I was originally going to write a long post; all about the appalling service I received from web hosting company Dreamhost.com.
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My Dreamhost server was a joke!

I was going to tell you all how Dreamhost put one of my blogs on a server that wasn’t working – then refused to move it onto a working server because; (I’m serious), their server software wouldn’t let them move my blog!  Yes, a hosting company claims they use software that can’t move a blog from one server to another!
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Dreamhost customer service – The worst I have ever experienced

I was even going to tell you that Dreamhost provided me with the worst customer service experience of my whole life! For example, their customer services manager actually advised me to leave them! Embarrassingly for him, he forgot to check my account or he would have known that I had already closed my account, by the time he decided to get in touch! :)

His email, advising me to find another hosting company, came with the offer of payment, if I recommended Dreamhost to people (honestly, I am not making this up!)

Dreamhost suck on Google

Why didn’t I write the full review?  Because I found out that when you do a Google search for the term dreamhost suck, there are already over 60,000 thousand pages you can choose from!

According to Wikipedia, WordPress.com is a ‘WordPress-powered blog hosting provider.’  In real terms, it is an extremely easy way for you to get a polished-looking blog on the Internet very quickly and easily – for free!

This blog is hosted via WordPress.com and as regular visitors will know, it runs quickly and is 100% reliable.

“This is in stark contrast to my experiences with Dreamhost, a chargeable hosting service; which I had to remove a blog from after just a few weeks, because of the shockingly-poor, unreliable service I received!”

WordPress.com also benefits from an extremely strong support community – people who know the software really well and are always willing to help via the excellent WordPress.com forums.

The only quibble I have with WordPress.com is their decision not to allow users to add any plugins to their WordPress.com blogs.  This means WordPress.com blogs cannot benefit from useful things like contact forms or from advertising revenue etc.  In fairness, there are some very good reasons for not allowing plugins too.

Some WordPress benefits

There are way too many great WordPress.com benefits to tell you about in one post.  I personally love the fact that WordPress.com; handle all my back-ups, look after security and deal with all the software upgrades etc.

WordPress.com – Ultra reliable

WordPress.com blogs, like this one, are hosted on a number of different servers.  This means that the odds on a blog ‘going down’ due to too much traffic are remote.  I had one of my posts read by over 12,000 people in less than an hour recently – and the blog remained super-fast for all of them!

WordPres.com ‘gives you’ stacks of new readers for free!

The WordPress.com ‘tag’ system means people searching WordPress for topics related to your posts will be able to find you.  I get a huge number of new viewers every single day, because of this great feature.

Summing up

As you might be able to tell, I am a BIG fan of WordPress.com and the great people (paid and unpaid) who support it.  I have been a regular Internet user since the mid 1990′s and in my opinion, WordPress.com is without equal – not just in the blogging arena – but anywhere online.

Thanks WordPress!

Are you a current or former Dreamhost customer?  If you are, I would really like to hear from you!

Why Dreamhost?

I am currently writing an article about the quality of service I have received from Dreamhost and would like to find out what kind of a service Dreamhost have provided you with.

Your comments regarding Dreamhost

Because I would like to give Dreamhost the chance to respond BEFORE I publish my article, I ask that you get in touch with me via email.

Email your Dreamhost experiences (good or otherwise) to thetechnewsblog [at] googlemail.com

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Thanks for your help.

Jim Connolly

UPDATE: 118 emails now received – thank you! I would also like to personally thank Robert Scoble for his help – Thanks Scobleizer!