted anyway. It did seem like you were just sitting by the pool because all we had was the occasional review or news post. Never saw any new updates or news on the site development. I understand alot goes on behind the scenes but to avoid problems with the community you need to keep us updated. I appreciate this thread and hope it's not the last. Thanks.

hi, i just wanted to say that i'll wait as long as it takes for this site to become what u want it to. i know it will be the best when all is said and done. thanks and keep up the great work bro!