HI! I’m new here – thought I’d drop in and make myself comfortable..knock around a little – kick the tires and see how things run here at the PEER1 blog. Let me introduce myself – Let me introduce myself: I am Lisa Sabin-Wilson and I am the author of WordPress For Dummies, and the creative director of E.Webscapes Design Studio. I’m really excited to announce that ServerBeach and I are joining forces this weekend at the SXSW Interactive Festival and bringing you some really COOL schwag at the ServerBeach/PEER1 exhibit booth!

What kind of schwag, you ask?  Well, if you’re a fan of the WordPress blogging platform like I am (and I KNOW ServerBeach and PEER1 are) – you’re in for a treat if you drop by the ServerBeach booth. I will be hanging out with these great folks and spending some quality time at the booth making sure you have access to the following WordPress goodies:

1. WordPress For Dummies: ServerBeach will be giving away free copies of WordPress For Dummies at their booth, and as a bonus – I will be present at the times stated at the bottom of this post, to do book signings. So stop by the ServerBeach booth and pick up your FREE autographed copy of WordPress For Dummies. Already have a copy? No problem – stop by the booth to say hi … I love to meet my readers, and I’ll sign your copy!
2. WordPress Q&A: During the times I will be at the ServerBeach booth, I am also available to do a quickie WordPress Q&A if you have any specific questions on how to use WordPress on your site or blog. I’ll have my laptop ready with a clean install of WordPress open, ready for your questions.
3. Premium themes, anyone?? I do a lot of custom design work for WordPress users over at E.Webscapes – - for SXSW I am doing 5 free themes for WordPress users – available ONLY to SXSW attendees who stop by the ServerBeach exhibit booth on March 14-16, 2009. Here’s what you do: stop by the booth and ask for the super secret link to Lisa’s WordPress themes they are giving away. That’s it! (the themes are free and completely GPL). (ServerBeach just might give these themes away to the general public after SXSW is over – that is totally up to them, but for now, they’re available from the ServerBeach exhibit booth at SXSW exclusively.)

Let’s see…. today is Wednesday. That means I have exactly TWO days left before I head out to Austin. I’m looking foward to visiting the great state of Texas – I’m originally from Texas (born in Houston). Plus, I’m really looking forward to getting away from this artic Wisconsin weather.

I’ve been hard at work developing the exclusive ServerBeach WordPress themes and I’m almost done! I’ve been working night an day making sure you have some really fantastic WordPress themes to take home with you from SXSW – - a little token to remember us by. I like it here so much on the PEER1 blog, I just don’t wanna leave! So, I’ll stick around a little bit longer and give you a special sneak peek at a few of the great WordPress themes ServerBeach and I will be handing out at the ServerBeach booth at SXSW in Austin this weekend:

Want to see more? Well, you’ll just have to stop by the ServerBeach booth at the SXSW Interactive Festival in Austin Texas this weekend and you’ll get the whole package of 5!

I am appearing at the ServerBeach booth on Saturday, March 14 from 1-4pm, Sunday, March 15 from 1-4pm and Monday, March 16 from 1-3pm. I’m really looking forward to seeing my good friends from ServerBeach again, after the fun we had hanging out at the BlogWorld Expo event in Vegas last November!

If you’re attending SXSW and have your profile set up at my.sxsw.com – you can add me here. Otherwise, follow me on Twitter – @LisaSabinWilson – I’m sure I’ll be all a twitter about it!

Recently we announced the PEER 1 Quick Hits Twitter contest and have been having a lot of fun with it. Today is day three of our contest and we’re happy to announce the winners to date:

Twitter Trivia Day One: PEER 1 Million Hits Video – “Slacker“

Flip Video Winner: @geekgiant

PEER 1 Sumo Wrestler T-Shirt: @sapphirelaninja

Twitter Trivia Day Two: PEER 1 Million Hits Video – “Washroom“

Flip Video Winner: @garannm

PEER 1 Sumo Wrestler T-Shirt: @donred

Twitter Trivia Day Three: PEER 1 Million Hits Video – “Meeting“

Flip Video Winner: @KelByrd

PEER 1 Sumo Wrestler T-Shirt: @the_real_mkb

Congratulations to all of our winners to-date! We will be having two more contests at 12:30pm CST (10:30PST/1:30EST) March 2nd and March 3rd. Follow me (@charnellpugsley) on Twitter for your chance to win!

We’re getting such a great response to our Million Hits campaign that we’ve decided to take it a step further with a Twitter contest.

Over the next few days, I’ll be posting “Quick Hits” trivia contests on my Twitter account at http://twitter.com/charnellpugsley. For each contest, the winning trivia factoid will be embedded in one of our YouTube videos.

