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MINNEAPOLIS, MN - November 17, 2004
I. CEO's Corner
II. Top 10
III. We've Moved!
IV. New Hosting Tech
V. Improved Email Services
VI. Digital North Technology Update
VII. Important Domain Name Rule Change
VIII. Customer Profile: Allen Interactions
I. CEO'S CORNER
Labor Day has come and gone and Fall is upon us in Minnesota. The leaves have fallen and the
temperature is getting cooler. We've passed Halloween and the halfway mark in the football season. The changes
are evident around Digital North. We have added personnel, moved our office space, improved our email offering,
upgraded equipment and signed new customers.
I want to take this opportunity to thank our existing customers. We truly exist to serve our customers. You
have been the catalyst for our 70% growth in the last year. Some of the new customers that we have signed up
in the last few months include: Arctic Cat, Better Life Media, Caribou Coffee, Frankie's Pizza (I love their
pizza!), Health Partners, Leeann Chin and many more. Read on to learn more about the changes at Digital North.
Sincerely,
Mike Sowada
CEO
Digital North
msowada@digitalnorth.net
952-924-2450
II. Digital North ranked in The Business Journal list for third consecutive year
Digital North is pleased to announce that we have been ranked in The Business Journal list
of Top Web-Hosting Firms for the third consecutive year. Digital North has moved up the list every year --
this time into the top 10 -- despite the weighting The Business Journal gives to internet service providers.
Compared to companies that solely focus on web hosting, Digital North is now one of the largest hosting firms
in the Twin Cities market. We extend a thank you to all of our customers for helping us achieve this special
recognition!
III. We've Moved!
Digital North recently moved down the hall into a larger office suite at the 511 Building in
downtown Minneapolis. The move was definitely long overdue. After moving into the new office we were amazed
at how much stuff we were able to cram into the old space. Our new suite is five times larger. Our new suite
number at the 511 Building is Suite 231.
IV. Douglas Woodgate -- New Hosting Tech
Doug Woodgate recently joined Digital North as a system and network administrator. Doug is
a recent computer science graduate from the University of Minnesota - Morris. He recently helped revamp the
technology infrastructure at a large rental agency in Bloomington, MN. Doug is a newlywed and is a big fan of
the Minnesota Wild hockey team.
V. Improved Email Services
Effective immediately, Digital North is pleased to announce that the storage limit on all 10
MegaBytes (MB) email accounts is increased to 30 MB. Anyone who was paying for the 30 MB service upgrade will
no longer be charged an upgrade fee. 100 MB email accounts are still available at $4/mo and 200 MB email
accounts are now available at $6/month. If interested, please order the upgrade on our web site at
http://shop.digitalnorth.net or talk to your account representative
at 952-924-2450.
VI. Digital North Technology Update
by Jason Baker, Director of Operations
The Digital North technology staff implemented a number of important service upgrades over the
past three quarters. We greatly increased our data backup storage capacity, implemented a new email
architecture, and introduced more automation into our hosting infrastructure.
We installed Dell PowerVault Super DLT storage libraries into the Minneapolis and St. Paul datacenters. The
robotic libraries use the latest Super DLT tapes which can store up to 320GB of data per tape. Each library
can hold over 3TB of data -- which is about the storage capacity of 100 typical workstations. The new libraries
represent almost a 10-fold increase over our previous storage capability.
Our team was also busy designing and implementing a new email service architecture. We spent months carefully
designing and testing various components of the new service. The new architecture includes redundant email
filtering systems which scan every incoming email message for viruses and spam. The email filtering servers
are located in separate datacenters to provide greater reliability. We are also installing hot-failover mail
servers to deliver an exceptionally high level of service availability. The vast majority of hosting providers
do not implement these important service features due to the complexity and cost.
We recently transitioned all of our customers to the email authentication standard called SMTP Authentication.
We appreciate your assistance during the email service upgrade. SMTP Authentication provides greater security
and reduces spam.
