business

It's been a long two days in Bournemouth meeting a spectrum of businesses already trying out social media or thinking of giving it a go – so it was nice to end the day with Serena Everton, the Head of eCommerce at AllSaints Retail, saying I'd given her 'the best piece of advice of all'. And what was that advice? If you're in the retail sector especially, don't attempt to engage with social media initiatives if your business is not already truly customer-focused.

Not so many years ago, when for most companies the web was little more than a way to publish a brochure without paying for the printing, the subject of 'uptime' tended to be of interest only to the big players - online banking, eBay, Amazon, the BBC and so on. These were true 24x7 operations with money, market share and reputation at stake if their service went offline.

What's the difference, then, between 99% uptime, and 99.99% uptime?