News Sites Slammed By Michael Jackson Traffic 387
miller60 writes "Major news sites struggled to remain online yesterday evening as news of Michael Jackson's death triggered huge waves of Internet traffic. TMZ.com broke the news and was quickly overwhelmed, while Twitter turned off features to handle its load. They weren't alone. Keynote Systems reports that ABC, AOL, CBS, CNN Money, MSNBC, NBC, and Yahoo! News all experienced performance problems between 6:15 and 9 pm Eastern time, when the average availability of news sites tracked by Keynote dropped from almost 100% to 86%. The cloud computing crowd immediately jumped on the traffic jams to argue their case. 'Not have a cloud bursting strategy in the age of cloud computing isn't just wrong — it's idiotic,' wrote one cloud blogger."
Not only news (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.sickipedia.org/'s [sickipedia.org] been out all day too...
Wikipedia article (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Ok, So How Would It Help? (Score:4, Informative)
Supposedly cloud computing is "on demand" so, having more resources available when you need them (though who knows if it'll help in cases where bandwidth is a limitation) should resolve a lot of these problems. It'd probably also be a sort of intermediary, a cloud of caching servers, leaving the main servers to update the cloud..
Take that with as much salt as you feel it needs.
Not THAT slammed though... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Michael who? (Score:1, Informative)
Pretty good on single malt Scotch too.
Re:Poll results (Score:5, Informative)
Er, I'm of the "Michael Jackson" generation, except to me he's still forgettable when he's not in the media because of a child molestation case or for dangling a baby over a balcony or for managing to blow hundreds of millions of dollars mostly on tat.
Age has nothing to do with it, it's just whilst all the pop fans were listening to Jacko the rest of us were listening to things like Guns and Roses.
To many of us, the only reason Jacko wasn't forgettable was the fact he was always getting himself in the media by doing something pretty stupid.
I think you'll find it's your assumption that just because you seem to like Michael Jackson that he must universally be liked that's wrong. Not everyone has the same tastes.
If I had to pick some favourite tracks from the 80s then stuff by U2, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Guns and Roses, Bon Jovi would come well ahead of anything by Michael Jackson. They're slightly different genres, but frankly if I had to pick something cheesy which is the category I'd personally put Jacko's songs into I'd probably even choose something more catchy and recognisable such as A-ha's "Take on me".
You're welcome to like Jacko, but don't assume everyone else does and assume that if they don't they're from the wrong generation. I distinctly remember even at the time friends were pretty split about him - sure some loved him, but there were still plenty that hated him even when he was in his prime.
Re:Poll results (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Poll results (Score:5, Informative)
He could sing, he could dance, he was a damned good writer of pop songs (let me just say I'm not a big fan of pop music in general, and I was no Jackson fan). People seem to forget that some of the big hits, in particular Billie Jean (which is probably up there with She Loves You and Good Vibrations as being one of the most of the successful and influential pop songs) were songs he wrote.
The story of Billie Jean is actually kind of interesting. It was his breakout hit that pretty much defined him as an international pop star, as opposed to a Motown star or black star. It was a musically sophisticated song with some pretty weird lyrics. Quincy Jones didn't even want to release the song, and he and Jackson nearly fell out over it, and yet Jackson, before he became the next Howard Hughes, was a damned savvy operator who knew even better than Jones that this was going to be THE song, and it does, whether we like it, pretty much define pop music in the early 1980s.
In general, his achievement with Thriller really does put him up there with Elvis, the Beatles, Pink Floyd and Fleetwood Mac as one of the most successful recording artists of all time. Thriller has moved over a hundred million units. It's a staggering number.
Re:Poll results (Score:4, Informative)
Well, most people talk about stuff like Thriller, Smooth Criminal, Billie Jean etc.
It wasn't until the mid 80s that Jackson really peaked which is around the same time that GnR came about which is why the comparison. The earlier stuff wasn't anywhere near as popular and most Jackson fans almost certainly didn't become so until the mid 80s, that's probably why the 80s are commonly referred to as being the period that defines the Jackson generation because it was the period that really defined his career.
Re:*sigh* (Score:5, Informative)
For all the grief we give about Bill Gates, at least he is doing something for humanity that is good other than spend money on luxuries.
Score: -1, factually incorrect. From USA Today's coverage: [usatoday.com]
Jackson had a huge soft spot for charitable causes. He gave millions of his own money and helped raise millions more to support advocacy groups ranging from the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation to the American Cancer Society. His efforts prompted a listing in the 2000 Guinness Book of World Records for most charities supported by a pop star. [emphasis mine]
He donated $1.5 million to a burn center, the proceeds from a settlement he received from PepsiCo after sustaining second-degree burns to his scalp while filming a 1984 TV commercial for the soft-drink giant. Later that year, he donated an additional $5 million to charity from his share of the Jackson 5's Victory Tour. Also that year, he was honored by President Reagan for his contributions to combat drug and alcohol abuse.
Jackson also co-wrote with Lionel Richie We Are the World, the star-laden 1985 single that sold 20 million copies, raising millions for famine relief.