After almost four years in our original office in downtown Palo Alto, it was time to accept that we just couldn’t keep stuffing people in the space. Now, I’m thrilled to say that we have found and moved into a fantastic new office! Thank you to all that responded to our request for office suggestions.… Continue reading Hello, San Mateo! Our New Office Home
10 Petabytes Visualized
As we approached the end of 2010, our VP of Engineering sent an email: Backblaze crossed the 10 petabyte mark in data storage for our customers. While I see us constantly adding storage for our online backup service, it was one of those moments that made me think, “Wow, that’s a lot of storage.” 10… Continue reading 10 Petabytes Visualized
Backblaze Saves Christmas
Every day Backblaze restores data for over 100 people. Sometimes people share the stories of their data loss and recovery. This story was so good, though, I just had to share it outright. Enjoy. Yesterday my wife was working from home; feverishly trying to finish a document she needed done today. She had been up… Continue reading Backblaze Saves Christmas
Connecting Two Points: How My Face Unexpectedly Ended Up on TechCrunch
Yesterday a number of friends emailed me saying, “You’re on TechCrunch.” I quickly racked my brain, “Did we announce anything new yesterday…?” Then I looked and saw that what they actually meant more specifically was that my face was on TechCrunch, along with a wardrobe I was selling. Here’s the quick backstory: My wife wanted… Continue reading Connecting Two Points: How My Face Unexpectedly Ended Up on TechCrunch
Server Spring Cleaning
When we started Backblaze almost four years ago, we signed a one-year lease on a half cabinet in a data center. At the time that seemed like a fairly significant commitment. Over the years we grew very quickly, adding cabinet after cabinet. As such, we signed up for a large space with fantastic room for… Continue reading Server Spring Cleaning
Digital 007: Outwitting the Thief
Over the Thanksgiving weekend I noticed the following Tweet from @DigitalRoyalty: My friend’s laptop was stolen. He tracked the thief via @Backblaze for weeks & finally identified him on Facebook & Twitter. Digital 007. I know our online backup service saves user data every day, but physical theft recovery? That certainly caught my attention and… Continue reading Digital 007: Outwitting the Thief
Give the Gift of Backblaze
When we started Backblaze, our earliest customers said, “I love backing up my computer with Backblaze. It lets me sleep peacefully. Now, how can I give this as a gift to my friends to help them as well?” Several holiday seasons went by during which we wished we had the ability to give the gift… Continue reading Give the Gift of Backblaze
Weird Doggies Need Online Backup Too
Convincing friends can be hard. Need a doggie to get them to use online backup?
Search Backed Up Files
A brand new Mac computer has approximately one million files. When you’re trying to recover that one document you need after mistakenly clicking delete, it may be a bit daunting to find. With Backblaze, you could always browse through your online backup directories to find your file. However, we’ve just introduced something to make it… Continue reading Search Backed Up Files
Backblaze Release 1.5.1 (Minor)
Backblaze has made a new release available and all users are scheduled to be automatically upgraded over the next two weeks. Below are the enhancements in this release: Release Date: 10/25/10 Version: 1.5.1 Auto-Update: All Users Scriptable installer for mass deployment in organizations (Windows) Bug fix for Mac OS 10.4 to prevent messages in the… Continue reading Backblaze Release 1.5.1 (Minor)
Backblaze Presenting at FailCon ’10
FailCon takes place on Monday and if you haven’t signed up yet, I highly recommend you sign up now. (Use the code “20backblaze” to get 20% off your FailCon admission.) You can attend a conference every day in Silicon Valley. Many would be interesting, entertaining, and provide an opportunity to network. But FailCon is different.… Continue reading Backblaze Presenting at FailCon ’10
Backing Up Photos While Traveling: Feedback
Last week I wrote about the struggle I had backing up photos while on my honeymoon. I had a few thoughts for how I would solve the issue in the future, but did not find any ideal solutions and said I would update the blog post if anyone emailed me with good tips. With feedback… Continue reading Backing Up Photos While Traveling: Feedback
Backing Up Photos While Traveling
Two weeks ago I returned from my honeymoon—a trip to Kenya that included an amazing safari. While the trip was incredibly relaxing, I was nervous until a few days after I returned home. You see, since this was a honeymoon, my wife made a firm request: no laptop. Checking email and doing work could wait… Continue reading Backing Up Photos While Traveling
Scheduled Maintenance: Lessons Learned
Sorry and Thank You Last week we had a maintenance window that was scheduled for 12 hours. Instead, our core services were offline for a day and a half with some backups being throttled for an additional day. I am very sorry for any inconvenience that this caused. Rest assured, we take any disruptions in… Continue reading Scheduled Maintenance: Lessons Learned
Scheduled Maintenance: Thursday 9/23/10
UPDATE 6: All services are live! We are fully back online—new installs, trials, backups, purchases, and restores. We really appreciate how patient everyone has been with us during this time frame. Over the next couple days we will be digging in to everything that happened and working to figure out our lessons learned and how… Continue reading Scheduled Maintenance: Thursday 9/23/10
Backblaze Needs a New Office
Backblaze was founded in a small office where we planned to stay for six months. But we kept finding creative ways to cram more people in. Three years later…we’re bursting at the seams. So it’s time to move out of our humble abode and move to…well, a slightly larger humble abode. Do you have or… Continue reading Backblaze Needs a New Office
Backblaze Release 1.5.0.311 (Minor)
Backblaze has made a new release available and all users are scheduled to be automatically upgraded over the next two weeks. Below are the enhancements in this release: Release Date: 9/2/10 Version: 1.5.0.311 Auto-Update: All Users Increased frequency of updating summaries in customer accounts (helps Transfer Backup State reflect accurate information). Minor security enhancements. On… Continue reading Backblaze Release 1.5.0.311 (Minor)
Backblaze Online Backup Almost Acquired: Breaking Down the Breakup
In this post, I’ll share why I am publicly sharing this, exactly what happened, the details of our acquisition process, how we are moving forward, and what we learned.