[bschlinker]

Looks like hellofax couldn't handle the surge in traffic -- site is now down for me.

Whenever I see a site down like this due to a surge in traffic for a "free" opportunity, I always question whether it is in the site's best interest. For instance, if I was a hellofax customer attempting to send a fax right now, I would be unhappy -- I pay to be able to send / receive faxes, and an (perhaps from the customers perspective) "unnecessary event" has prevented me from doing that.

Brings up another question -- whenever companies do these types of "promotions" / "events", should they be hosted on a separate system to minimize impact on existing customers / site activity? I believe this year, Sparkfun use a separate system for free day to ensure the surge in traffic did not impact the main site (and paying customers).

(Edited to add further discussion)

[guiseppecalzone]

Joseph here, cofounder of HelloFax. The anti-sopa campaign produced a big surge in traffic. We'll working on resolving things now.

[pasbesoin]

If you can let us know when it stabilizes, I'd like to then share the link to my personal network. (Although I guess that might be kind of self-defeating for your at this point? OTOH a significant portion of my network is small businesspeople who might appreciate having an inexpensive, email-accessible fax line on hand.)

To others here: Remembering HelloFax as a YC company, I signed up for and used it a month or two ago to fax my legislators on SOPA/PIPA at a time when my landline was having problems. (I signed up even though the free trial might have sufficed. TANSTAAFL.)

For $5 a month (and I didn't take the lowest plan), I have a web and email accessible fax machine, without the hassle of trying to set one up, myself. If I'm traveling, in the cafe, or whatever, it doesn't matter. My fax machine's with me.

There's still an annoying amount of stuff where fax is the only choice or the only choice that works for the other party.

And in the past, I've found my legislators to be consistently responsive to faxes. From my own experience and reading, they seem to have some of the impact of a written letter [1] while getting through in a timely fashion.

--

1. As I understand it, they generally are perceived as taking more time and effort to write and send, and as a message category there are fewer of them than e.g. emails and phone calls. And if and as they are printed out upon receipt (I'm not sure, these days), they represent a physical object in the office and in someone's hands, rather than another message on a screen or a tick in an intern's phone call tally.

P.S. I've shared it, now. Hope that generates a few more faxes and some good will (and maybe a customer or three) for you.