If you’ve visited the Rails Machine website recently, you may have noticed something new: we’ve redesigned and relaunched with an all new look and brand, just in time for RailsConf 2008. Take a look around. Kick the tires. Take it for a spin.

In addition to the main website redesign and content refresh, we’ve also updated the look and feel of our Support website, the Wiki, and the Blog to match. We’ve even recorded a new screencast walking you through getting an application setup using the updated Rails Machine gem.

While it’s true that the old website did its job well enough, the new branding reflects a new direction and a new outlook for us. We’ve changed the way our hosting plans work to better reflect the kinds of services and upgrade paths our customers have been asking for. We’ve also added a Questions Page that we hope will be helpful both to potential new customers wishing to learn about our service offerings, as well as to existing customers wanting to learn more about our business and philosophy.

We’ve also added a Rails Machine Badges Page, where we’ve posted a variety of badges you can use to show your support for The Machine by linking to us from your hosted website or blog.

RailsConf 2008

As Bradley mentioned in our Spring newsletter, both he and I are speaking at at RailsConf 2008. I’ll be talking about Entrepeneurs on Rails and Bradley will be on the Scaling Rails panel, which looks awesome. We’re getting T-Shirts printed, as well as a few other things to give away, and Bradley has been planning the annual Rails Machine party which – as always – is going to be a blast. Our superhuman support guru Rob will also be coming, and we’ll have some special announcements to make at the party.

What’s Up With You?

As much as we do our best to keep everything running smoothly so you can focus on building applications and running your business, we realize that there’s always a way for us to do something better. This is where you come in. I’ve setup a special email address you can use to share your thoughts with us, and let us know how we can improve The Machine. Do you like the new website? Are there additional products or services you’re looking for? Have an idea for a way we can improve or streamline something? Have you had an experience using a Rails Machine that you’d like to share? Let us know – we want to hear from you.