Media Converter

12.03.09 - Downtime

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 08:19:00 +0000

Hello everyone

The site was down very often during the last few days. I am very sorry for that. I thought limiting the conversions to 5 per day would be the best to get rid of the problems. But it looks like as it didn't help a lot. There are too many users so the main server crashs and the website is no more available.

I am going to take the current version down in April and replace it directly with the beta version of the new site. So there will be no separate beta testing phase. I'm sure that the new version will perform much better. So this might be the best solution.

To all premium users:

As I am very sorry for the problems and the inconveniences I extended all accounts for another week.

Sorry again for all inconveniences.

Pascal

01.03.09 - Beta phase announcement

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 20:17:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Yes! The new version is almost done. The public beta phase will start on the 1st of April. So everyone is welcome to help me testing the new version.

And attention! The new version is NOT compatible with IE 6. Internet Explorer 6 is completely out-of-date and is not web standards-compliant. So please make sure to update your browser or switch to a way better browser like Firefox.

Regards
Pascal

08.02.09 - Some details about the new version

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:05:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Just some details about the new version of mediaconverter.org:

- Support for Facebook videos (free)
- Some erotic portals: Youporn, Timtube and Pornhub (premium users)
- Premium users can download adult protected videos on Youtube
- Again 10 free conversions per day (sorry for the inconveniences at the moment)

Some people asked for hulu.com support. This is not possible since I all my servers are located in Germany. The videos on hulu can only be accessed from inside the USA. Sorry!

The new version doesn't just bring new features it also misses some features like support for Office file formats (too much ressources / only a few users).

By the way .. I still accept feature requests for the new version. So feel free to request whatever you're missing in the current version.

Regards
Pascal

24.01.09 - Conversion limit set to 5

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 16:47:00 +0000

Hello everyone

To avoid downtime during the peak times I set the daily conversion limit to 5. This will be reset as soon as the new version is online. So you can convert again 10 files per day.

Thank you for your understanding

Regards
Pascal

15.01.09 - Just some news

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 08:10:00 +0000

Hello everyone

As you know from my last post I'm working on a new version of Media Converter. I mentioned that I will release the new version somewhen in February. I think this was too optimistic. There is still too much to do and I don't want to release an unfinished website. So a more realistic release date would be a date in March or April.
I hope you don't mind as the current version can be sometimes really slow during the peak time. Mediaconverter.org now has about 80000 users per day. Maybe too much for this website at the moment.
I'm going to use some new technics to reduce the load time and server load. I hope this will avoid future complications otherwise I'll have to install a load balancer and more servers. Since this isn't very cheap I have to get more premium users. The amount of premiums users is almost always at the same level. I really don't think that it is too expensive. What do I have to do to make more users to sign up? Maybe you can help me out ...

Oh by the way .. please post your requests for new video portals in the new version. I'll do my best to integrate all of them.

Regards
Pascal

15.12.08 - Announcement

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 08:03:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Now it's more than two months ago since my last news. In the meantime I wasn't inactive of course. I'm working hard on a new release of mediaconverter.org which will beat the other conversion websites by far with its new features.

Here are just some of the changes:

- The website will be available in different languages. Everyone is welcome to help me to translate the website. At the beginning it will be available in English and German.

- You will be able to queue up to 10 files and convert them all at once

- Completely new design. I won't tell you too much so it's still a surprise ;). You may wonder why I created a new design again. It's just that people with a lower display resolution don't have to scroll down the page after every conversion. So you can access the main features faster than before.

- Support for new websites

- Again two new conversion servers for better performance (total of 10 quad core servers with 4gb ram per server)

- There will be a help chat. This will allow you to talk to each other and share your know-how and may help other persons who have problems to convert their files.

- The conversion wizard will be much easier to understand for beginners. I will add some extra help sections and hints or something like that. I recognized that still too many people have problems to convert their files without any problems. It's hard to make technical things easy to understand for everyone. I hope this is the right step to avoid problems. I will also improve the FAQ as I don't have enough time to answer all the emails and support tickets all the time.

- It's also planned to offer an API so other webmasters can access my infrastructure. The API will follow in an upcoming release since it's not my main focus at the moment.

The current state of the project is approximately 50 - 60%. So there's still a lot left to do. I think I can start beta testing at the end of January so a release will follow somewhen in February. This will result in a interrupt of the service since I have to prepare the servers for the new version.