FIRST PRIZE: A Flip Video Mino
SECOND PRIZE: A “Million Hits” sumo wrestler t-shirt.

So please follow me on Twitter, keep an eye on my Tweets, and maybe you’ll win a prize! And don’t forget to visit http://www.peer1.com/millionhits/ and learn how PEER 1 can help get your business ready for a million hits.

As an exclusive Microsoft Network Partner, PEER 1 invites you to join the new Microsoft BizSpark, a new program for Startups. Microsoft knows that today’s most promising Startups are tomorrow’s most successful businesses, and wants to ignite the process. With Microsoft BizSpark, Microsoft encourages you to innovate by giving you fast and easy access to its current, full-featured development tools and platform technologies.

Find out how choosing PEER 1 as your BizSpark Hosting Provider can benefit you today!

Read the full details here: http://www.peer1.com/hosting/bizspark.php

Need a quick, simple way to “catch the moment” on the fly? Taking a video is just as easy as taking a picture at a moments notice! Get a free Flip Video Mino and tell YOUR story, YOUR way.

From now until December 31st, we are giving away a free Flip Video Mino when you sign up for a Managed Hosting plan at PEER 1.You can get this year’s hottest gadget just in time for the holiday season! The Flip™ Video Mino is a point-and-shoot camcorder that is the size of a small digital camera. It is equipped with 60 minutes recording time, 2GB internal memory, rechargeable batteries, and the ability to publish directly to YouTube, MySpace, and AOL Video. The Wall Street Journal calls it “a sleek, hip-looking gadget… changes the way people capture and share videos” and The New York Times claims the Flip™ Video to be “one of the most significant electronics products of the year”.

Details on this promotion: http://www.peer1.com/promo/flipout/

Today marks the official launch of another great PEER 1 customer, Sitemasher. This new SaaS solution is a Web site development service that allows the everyday person to create their own professional and comprehensive Web site. The service integrates Web site building and publishing, content management system (CMS), analytics and search engine optimization (SEO), all within single platform.

Sitemasher went with PEER 1 because it provided the customized hosting solution that Sitemasher needed to power its service.

So if you haven’t yet, check out Sitemasher and let us know if you like them as much as we do.

Sitemasher Demo

Today PEER 1 launched the new Partner Network, for all its lines of business – co-lo, managed hosting and ServerBeach self-managed – and means that we can work even more closely with our partners and their clients. This program really opens up many more revenue options as well, since it includes both a comprehensive Referral Program, active now, and Reseller Program, available soon. These programs offer features like:

Referral Partners
· Provided a variety of choices for significant business and revenue growth opportunities, and don’t have to close the sale or support the client afterwards
· Have revenue options to receive a one-time commission of up to 100% for each new referral or participate in a revenue sharing plan that pays a monthly recurring commission of up to 15%

Reseller Partners
· Eligible discounts for dedicated servers, setup fees and managed services
· Have the flexibility to set pricing
· Receive the full support of a dedicated PEER 1 account team made up of a personal account manager, technical specialist, and a billing specialist

One of our long-time partners who has been working with PEER 1 for 10 years, Mark Lewis the CTO of Mass Transmit, says:

“We have enjoyed a very consistent level of service with PEER 1 both with its Referral and Reseller Programs. We mostly resell their dedicated servers, but sometimes have clients who want to deal directly with the hosting provider. In those cases, we refer them to PEER 1 without hesitation, knowing they are in the best of hands. We also enjoy a good relationship with our account team. Our technical account manager has helped us many times when we’ve been in a pinch.”

To learn more or to get involved check out www.peer1.com/partners

Last week at the Austin Game Developers Conference PEER1 employees spoke with attendees on just how much latency kills when it comes to gaming. What a coincidence! PEER1 just so happened to have a booth at the conference offering “Latency Kills” packages geared towards hardcore gaming providers, publishers, and developers. GREAT!

The conference turn out was even bigger than last year, which PEER1 also attended. There were many great companies exhibiting their products and we all made our rounds to introduce ourselves to each and every one of them, learning about their business and products at the same time.

The 2-day conference was a complete success and we certainly look forward to attending next year seeing many familiar faces, while at the same time making many new friends.

You can view our pictures taken from the conference at any of these websites: PEER1 on FaceBook, PEER1 Community, Flickr, or PEER1 on MySpace.

We are pleased to announce that ServerBeach, our Dedicated Hosting division has rolled out some new product offerings today. Do you have large-scale, mission critical applications, stream media or rely heavily on database and e-commerce, but don’t need managed services? Then have a look at these new ServerBeach Dedicated Hosting offers.

PEER 1 Growing Pains Episode 3 – ‘100% Downtime’.

Janet is at Todd’s bedside in the hospital while he lies in a coma. She speaks to him and he appears to be responding, until things get unplugged…