Salesforce.com: OnDemand...Um...When Available<< Webinar: The Costs of Failed Customer Service | Main | Amazon Makes Real-time Phone Service Available, For Real This Time >> Zachary McGeary | December 24, 2005, 09:55 AM A database crash at one of Salesforce.com's global hosting sites left many customers with intermittent access to their critical data for six hours yesterday. This is definitely a strike against the software-as-a-service revolution but I don't foresee long-term consequences. If anything, this will cause short-term panic and only encourage companies (and vendors) to seek more comprehensive service level agreements. While the situation underscores a slightly different side of the concern that many companies have about placing their business intelligence completely in the hands of a third party, skeptics of OnDemand must weigh the potential bad with the proven good. OnPremise installations are not immune to service outages either. Many companies with Salesforce.com (or most other hosted CRM providers) deployed cannot (or do not want to) afford the responsibility of owning and maintaining software or afford the measures that must be taken to ensure redundancy on their own. Redundancy is most importantly about preserving vital data, not necessarily maintaining service on a seamless basis, anyway. Even with six hours downtime over one year, Salesforce.com is still looking at 99.9% uptime. Sorry folks, this is not the end of OnDemand. |
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