Necessity and Her Masculine Midwives
A new idea in homebuying, the frustrated shopper who conceived it, and the service provider who made it possible.
eProperty Direct

Occasionally the mother of invention can use a little help. Dana Miller, computer-savvy entrepreneur that he is, had been considering starting an Internet business; he just wasn't sure what kind. The epiphany came partway through his quest to sell his house and relocate. Paging through volumes of listings and plucking soggy flyers out
of yard-stake bins is enough to drive anyone to complain, but it takes a certain kind of person to envision a solution. Dana started planning his website. It was all perfect in his mind. People could go to the site, input exactly what they were looking for, and view/bookmark/print out/email/drool over all the candidates that fit their description. Home sellers could host around-the-clock virtual open houses and only have to vacuum once.

Imagine: a sprawling nation of real estate, condensed into a single database, exhaustively indexed and immediately accessible to all. The internet would make it possible, and his programming wisdom would make it happen. He would call it Homeyeah.com, and later, eProperty Direct. Alas, there were issues. One issue surfaced immediately—the immense size of the website. That's a lot of listings, and a lot of pictures, and a lot of users looking at all those pictures, Dana realized. Making all that data accessible all the time would cost a fortune, if it were even possible.

And reliability: with the whole company online, it had to work all the time, absolutely. According to his calculations, if the site went down for even nine hours in a year, he'd lose money. What if somebody hacked in just as he went to bed? By the time his alarm went off, he'd be the owner of a failing business, all because of some gifted 13 year-old with a mean streak. Dana went shopping for an internet service provider.

It had to be a dependable company with space and speed (bandwidth in netspeak) that was fanatical about reliability issues. A company with determined reliability that knew how to back up even the back ups. Enter Indyweb, the brainchild of Dave Nelson and his force of highly qualified data professionals. With their OC3 fiber optic cable providing enough internet access to accommodate a city and bulletproof servers that automatically notify a squadron of experts if there's even a sliver of a chance of a problem, Indyweb was built for challenges like Dana's.

Dave reflects on meeting Dana, “When Dana approached us, we were really excited
about helping him reinvent the real estate business. His challenge to us was ‘no down time’, so we created a system that ensures Dana’s clients will never loose a sale
because of us.” Indyweb’s Network Operating Center, ensconced in a climate-controlled, fire-protected stronghold, is something like the Air Force One of internet onramps.

It even happens to sit on Time Warner's Sonnet Loop, which is a junction between two gigantic circuits of cable. If one side breaks, Indyweb defaults to the other side, with zero loss of connection.

The fortuitousness of it all isn't lost on Dana: "Not only is it unbelievable to have access to that level of service; it's fantastic to know that if some unforeseen catastrophic
event physically disables my server, there is another one, equally large and capable, sitting there to take over."

What's more, Dana found like minds at Indyweb, people who understand the importance of their services to clients like Dana. In Dave's words, "When people have a computer-based business, their office is in cyberspace. And when that
business has a server on the internet, they can work from anywhere in the world."

That's assuming everything is working as it should be. Knowing Dave, that's a pretty
safe assumption.

INDYWEB CASE FILE
Client: eProperty Direct
Goal: Allow the world to immediately access a sprawling nation of real estate condensed into a single, exhaustively indexed database
Challenge: Provide reliability and accessibility so an eProperty client will never lose a sale due to the server being down
Solution: Placing the system on a junction between two gigantic circuits of cable. If one side breaks, Indyweb defaults to the other side, with zero loss of connection.
If some unforeseen catastrophic event physically disables the server, there is another one, equally large and capable, available to take over.
Bonus: Home sellers host round-the-clock virtual open houses and only have to vacuum once
Added Bonus: Indyweb helps reinvent the real estate business

To contact eProperty Direct, call 317-545-9824 or visit www.epropertydirect.com