Ethics Policy

Ethics Policy

Let's do things differently.

Large Affiliate Payouts

The web hosting industry is littered with fake or misleading reviews by various bloggers and websites, who promote companies based on affiliate payouts, not service quality. The most egregious offender, EIG, pays up to hundreds of dollars per sign up. We don't believe that's right.

That's why we have one of the lowest affiliate payouts in the industry, at just 5% of the signup, This means reviews you read about us aren't because they earn a lot for promoting us. It's because they truly believe in it.

Paid Reviews

Along with "affiliate reviews," reviews paid for by the hosting company are rampant. Paid reviews rarely are "reviews" at all. They just list some features of a plan. These reviews also tend to be overly positive because who's going to talk poorly about a company that just paid them $400?

We've gotten many requests from bloggers offering to write us a review, in exchange for a "fee," which we've all politely declined. We're happy to offer a free trial account for the reviewer to test us out and write a review if they'd like. Otherwise? No thanks.

Misleading Contracts

Offering especially cheap or low prices -- only to require signing up for long contracts happens far too often. Not only are these lengthy contracts bad, because you can't change hosts should their quality decline, they're are also very rarely stated upfront.

Yearly contracts can also be a convenience though, and we understand that. We offer options to automatically pay for multiple terms upfront. However, our listed prices will always reflect the costs of a single month of hosting, without any commitments, or very clearly state otherwise.

Upselling

We don't sell you stuff you don't need. "Premium SSL"? There's very little difference between basic free SSL and paid SSL, and you probably don't need it. "Security Services"? securing your website is great, but only if you actually need it.

Our checkout process doesn't push other third-party services that we might earn a commission from, and neither will our support recommend these services unless they'll actually provide good value to your site.

Introductory Pricing

We offer occasional discounts for the first month of signups, but drastically increasing prices after the first term is a big no-no for us. We guarantee any introductory pricing that we might offer will be clearly stated on any promotional material and our site, and the second term will not see prices increases beyond 40%.

Honesty

We will make mistakes and we will publicly apologize and own up to these mistakes when they happen. We hope by being fully transparent and honest we can restore or repaid your trust in us through these incidents.

Independence

Far too many companies are owned or bought by corporations like EIG or GoDaddy, and go downhill after the acquisition. We are currently 100% employee-owned and we aim to keep it that way. No large investors who only care about profit, and definitely no EIG.

Service-First

Above all, we prioritize the quality and reliability of our service. Added features, marketing, fundraising, and affiliates comes after, because we truly care about your website and success.

Transparency

We are dedicated to being transparent about our limits, plans, pricing, and operations. We understand the importance of being able to rely on and trust your host. That's why we are committed to being upfront, transparent, and host about our limitations and abilities. No false expectations or promising what we can't do or support.

Acceptance

The internet should be a safe space for everyone, regardless of religion, job, income, identity, race, gender, ethnicity, or legal status. We have strict zero-tolerance policies against content that is illegal, infringes the rights of copyright holders, purposely slanders others for the purpose of causing harm, targets a specific group of people because of said attributes, or is discriminatory in nature.

Freedom of Speech

At the same time, we believe in free speech and we will never remove something that we disagree with or speaks negatively about us, or is controversial, as long as it does not incite violence or unrest or target a specific group of people. We will never edit your content, regardless of what it is. If we deem it's immoral or unethical and against our policies, we will contact you and/or remove the site in its entirety temporarily.