I'm currently re-doing my site, including placement of freebies, so I thought I'd put them on sharecg while I'm working (I am very very sloooowwwwww.....

Problem is, I can't seem to upload - tried unsuccessfully in Firefox, tried again in IE7, got partially done,but then it timed out. Today I can't even get into Sharecg - got in maybe twice, and now it seems down completely.

So my question is, is this a common problem with sharecg, or is it usually pretty good? Is anyone else having problems there today or yesterday? (Matrixworks, I know you use it, and see you've made several uploads - by the looks of it people are getting in to download)

I'm just wondering what direction to look - try my internet settings, wait it out if it's a temporary glitch on their end, or what.

If it's a good place to upload, I might continue with it once my site is up, sure would save bandwidth. But I have to be able to get in and upload first, lol. And yes, I do have an account and I was signed in. ;)

Any ideas?
Thanks in advance,
judee

It was down for me a short while ago, and is up again for downloads at any rate. I have heard of occasional trouble with the site, not unexpected with the volume of downloads they must be handling (i.e. most of Renderosity's freestuff!) As usual, you get what you pay for. :)

Yeah it does have it's difficulties some days worse than others.  As Bob pointed out, It's most likely due to the amount of bandwidth being eaten up by all the freebies. It's a new site and the owners are going to have to address this serious bottlenecking issue fairly soon or the site will die. I don't think they anticipated the huge bandwidth issues they were going to run into by supplying freebies in such large amounts.

I also hear it has a lot to do with just how far away you are from the host. A lot of uploads and downloads timeout due to the longer distances between the California host and european sources. Items having long routing distances to leap to get uploaded time out more often than Items with less distance. Hopefully they'll upgrade the bandwidth before the site chokes completely.

Okay, thanks, at least I can be pretty sure now that it's not my pc. And yep I'm in Europe, so that possible creats another part of the problem - usually downloads work fairly fast for me though, it's just that this was the first time I ever tried uploading and I was surprised to have it time out on me.

It's a great place for finding things, that's for sure - I enjoy having different freebie creators with their own little corner - if I like something from someone I can see what else they have, etc.

I sure hope the people who started it will do what they can to keep it from floundering. Ir's a good concept, but they are going to have to expect to invest much, if not most of their advertising revenues into stabilizing bandwidth, at least in the beginning.

Anyway, I do thank you again for responding, :)
judee

Glad to help out. As one of the contributors there I too hope they fix it before it flounders. It may not be a huge income, but on my limited income, every little bit helps. I've made more in three months there with giving away my stuff than I made from 6 months of being a merchant with some of the same items.

Quote - Glad to help out. As one of the contributors there I too hope they fix it before it flounders. It may not be a huge income, but on my limited income, every little bit helps. I've made more in three months there with giving away my stuff than I made from 6 months of being a merchant with some of the same items.

And wouldn't you be willing to give up part of that income in order to keep the place stable running smoothly? I think that is the point I'm trying to make.

It's all good that they share the proceeds with the people who upload the freebies - but I can't help but wonder if they are being overly generous in a desire to get people in and uploading. The point is, I feel they should take whatever funds are needed for upgrades, updates, etc, and then divide the rest, only after the site maintenance has been completed.

Maybe they do this already - to a degree. But they must not hesitate to continue adding bandwidth, etc, for fear that the members will balk at less income. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems the principle that this whole thing was based on is that of sharing. Well, sharing the benefits is good, but there must also be a sharing of costs needed to get the place up to par. If that means a little less income on occasion so that updates can be made, well, that should be an expected part of the whole concept.

I'm not looking into it to make money  though of course, the thought of getting some small portion of the ad money is rather pleasant. But more than anything, I would like a stable place to keep my freebies while I am working on my site - and if all goes well, perhaps I will keep them there rather than use up the bandwidth at my site. Rather than pay (for extra bandwidth) to give stuff away, I can give it freely and make even more without worrying about site limits, etc.