If you have additional ideas for the new version feel free to contact me. Any help to improve the service is welcome!

Kind regards
Pascal

30.09.08 - Country specific bug fixed

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 07:39:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Youtube redirects all users to their localized version. So for instance it wasn't possible to convert files from il.youtube.com due to the domain check (false positive). This will no longer happen.

Sorry for the inconveniences

Regards
Pascal

14.09.08 - Godtube support

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:10:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Some premium users requested support for godtube.com. So here it is. It's now available for all premium users.

Have fun

Pascal

30.08.08 - Short news

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 09:47:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Mediaconverter.org is growing more and more. The Firefox extension helped to increase the daily user amount to ~35000. I still don't see an end of this process so I ordered once more a new server for this service. This time the server will replace the main server where the website is running (not a conversion server). So this means there will be an interrupt where you won't be able or only partially to access the website.
I'll keep you informed with further blog posts about the exact date/time when I will move the website.
As the most users here on mediaconverter.org are from America and my servers are in Europe many people complained about bad download rates or the website didn't load. These is just because of the distance to the server. Here in Europe the service is very very fast. So I changed the provider to a bigger and more professional provider which has better connections to some internet backbones. I hope you will recognize the difference.

So I wish you a very nice weekend and don't stop spreading this website!

Thank you

Pascal

10.08.08 - Back from holiday

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 12:16:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I'm back from my holidays in Mallorca.
Sadly there were some problems with the website for the last 5 days. That's really a pity as I hadn't the chance to check the state of my website everyday.
So I'm sorry for the inconveniences.
The only positive news is that the amount of daily users increased to over 31000 users.

Btw. I extended all premium memberships for 7 days as a small excuse for the problems. If your membership ended in the past few days and your account has been deleted feel free to contact me. We'll find a solution for sure.

Kind regards
Pascal

21.07.08 - Youtube bug fixed

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 23:12:00 +0000

Hello everyone

There was a small but very annoying bug in the Youtube conversion. The conversions always failed if there was a high quality version of the appropriate video.
I never recognized this bug till I tried to convert one of these videos today.

So I'm sorry for the inconveniences!

by the way how do you like the firefox addon?

Regards
Pascal

19.07.08 - Brand new Firefox extension!

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 01:15:00 +0000

Hello everyone

As I mentioned some months ago I planned to create a Firefox extension. Now it's done. It will make it much easier for the Firefox users to convert videos within your browser.

To learn more feel free to visit the official download page at https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/8189
Attention! You have to sign up for an account at mozilla.org as this is a brand new addon which has an experimental tag till it's moved to the public zone.
Please write as many review at this page as you can. Because as more reviews I get as faster the extension will be moved to the public zone ;) Thank you very much.

Cheers!

Pascal

03.07.08 - 3 new servers

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:30:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I just added three brand new quad core servers to this service. Once again an upgrade to make sure this service is still the fastest in the internet ;)

Have fun

Regards
Pascal

30.06.08 - Problems last weekend

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 09:41:00 +0000

Hello everyone

My provider had some network problems this weekend which was the problem that the service didn't work properly.
I'm going to change the provider as this one isn't as professional as I thought. I ordered three brand new quad core servers at a top provider in europe. This will solve this problems for sure.

I'm sorry for the inconveniences

Regards
Pascal

24.06.08 - Important news

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 20:09:00 +0000

Hello everyone

All users who tried to convert more than 10 files the last few days recognized that there is a new limit (10 conversions per day). I got many emails .. of course none of them very positive. Listen ... this website has no ads at all. It has probably the most features of all conversion websites. So many users use this website several times a day. They stress my servers a lot ;) and the users who just want to convert 1 - 5 files a day suffer from these few people.
First I wanted to set a lower limit like one between 5 and 10 conversions per day but this is really too low.
I want to make these people pay for this service. So I can improve it more. The income of the premium service almost cover the costs of the whole service but it still doesn't.

Now some questions to all of you:
- Is the premium service too expensive?
- Would you pay for it if it only costs 5$ per month (without online storage and no increased file size limit)?
- Ugly ads or a clean website monetized by the users who use this service a lot?

Thank you for your understanding and help

Kind regards
Pascal

17.06.08 - Please read this!

