Thanks Scoble

An evangelism opportunity... � Scobleizer My good friend Robert Scoble has been staying up with us a number of nights this past week as we've tried to launch Zooomr Mark III.

Finally tonight we were able to launch and everything seemed perfect. And then our database went down. It's times like this late at night that friends are there for you. And both Kristopher and I appreciate that Scoble.

Here is the post that I just uploaded to the Zooomr blog:

"When I was 5 years old I climbed Mount Whitney, the highest mountain in the Continental US, elevation 14,495. I went with my dad. It was just he and I. It was a pretty incredible and unlikely thing for a 5 year old and his dad to attempt. The night before we made the attempt at the peak we camped out at a lake at the base of something called the 99 switchbacks. When we started out in the morning I was fresh and ready to go. But after about 50 switchbacks I was done. The air was thin and I was tired and it was then and there that I first heard the story about the little engine that could. My dad was a great story teller and somehow he told the story of the little engine that could with enough conviction that it got me to the top.

I think I can, I think can, I think I can… I know I can, I know I can, I know I can…

And so what seemed like certain failure in the end turned out to be success. And my dad and I celebrated at the top of the summit and I got a little patch that I showed to all my friends back in kindergarten when I got home.

And that’s where Zooomr is tonight. We are the little engine that could.

About an hour ago we finally launched Zooomr Mark III. It was a glorious 10 minute stretch of time. People had stayed up all night with us after a week of anticipation and everything was going great. Our first photos were being uploaded. People were writing exciting updates on the Zipline and then our database crashed.

It was a pretty painful moment. And then Kristopher turned to me and said, you know what, we’ll get this thing back up. This will work. We are the little engine that could.

I don'’t have my car (it’s back in the East Bay) but one of our users who stayed up with us online offered to drive Kristopher down to the data center in Sunnyvale. I’m sitting in a BART station right now typing this waiting for the last train of the night to the East Bay.

Kristopher should be able to get our database back up from Sunnyvale but I don’t know how long this might take or what we need to do to make it stable enough that it doesn’t go down again. Zooomr Mark III is done and out, but we just need to make sure our systems can handle the traffic. I’m going to try and hook back in with him in the morning, but regrettably, after a brief 10 minutes of fun with everyone we are back offline.

Thanks to everyone who has continued hanging in here with us. I know it’s frustrating not to be able to have access to your photos. But we’re not giving up yet and we are going to fight like hell to get Zooomr Mark III back up and fully stable.

I’ll update more when I know more."