But if it doesn't work smoothly, there is no point. At the moment, I have few enough freebies that my site can handle it - I just want to be able to make more.

We'll see how it goes. I'll try again today, maybe I'll get some stuff uploaded. :)

Wish me luck!
judee

Quote - And wouldn't you be willing to give up part of that income in order to keep the place stable running smoothly?
It's all good that they share the proceeds with the people who upload the freebies - but I can't help but wonder if they are being overly generous in a desire to get people in and uploading. The point is, I feel they should take whatever funds are needed for upgrades, updates, etc, and then divide the rest, only after the site maintenance has been completed.

To my knowledge, SGC is run by a handful of people {2-3?} and the percentage that is split between members is really, really low...SCG however is making {imo only} quite enough to pay the rising bandwidth costs,  and advertising fees with money left over, as they get the higher split percentage.

In one month as an example: SGC generates $4,000.  Split percentage is %50/50= $2,000 to SCG, $2,000 to almost 7,000 members.

If the 50/50 split were divided total between SCG and the members, I would not have any problems with giving up some income to keep the site from floundering...but the way the split works now?..no.

I'll continue to use the site for giving content away for the community, but Im not going to depend/hope on any kind of income coming from there. Hopefully they won't go under.

Acually I wouldn't be happy. I haven't generated a HUGE income off my freebies by any means but I'd certainly be less motivated to create more if they lowered the already low payout rates that are in place now. I've just finished reading my latest email from David Hellar and they're steadily working to fix many of the issues people are complaining about and a few that nobody knows about. They're starting to notice an increase in BOT's trying to increase certain members views. These members had better watch out!

Well, I can sort of see your point - I was not aware that SGC were already taking 50% - lol, I guess I'm rather naive. But then, I also have no idea what bandwidth costs at that level, with so many users, etc. I just hope they remain aware that a buggy, slow site isn't going to help anyone.

Matrix, I understand you wanting to get income, heck, your freebies used to be store items, I think it's very generous of you to even attempt this. I truly hope you get what you need from your portion.

And I hope they do keep a watch out and get rid of those bots, and the members generating them! Not fair! Not only in terms of pay-per-view or whatever, but in terms of using up precious bandwidth. That alone might clear things up a bit.

I really don't care about the money, for me, when I make a freebie, I want it to be free and accessible to others. If the place is too slow, I'll just keep them on my site once it's back up - but that means I'll be limited in how much I can give away. So I really hope they get things stabilized. It looks like they are trying, and that is the important thing.

Knowing they are working on it and attentive to the probelms can build confidence. So we'll see how it goes - if I ever can get anything uploaded, that is.

Actually I've been in contact with David the site owner  and from what he tells me, it's not a bandwidth issue as they've never gone above 1/4 of their current allotment bandwidth-wise. Apparently most of the complaints are coming in from European dialup customers who seem to time out a lot. From what he's said, the ones who succeed in uploading usually succeed on second attempts. He doesn't know why their first attempts time out as the website timout period is set to 30 minutes already.

So if you're on a high speed connection, you should at least open an account and try uploading your stuff. Dialup too if you're patient enough to make multiple attempts to upload items that time out on you. It's free and it couldn't hurt to try.

the site owner has posted here in this forum. I appreciate his concern for his clients here, and for the service he provides. one concern on my part is whether new clients are joining at a greater rate than new advertisers are recruited. although I have no fiduciary knowledge, I suspect that each new client draws in new ad receipts per click (or per page view) so the ratio of revenue to clients may remain constant, meaning that the amount of money each client receives per page view (or per download) should not decrease as new clients are added.

Well, I was finally able to upload a couple of items. I think the problem may be on my end, too - seems like everything was running really slow yesterday, did a ping and it was way low. Looks like the isp did some work, because today everything is much faster. So hopefully I'll be able to upload today!

Just in time for the latest announcement today. ShareCg is cleaning house on suspected BOT users. If there are any and they get removed from September's payout. Everyone who remains will be getting a raise.