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 08:27:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Please stop to start conversions over and over again if they do not immediately start to download or to convert. During the peak time it takes a while because the servers are under heavy load.
My traffic just increases unnecessarily. If it doesn't stop I have to limit the conversions per day.

Kind regards

Pascal

04.06.08 - News for premium users

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 21:13:00 +0000

Hello

I increased the maximum file size to 500mb. Further I will add many new portals including some erotic portals as many people requested this feature.

So have fun and kind regards
Pascal

12.05.08 - New version online

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 12 May 2008 12:57:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I'd say it's really difficult to not recognize that there is a new design ;)
Now you can sign up for the premium services and benefit of the new features. There is also a new feature which is also available for the free version.
You can name the output file. Many people whished this feature so it was time to add it ;)
If you want some further details about the premium services please visit the following page:
http://www.mediaconverter.org/index.php?s=c&show=signup

Finally some special thanks to my beta tester Alessandro Rinaldi who gave me a lot of input to make this website more useful and convenient for you.

So have fun and if you find some bugs please contact me! Thank you!

Greetings
Pascal

21.04.08 - Donations?!

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 07:16:00 +0000

Hello everyone

This month are the donations very very rare. I don't know why but it'll become a real problem for me at the end of this month. So please help me and donate some money. If just everyone would donate 1$ I could pay the bills for about 3 months!!

Kind regards
Pascal

11.04.08 - Clarification

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 07:37:00 +0000

Hello everyone

Some people misunderstood my last blog post. They believe that I'll close the free version of MC. I just said that I'll introduce a paid service. MC will also get a complete redesign. Here is a first impression of the future look and feel.

Screenshot

MC will stay free but there will also be a paid service with many new features for people who want to use it more extensive.
Last month I had to pay 2000$ for this service. Many people donated a total of 800$ and the advertisment earnings were around 600$.
-> 2000 - 800 - 600 = 600$ from my own pocket. As I don't want to perpetuate this situation I decided to make this step.

Greetings
Pascal

01.04.08 - Two new servers added

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 22:54:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I already mentioned it in the last post but now its definitive. I added two new servers to the service.

Thanks again for all donations!

Let's convert!

Greetings
Pascal

28.03.08 - News and POLL

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 11:42:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I arranged two new servers for mediaconverter.org with 6tb free traffic. So I can decrease the costs every month at least a bit. This is of course also an advantage for you because soon it are 5 servers which will handle the load.
The daily user amount increased to 19000 - 20000 users. That's quite a lot.

By the way ... I'm glad to see that many people donated this month. The goal isn't reached yet but I'm confident that we'll make it.

Now to the poll:

As you may know I'm planning a paid version of mediaconverter.org. Of course it's important for me to know what I should offer that you would pay for it.
Here are some examples of additional features:
- Online disk space for your favourite converted files (something between 1 or 5 gb)
- Additional video portals (for instance: myspacetv, bebo, facebook and so on)
- File manager for the converted files
- No ads
- increased file size limit (200mb - 300mb)

What do you think? Any suggestions?

Thanks for your help

Greetings
Pascal

23.03.08 - New options

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 02:08:00 +0000

Hello everyone

I got some requests concerning additional options to set the time offset and duration. Now you can convert a specific part of a video or audio file. So you can remove unwanted intros or whatever.
You can set these new options in step 3 of the conversion wizard. The options have to be set in seconds so you may have to calcuate it first.

Greetings
Pascal

02.03.08 - Office file types are back

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 20:20:00 +0000

Hello everyone

All those users who are using this service since the beginning know that there was once a feature to convert office file types. I removed it after some months because it wasn't as successful as I expected.
But I started a poll about new features some months ago and some users suggested to integrate the office file types again. Now here they are again ;) ..

Enjoy it and don't forget to donate. Still over 600$ left ;(

Greetings

Pascal

26.02.08 - Call for donations

noreply@blogger.com (Pascal) — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 22:45:00 +0000

Hello folks!

It's once more time for donations. This month will be really expensive. The traffic costs are approximately 500$ which I can't pay from the advertisment earnings. At least the server costs are covered. So please help me with a small donation. Thank you very much.

Edit:
I got the bill today. 870$ !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! no comment .. please please donate!

Kind regards
Pascal Beyeler