Data center and hosting provider The Planet is in the process of trying to recover from a fire which has crippled their H1 data center in Houston, TX.

According to an Intology article, nearly 9,000 servers at the facility are currently off line. The Planet engineers are working with the Houston fire department to get clearance to restore emergency backup power and get servers back online.

Since The Planet is a provider of a variety of shared hosting and dedicated server products, I can only imagine the number of websites that may be affected by this outage.

The Planet customers seeking information about this outage can read more at The Planet’s forums.

If you’re not a customer, count your blessings and back up your websites. Experiencing a major outage with your hosting provider is not a question of if, but when.

The first linky goodness of a new month. If that’s not enough to

• A great account of why Jenn Laycock is a great person we need to be careful what we blog—and how we respond to criticism in the blogosphere. Warning: hug factor = high.
• Looks like Wal-mart is testing free online classifieds with Oodle. Who will be hurt worse: newspapers or craigslist?
• A Canadian privacy watchdog has filed a complaint against Facebook for violating privacy laws, but the allegations sound a bit . . . well, old hat.
• It’s not just the US fighting this battle:Net Neutrality Finally Rears Ugly Head in Canada

Looking for more good reads? Don’t forget about the SEM Scholarship contest entries (of course, I’m sure you’ve already read them all, but why not review. If you’re not busy . . . working . . . or something)!

Facebook is going to be offering numerous additions to its developer platform in the coming weeks. First there were the rumors, then the generic confirmation: Facebook’s developer platform will go (mostly) open source. CNET reports today on Facebook’s reasoning behind this decision:

The reason for going open-source, Facebook said, is that developers requested it. And it’s to Facebook’s advantage to listen, especially now that developers have an alternative to the Facebook Platform in the fully open-source OpenSocial.

“In helping developers better understand Facebook Platform, build tools, and share their findings, we strengthen the ecosystem as a whole and help developers build better applications,” the release read. “That translates into a richer experience for Facebook users.”

Now do you think there’s any connection between this and Facebook pulling out of Google Connect?

There’s a good reason why you’re getting Pilgrim’s Picks early today. I have big Trackur news to announce later today, and I need to get cracking.

• Duncan Riley had be excited about the launch of Twitter rival Plurk. The same micromedia format, but with a visual twist. Then I read the service is already having stability issues. Hmm, if I’m going to jump from the frying pan Twitter, I’d want to land in a cool refreshing pool, not a fire.
• The NYT profiles the man behind Google’s "ad quality" team.
• An entire town has told Google Street View: "We don’t like strangers around these parts." They’ve forced Google to remove North Oaks from the company’s Street Views saying the town’s roads are all private and Google "didn’t have any authorization to go on private property."