I sure hope the jump in my view count from adding my freebies to Renderosity's freestuff section doesn't look botty! I've certainly had a HUGE jump in views by adding my stuff to the freebie section here in the past week.

the click-bots might be repetitive page requests from the same IP address, but a devious click-fraudster would use a zombie network, which would be more difficult to detect. a pay-per-ad-click system would be susceptible to the same vulnerabilities as a pay-per-page-view system, but the latter is more beneficial to the submitters IMVHO. the worst-case scenario would be repetitive page requests from the same IP address that submitted the item to sharecg.

They already filter out repetative views from the originator's IP address as part of their process. That's a no-brainer.

Hi Judee...I thought I would add here that I am about ready to just forego ever trying to download from share cg ever again. Yet again it is hanging up and crashing my computer. I wrote in the forum here a few months back, and today I wrote to thier forum about the issue. But this happens almost every time i try to use it. I tried to download Sparky's M3 hair fits, and then went over to Bogget's area and the same thing happened over there...it is site wide. I did some downloads from here and Daz so I know it isn't my DSL or computer...I am really fed up, and it would i think look bad to have a non-compliant site attached to a site...Just my opinion.

HuggerZ!

Ariana

Oh, I wanted to add that I am in the USA, and I have spoken to several people Here (*USA) that experience the same issues that I have with it freezing thier computers up, and not downloading. 2 people have also had serious upload issues one is located in Arizona, and the other is in Washington. So it isn't a one way street for any of us...we can't upload and we can't download! Solution, use a reliable site that isn't doing this money thing, because it isn't working!

Helloooooooo????    Are you listening???    It isn't working!!!

Sorry I had to vent. But in all honesty I would say out of 10 attempts to download a file(*example number) only 1 worked. Those are in my opinion lousey odds. I use Div Share and it has been pretty reliable so far.

Ariana

If you have issues with the uploads and downloads, could you possibly post some of your system information such as are you on dialup or broadband? Do you have antivirus software or firewalls that may be the culprits?

It would help a great deal knowing the stats from people who are having issues just what kind of setups they're using. Without that kind of information, it's going to be hard to track down the problems. For every 1 person having a problem there are 9 people who aren't. Help them help you. Give some technical information on what's going on.

Thank you for the input, Ariana, it's much appreciated. I am certainly going to give it some thought - I've got at least a couple of weeks work to do on my site, maybe more as I am notoriously slow. I'll see how things go during that time.

And yes, as a downloader, I too get frustrated. Seems like everyone is going sharecg now, and it is a great idea in theory, especially for those who would like to make a little money off their work.

But like I said before, money isn't the object here - the main reason I put my freestuff there while site-revamping, is that it has become so well known - and is so easy to do. And no bothersome ads or waiting periods while stuff countsdown - that is, of course, when it's working well.

Though I do also notice that if I am in the process of downloading one item and try to even change the page or look at another item, sharecg won't let me - even from a rosity link - can't even see it on scg until the previous finishes downloading.

Nothing is perfect, granted. I'm sure they are doing their best, but what exactly is that? I too have a high performance cable. I can go on a site that has a high speed bandwidth and download at 3-400 kbps. At sharecg, on a good day, it's around 50. That's a good day. When it lets me.

Matrix, understand, I am not at all dissing sharecg, I think they have a good idea, but they are going to have to work out the kinks or it's just not going to work. I understand people wanting to share the money thing - but  it seems to have drawn in the wrong kind of sharers.  People who, instead of wanting to all work together to benefit all, and get their freebies out to the public, would reather enter into competition for the highest page views, etc. It's not working. I mean, even if they clean up the bots, what's to keep people from continuing to show single textures rather than put them into zips - even 5 to 10 in a zip would be better than one at a time. But it's all about page views.

That's just not what I am looking for. And I do have enough space on my site to handle the few freebies I have, and a handful more, so it's not really a problem yet - but I also use space for promo images and other things - if I could find a good stable download place that wasn't too weird in the downloading practices (I hate those that you have to type in a code, my eyes are bad). Ariana, I may check out DivShare for future references.

