Business 2.0-the Business magazine should practice what it preaches

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You remember the time when mom used to tell not to talk on the phone while ironing clothes lest you make a mistake and burn yourself. And then one day she forgot to practice what she was preaching and…! Well a funny situation like this has occurred in the business world too. Business 2.0 is a magazine published by Time. They have been warning their readers against the hazards of not taking backups of computer files. So much so that in an article published by them in 2003, they 'likened backups to flossing - everyone knows it's important, but few devote enough thought or energy to it.' And one fine day, sorry night, (April 23 to be precise) the magazine's editorial system crashed, nullifying the work done for the June issue. The backup server failed to back up.


Luckily for them copy-edited text of the lost issue has been mailed to the lawyers to get legal clearance. The page layouts had to be totally redone from scratch. Business 2.0 never had to rely on their backup software until that day, which is why they probably did not realize that it was either obsolete or dysfunctional.
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May 2, 2007 - 6:44 AM | Related Entries - Computing | Comments (8)


Reader Comments

  1. Charlie on May 2, 2007 11:53 AM

    As an IT pro, one of the things I have always stressed is backup. Not just having a backup, but multiple backups. Off-site backups. Done on a regular schedule. And testing your backups to make sure they work and that the data is intact. There are two types of hard drives in the world: those that have failed, and those that are going to.

  1. Garth on May 2, 2007 12:00 PM

    It's unfortunate that this last sentence...

    "Business 2.0 never had to rely on their backup software until that day, which is why they probably did not realize that it was either obsolete or dysfunctional."

    ...has "backup software" linked to an advertisement for Symantec Backup. It draws an unpleasant (albeit unintended -- I assume) correlation between obsolete/dysfunctional software and Symantec's Backup software (which maybe isn't that far from the truth anyway).

  1. Scott on May 2, 2007 12:22 PM

    Like any sysadmin reads trash for cash like this anyway.

  1. IT Man on May 2, 2007 12:47 PM

    Ha Ha Ha

  1. Michael on May 2, 2007 3:56 PM

    All I can say is you need to either:

    1) Fire the system administrator for failing to test backup and restore methods regularly.

    2a) Install Microsoft Small Business Server 2003 and either utilize its internal backup software _or_ install Veritas Backup Exec Suite for SMBs and rely on upon it faithfully.
    2b) Install Microsoft Server 2003 and install Veritas Backup Exec Suite and rely on upon it faithfully.

  1. George on May 2, 2007 7:01 PM

    That's a shame

  1. c on May 3, 2007 2:52 PM

    Irony 2.0

  1. JT Smith on June 14, 2007 3:04 PM

    My company has gone through this before. It really opens your eyes when the critical data is gone all of a sudden and your backups haven't been as regular as you hope (if at all!)

    Habits change, especially when you end up having to get the data back from a data recovery company like we did (cbltech.com if you were wondering)

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