USSHC Announces EColo Program

USSHC announced "EColo" today - their new program to allow customers to offset the energy needed to run their systems with renewable energy. For every customer that enrolls in the Ecolo program, USSHC will in turn buy the equivalent amount of renewable energy from Alliant Energy. This exchange is a part of Alliant's Second Nature Program.

"Alliant Energy's Second Nature program allows us to be a catalyst for change in the data center colocation industry," said Isaac Helgens, Project Director for USSHC. "No other program allows us to make an impact so quickly without making major changes to processes in place. We are able to able to reduce our ecological footprint and in doing so give our customers a more efficient alternative.

Check out the EColo (pronounced ECHO-low) program here
and the press release here.

XSF Selects USSHC for Colocation

Another high availability site/organization has selected USSHC (US Secure Hosting Center) for colocation services. A month ago we learned of Wikia locating their infrastructure at USSHC and now the XMPP Standards Foundation (XSF) has selected USSHC. Core Jabber/XMPP services as well as the Jabber.org IM service will run from their infrastructure there.

"Given the secure, always-on nature of Jabber/XMPP technologies, the choice of USSHC is only natural," said Peter Saint-Andre, Executive Director of the XSF. "USSHC's commitment to secure hosting, highly reliable systems, and fast, friendly service is unsurpassed in the industry."

USSHC is a military built, hardened, underground facility located in Monticello, Iowa.

Check out the press release here

Wikia Colo in an Iowa Bunker

In a January 7th press release, United States Secure Hosting Center (USSHC) is set to announce that Wikia has selected them for colo and DR services. Wikia is Jimmy Wales (of Wikipedia fame) latest venture - a new way of community search, that challenges the typical model (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft).

Wikia Search looks to give users an alternative to today's search engines by using individual feedback rather than secret algorithms. This approach is designed to lead to more effective results where the users determine how accurate a page or wiki is based on its relevancy. With the community providing the fine tuning of the searches, there will be fewer results with “parked pages” and ad content, and more relevant data.

Wikia is cited as selecting USSHC because their "level of service and security is as unprecedented as the disaster tolerance of their facility itself". USSHC is an underground bunker in Monticello, Iowa. Their facility is another U.S. Government project from the cold war that is 2N for power and 3N for cooling and fuel stores.

“We are very excited to host Wikia at our facility for their various projects,” stated Jerry Pasker, CEO of USSHC. “Our facility allows us to offer the best physical security available without breaking your budget. Companies that are looking for more than just commodity data center space expect a higher standard. We're able to offer that peace of mind through our attention to detail and dedication to having the best systems and practices in place.”

Maybe a 2008 project for me will be to research how many data centers would be able to survive a nuclear bomb. :) List any of the disasters in my site selection paper and these guys have you covered!

Congrats on landing Wikia as a customer!