Meanwhile, until I get my site squared away, I'm willing to give sharecg a chance. They may say it's not a bandwidth problem - maybe not, but what about an overall speed problem? Maybe they need to be on a higher speed server.

Whatever, I've got work to do , lol, thanks all for the input!

I know you're not dissing them. I would complain too if I was experiencing the problems others seem to be having. That being said, people who have issues with the site should maybe try exercising a little patience. The site is new, innovative and constantly being modified at this point to correct issues as they crop up. This constant modification alone could be causing many downloads to sputter if things are being moved around a lot.

I'm not sure why they limit each IP to one download at a time, but my guess would be to stop bandwidth theives from downloading the whole site for use elsewhere. Again, this is just my guess. The site admin's would have a better answer I'd hope.

I'm a few miles from their servers, hence not an usual situation, however sharecg lets me download 2 or more files at once, lets me click off the page, close the page whilst downloading, etc. OS X.

Hi , I just got back in...

MatrixWorkz here is the original thread I created,

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2708602

and yes they are 100% aware, and they know they need to fix it, and yes as I said before I have been able to download 4 files from them in the past....but that was too much effort to keep doing. I can't reboot everytime Share CG gets a bug in it's bottom!!!

I am on DSL, very fast "ProSpeed", don't know the ping rate but I can download a file from here or Daz in about 45 secounds to 2 minutes for a HUGE file. I live in an unobstructed area of the country (*ie:No city interference), and I download from a several different sources besides here and Daz...

It is them. I have no problems with anyone else. I have to download file updates for software. I download software, models, clothing, etc... and I often download up to 5 at a time from Ren (*on a good day!) and Daz, amongst others which includes individuals sites.

The only place I have this problem is with ShareCG. I am not dissing them either. But I am also not using them any more. (*LOL! I should say attempting to use them!)  This is something that not a few have issues with, I know of one whole site that won't use them...that is how I found DivShare (*No I don't have any association with them, just that it works, it was down 1 time for maintenance).  My point is only that if a site opens and everyone decides that they are going to use that site (*BECAUSE IT PAYS MONEY!) and it doesn't work. Well and soon, many will stop using it. THAT makes people file share, and all though it is free stuff, it does away with your making money on each download I would assume.   

Lastly...

I have a mouth and I use it when unhappy or dissatisfied.....sometimes makes me unpopular, but if I (*1 person) is willing to speak out, how many do you know that won't for fear of being unpopular, or tagged a complainer? Or Goddess forbid not liked! Seriously, the truth is buried many times because on line people go two ways, brave and outspoken, or afraid to say BOO!, because they won't fit in. I remember when I started the afforementioned thread here in Ren, lots of folk got brave and spoke up, that possibly would never have said anything. Just sufferred without (*so to speak). I don't need or use freebies very often. So if it happens to me on the rare occasion that I visit there, and others say it happens to them more. I guess there is a real problem. Saying that they are new is valid, but since everyone and thier cousin puts things over there (*and they SCG, admit they didn't expect that) it is entirely possible that it could take months to fix this. Since I first brought it up back in mid august, and here it is in October with the same issues.

OK, that is all. This is just IMHO, I think if they, ShareCG, plan to do this, they need to fix it PDQ. I also wrote to thier forum at about 7am this morning and no one has answered the question of what is wrong. Maybe they have weekends off? I don't know. But I give up and I am sure I will live without these hair fits for M3....  altho the one for VayneBraid is really Wicked!!!

Ariana

Ok I read your whole other thread again. I don't recall which thread I said this in last, but have ANY of the people having difficulties accessing the sites sent your IP address to the site admin's to make sure it hasn't inadvertantly been blocked by their software or their host provider? If they can ping you and you can't ping them then it's a server/host issue for them. Have you checked your secuirty settings and popup blocker/firewall settings?

