As Web Traffic Grows, Crashes Take Bigger Toll(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
As Web Traffic Grows, Crashes Take Bigger Toll
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/06/technology/06outage.html?hp
1 comments
Of course you could make an overly elaborate uptime monitoring system. Many people have in the past. The thing that makes downforeveryone neat is that it is absolutely bare-bones. "Is it down for everyone?" "Nope, just you." No screen shots, no packet traces. Does it work? Yes/no. All I wanted to know.
Site doesn't load or has other problems? Hit the question mark and see the latest reported issues. Your details (browser, IP, etc.) are automatically uploaded and attached to an optional comment, for other people to compare against (same ISP, same country, same browser, etc.).
Pingdom and others sell monitoring. You could probably sell this data to companies - live reports on failures for certain user groups.
Actually... why not make it an open database where you can log issues (not just site failure) against all kinds of services - internet banking sites, the London Underground (District Line still suffering signal failures), etc. Many organisations would ignore or oppose it, but the good ones would find it useful, which implies a way to make money.
All you would have to do is connect the question-mark to the web site / page being visited, and use that as the basis for the ticket. People could maintain a database of contact/help email addresses for each site (the sites could pop up on a queue as they were reported), and the tickets could be sent to that address, to let the organisation know "you are being watched". :-)
Every organisation has a site, and every site has a way to get a message to whoever runs it.
This could grow to a size where it became a significant cultural force. Perhaps that's just the wine talking, but it's quite good wine, so who knows.
Edit: You should also be able to submit a screen-grab with your complaint/suggestion.
Opinions?