If you were able to make your way to this page here, you will have realized on your own that www.frenchiflyable.com has moved back to where it started years ago: http://frenchiflyable.blogspot.com/
I'm angry about this but I have given up. I can't spend my life fighting virtual windmills. I have spent literally hours and hours if not days trying to get my website back. At first I couldn't even access the fifty odd posts and articles I have written. I thought I would end up losing everything.
I consider what happened to be treacherous, unfair, and devious!
One day in January I logged on to write a new blog and couldn't get in to my account. Every time I went on my dashboard or tried to type my address on google search I was forwarded automatically to a server called godaddy.com which informed me my blog was no longer mine but I could purchase it for the right price. Much to my chagrin, I paid godaddy.com $50 to get my domain back, but to no avail. They wanted more and guaranteed nothing in exchange. They spewed a bunch of technical gobbly gook which I had to devote much of my precious time to decipher. In the end it meant nothing. Really, this unfortunate experience could easily have become a money trap, me paying to get back what is already mine! NOT! I sollicited help from experts, technicians at goggle, chatted with godaddy, visited helplines. In the end I could do nothing about it. It was beyond me. It was driving me insane.
Now I've let go. I really need some zen Buddha. Hooommm. I have accepted that my domain has been lost forever.
I am especially fuming about the way it happened. Apparently in December the subscription I bought from google expired. No one informed me of this, told me I had to renew it, let alone give me advice on where or how to do so. No, not everyone on the net is a systems analyst nor computer programer not even a geek. I bet this is the case for most blogs. This enabled godaddy to seize my domain, yes, legally seize it, sever the connection with my blogger dashboard, and take it away. The gall! I eventually found out my posts still existed on blogger, they just were not linked with any site. Thus, my decision to go back to blogspot. It's a longer address to find, but I think I'm safe here. If I ever get frenchiflyable.com back I might change again, if not, I am here to stay. Godaddy.com can go _____ themselves. Internet thugs!
Honestly what hurts the most is losing contact with the friends around the world that have supported me and with whom I have been in contact through my blog. We developed a genuine rapport and I learnt quite a bit from them all. When they access my site from now on they will only see a blank page with a link to godaddy saying the site does not exist! There are also numerous connections all around the net with links to my old site. It's hard to update them.
All of this has left a sour taste in my mouth, towards the web community, google for letting it happen, and especially godaddy. I know now there is no protection at all on the net and no courtesy can be expected. Unfortunately, it'll take me a while before I build confidence again. My advice to you is beware, keep copies of what you post online, backup and backup again, and especially get an e-mail address from your virtual friends so you can have another way to reach them when godaddy.com or the likes attack again.
The moral: Once bitten twice shy!
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