I'm not trying to rile you or anyone up here, but the only way to solve the issue is to dig into all the settings we can think of so don't get riled up by my questions, please. They aren't being asked to make you or anyone else look stupid. Believe me, I worked in Tech support for an internet company and I KNOW how many of their basic questions make you feel like an idiot, but they're there for a reason. All it takes is over looking one simple silly setting to screw up your internet experience sometimes.

Some internet providers block certain sites internally and some do not. Sometimes it will take a call to your internet provider to make sure the site hasn't somehow gotten itself on a banned spammer list somehow. Likewise they may have to check with their HOST to make sure your IP address has not found it's way onto a blocked list.  I had to deal with many such issues when I worked for Primary Net. So here's my point, it may not be YOU and it may not be SHARECG. It may be either your provider or theirs. Don't be so quick to point fingers without all the facts.

Hi. I too, wasn't here to get that involved, just sharing my experience with this download site. First, foremost and lastly. It doesn't work for me, I am not jumping through hoops for freebies, and if every other site under the internet skies works....

Well, walks like and quacks like, it must be!

I am sure that if enough people stop using the site because it has these issues, then they'll be fixed. This was only expressing my opinion, and my experience with that site. They already tried once to fix it. That is how I got 4 files from there.

But they just sent out an e-mail (*that I got because i am a member) that the click issue is becomming a monster and they are delaying checks by 5 days to double check if there is cheating going on. SO..... It isn't my problem, because I don't use them any longer. They will or won't fix it. 

BTW...ALL of you queries as to helping them was done, and it apparently isn't on this side.

Ariana 

I think we all agree that no one is trying to get anyone riled up. I know how individual some problems can be.  Heck I can't even write an email to my mom because her providor has me or my isp on a spam list for some reason. This isp is from a small cable company in Switzerland, and I assure you they are not spammers! At first when I tried to write, I got a return notice saying it was refused due to article 504something or other - I followed it back to the main providor that was refusing it and they had me or the isp, not sure, listed as "potentially hazardous", lol!

They did explain how to get back in the good graces, but my mom would have to take care of it from her end, and she's 85 and very un-savy when it comes to computers. So I just write to her from yahoo mail, which I hate with a passion, but heck, gotta do what you gotta do!

So yeah, back to sharecg - it's all cool. I know they are doing their best, and for those that can get it working, great. I'm beginning to wonder if the limited downloading is on my end. But then I have limits elsewhere - and sometimes it's two at a time, sometimes 3. Rarely 4. Maybe it is associated to the size of the files - perhaps my isp has a limit as to how much I can download in one session. shrug could be anything, and I'm willing to say some may be on this end - but when one site downloads at 340 kbps, and then sharecg downloads at 5o kbps, it seems pretty clear that they are  not using high speed servers.

I'm just saying that I think they should look into getting more speed on their servers - and yes, I know they are working on it. I'm patient, got too much enjoyable stuff to do to worry about it. Thrre are other options if scg doesn't work out, but I do hope they manage to get their act together. I have a feling they really didn't anticipate the swarm they would have.

I'll just sit back and see what happens. :)
judee

Ok, well apparently asking people for an IP address makes them skiddish so I started digging using my old friends at domaintools.com. While ShareCG is based in California and bought their hosting from GoDaddy, their IP address resolves to the Dominican Republic!! GoDaddy obviously bought some IP's from down yunder and is reselling them here. I did a few Pings and Traceroutes to ShareCG's IP address. The Ping's got through but all traceroute's failed to complete. I'll be reporting my findings to David and Jake asap.

More news: If you actually try reaching ShareCG via http to the IP address assigned to them it pulls up a completely different site. Just try going to this URL and see what you get. http://66.220.4.54/
Not ShareCG

page cannot be displayed

Oh and by the way, they have stil not responded to my request for assistance. Maybe you can point this out to them, since they seem to have overlooked this! 

http://www10.sharecg.com/wwwthreads-5.3/showflat.php?