We focused on improving our service automation and delivery over the past year. Service automation is an
important part of every hosting infrastructure. We plan to invest in new technologies which allow our
customers to order services faster and make changes to their existing services. Of course our support team is
always ready to help lend a hand when you need it.
Finally, we are upgrading our core network infrastructure in the St. Paul datacenter this month
to Gigabit Ethernet -- a ten-fold bandwidth increase!
VII. Important Domain Name Rule Change
Domain names could become easier to hijack as a change in domain transfer rules takes effect
Friday. Under new rules set by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), domain transfer
requests will be automatically approved in five days unless they are explicitly denied by the account owner.
This is a change from current procedure, in which a domain's ownership and nameservers remain unchanged if there
is no response to a transfer request.
This could mean trouble for domain owners who don't closely manage their records. Domains with incorrect e-mail
addresses and outdated administrative contact information are at particular risk, as the domain's WHOIS database
information will be used to inform domain owners of transfer requests. A non-response becomes the equivalent of
answering "yes" to a transfer request, according to the ICANN policy change.
VIII. Customer Profile: Allen Interactions
http://www.alleni.com
We had the opportunity to chat with R. John Welsh Jr., VP Sales and Marketing at Allen Interactions this past
week.
Digital North: John, what is your role at Allen Interactions?
John: I am responsible for leading the sales and marketing effort for Allen Interactions and expanding its
penetration into Global 2000 and mid-market companies.
Digital North: Could you tell us a little about the history of Allen Interactions and what
your company does?
John: Dr. Michael Allen, the original creator of AuthorwareR, founded Allen Interactions Inc. in 1993 to train
multimedia professionals and to build engaging interactive learning applications. The consistent theme of Dr.
Allen's work has been to use the computer to enhance each individual's learning by providing "lasting learning
experiences."
Allen Interactions has assembled a team of world-renowned industry experts, including instructional designers,
educators, developers, and multimedia producers, to continue Dr. Allen's mission-inspiring, more effective and
engaging uses of interactive multimedia for learning and communication. Allen has a team-based organization of
over 50 individuals that can build and maintain close functional relationships and respond quickly to work
demands and client needs. They have been providing e-learning services and product solutions for over ten
years, always adjusting along the way to accommodate market needs and trends.
Digital North: Has your organization received any notable industry accolades recently?
John: In a recently published report from Brandon Hall entitled, "Custom Content Developers: Comparative
Analysis of 97 Outsource E-Learning Providers," Allen Interactions was the third most mentioned custom content
development organization among a survey of over 200 CLOs, e-learning managers, and training directors.
Digital North: Why should businesses invest in e-learning?
John: People learn by doing. We live in a culture that pretends that people learn by reading or by being
lectured to ... but they don't, at least not much. Allow a learner to practice doing what they need to do on
the job and give them realistic feedback. It is amazing what they will retain and more importantly what they
will do differently when they are back on the job where performance matters. There is still an art and a science
to designing good feedback, to balancing the practice so that it isn't too difficult and overwhelming nor too
easy and boring. Dr. Allen has worked for literally decades creating and refining methods for keeping the
learner in a gradually rising state of challenge, which is interesting and satisfying. It's hard work, but
the payoffs are substantial. Allen Interactions is very happy if you're going to be measuring the change in
business metrics as a result of this training. The real payoff from great e-learning is not in reduced training
costs ; but rather is in increased revenue and profit!
Digital North: What types of companies are perfect customers for you?
John: Customers that want to allow their employees to create significant value through retained learning. Most
of our clients are Fortune 500 and progressive mid-market companies.
Digital North: Why did you select Digital North as a hosting partner?
John: Digital North displays many of the values Allen Interactions prescribes to such as allowing people to
learn by doing. They also have the "can do" attitude that we appreciate and enjoy. We are continuing to allow
them to provide us with additional services as we grow. We trust their judgment!
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