Arqspin customers are free to create unlimited spins so they can capture the perfect view of their products. But where do these spins go? To the cloud—a network of computers distributed around the world that store your data. We host your spins using Amazon’s CloudFront Content Delivery Network. We get a lot of questions about how our data hosting service works and why it’s a good idea to let us host your spins, so we thought we’d compile a list of benefits.
1. We’re really good at hosting spins
When you choose to host your own spin data, you have to figure out which platform you’re going to host it on and where the data will live best. When Arqspin hosts your spins, you’re up and running immediately. We are experts in this area, and we’ve thought deeply about issues like where to host data and how to organize it so that spins load quickly anywhere in the world. These are serious engineering questions and taking the wrong strategy will leave your visitors staring at a blank screen.
2. Faster delivery
Amazon CloudFront employs a network of “edge locations,” or computers, that stores multiple copies of your spin data files all over the world. It ensures that end-user requests are served by the closest edge location. So if someone in Saratoga wanted to view a spin, and the closest edge location in the network is New York, the data only has to travel between those two locations, not all the way from Virginia (where we are) to Saratoga. This means that requests travel shorter distances, and your viewers can see spins faster.
3. Progressive loading
We store each spin in multiple proprietary formats. We’ve designed our spin viewer to download the optimal format depending on the browser being used to view the spin. With our viewer, web pages with spins progressively load data off of CloudFront to show spins right away instead of waiting for the entire spin, or all of its frames, to load. This minimizes the amount of time visitors to your site are left looking at a blank screen. This optimization isn’t available if you host your spins yourself or use other 360 photography services—anyone visiting a page with a spin hosted elsewhere would have to wait until the entire spin loads before they could see it.
4. Scalability
One thing we love about using Amazon CloudFront, is that it automatically scales as demand increases or decreases. It uses multiple layers of caching at each edge location and collapses simultaneous requests for the same object before contacting the origin server. This means you don’t need to worry about web server capacity meeting demand from traffic spikes when you post a spin that goes viral.
5. Data loss prevention
Because multiple copies of your spins are stored in Amazon’s industrial grade computer network, files don’t need to be saved or backed up to a computer. So if your computer crashes, or if Arqspin HQ is taken out by aliens, your spins will remain in tact. Some customers have asked, “what if you go out of business, how can I get my data?” Arqspin’s policy is that if we (and we don’t intend to) close the business, that we will release all of our data to its users before we go.
6. Seamless tool integration
When your spins are hosted by Arqspin, you can seamlessly use our account management and editing tools. You don’t need to download any data or software to your local machine, it’s all available in your browser. And when we upgrade our software, you automatically get the latest tools, spin viewer, or whatever else we’re improving upon.
7. It’s affordable
Having us host your spins is also included in your Arqspin subscription. You can create unlimited spins until you get the one you want. This way, you don’t have to worry about adding extra bandwidth capabilities to your network, or the incurring costs.
Hosting your data allows us to give you the best 360 photography experience possible, from capturing your spins, to editing them, and embedding them into your website. Contact us if you have any more questions about data hosting, or learn more about our plans and services.