Cat=8,9,10,11,12&Board=discussion&Number=74682&page

=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=0&part=

So tell you what. Since you have a vested interest in seeing that ShareCG is accepted and beloved by all, why not down load this for me and IM a link to me here at Ren! ;)

http://www.sharecg.com/v/14450/poser/Vayne-Braid-Refit-to-M3

Then since it is the only M3 fit I wanted, I'll be a happy Gal! You'll have made me less tense and I will have my hair fit!!! See and everyone will have a great day!

What ya think?

Ariana

I've just gotten up after less than 4 hours sleep because I was tracing their DNS til early this morning. I have already emailed them with what I found. Their IP address is not resolving to just their site but also it's previous site. THIS is what's causing all the muckups and it will have to be fixed by their hosting service. There's nothing Jake or David can do themselves except place the call to their host and try to get the DNS cleared up. There's nothing wrong with their software. It's a DNS issue. Currently it's pointing to two completely different sites. This is why some people can reach it and some people can not.

               As we all know , they only opened the site a few months ago and apparently GoDaddy, the hosts who they bought their hosting package from, didn't properly clear the DNS Nameserver information for the IP address they assigned to ShareCG before giving it to them. This can be fixed, it will just take some time to either get a new IP address for the site or clear up the current one.

the dominican republic? well, I'm not a few miles from that, anyway. I hope they get this resolved for those with problems downloading or using the site.

Ok, David says he thinks they have the DNS issue fixed now. It may take up to two days to propogate through all the nameservers, but I'd say give em' another try and let us know how it goes if you've been unable to connect to them.

All I can say is I wouldn't make a false report, and I am glad that it might get fixed. If so that would be great..... Still a touch pessimistic.

Ariana

Nobody ever said you were making any false reports. I certainly didn't say or mean to imply that you were. I was uncomfortable with your talk of rallying people to avoid the site but that was your perogative. Nothing wrong with pessimism, it's antagonism that I don't really like.

OMGDDSS!!! MatrixWorks I was joking! I meant no disrespect, I was just erring on the side of caution. But I never meant for you to feel hurt or abused by my ill temper. It is a site I targeted, not yourself. Please accept my apologies for seeming calous...

Ariana

Sorry Ariana but jokes without smilies don't translate well on 4 hours of sleep with no caffiene. I'll survive. I'm hoping the loss of sleep last night will profit everyone with a better connection to ShareCG and I HOPE that the buggy DNS/IP issue was the only problem with pages not loading and horrible lockups and timeouts. I WANT people to be able to get to my freebies, so yeah, I'm biased.

I think you've done sharecg an enormous service, Matrix. I do hope it works better now - I'll be checking again once I finish up some other pc stuff. I'll let you know what I find out.

I, too, will check out the site. I never got a reply to my post BTW...it seems that I am personae non grata over there! :) But I think because i suffer the experience personally, we can't be sure it is fixed if I don't let you know!!!  Cause i want everyone to be happy! :) :) :) !!!

HuggerZ!

Ariana 

Well I have to admit that all of this is slowing dawning on me.

As I have downloaded from the site its just occuring to me now that I, myself could join the site and upload my (soon to be worked on and completed) stuff.  I didn't even know anything about the "getting paid" part until I read their FAQ.

I have to admit that I don't understand how they are making money from it.  I saw the word "ads" mentioned but I haven't seen any advertising on the sites where I have downloaded stuff.

Quote - I have to admit that I don't understand how they are making money from it.  I saw the word "ads" mentioned but I haven't seen any advertising on the sites where I have downloaded stuff.

A lot of users are using Firefox with Addblocker installed.

There is no "professional advertising" on shareCG. You see ads only if you have Javascript enabled and no other filters active. I switched my addblocker off and allowed Javascript if it comes from shareCG. Still no adds. Because you have to allow Javascripts loaded from "alien sites". But this is a no-no for a lot of users these days. Escpecially because my IP-Filter says: "Access from/to spyware server xxxxx blocked".

Seems there is a lot of work to do before this site is able to make a remarkable amount of money with adds.