Free Web site Hosting without the Banner Ads? Looking
for free web hosting with no annoying pop-ups, pop-unders,
buttons, banners, headers or footers? And as well
as this, you'd like 99.8 percent up-time, fast servers,
access to the cgi-bin for scripts, FP extensions,
PHP and MySQL databases and FTP access?
We went out searching for the best "no ads"
totally free site hosting space deals around. The
results: disappointing, they are very few and far
between. Many have come and gone, or as in the case
of Bizland, quite suddenly withdrawn their free service
and demanded that all their customers begin paying.
We took a look at the promotional information for
over 300 free web hosting companies, but then also
looked at customer reviews. There was usually a major
difference in opinions.
There is still a plethora of free web hosts around,
but most require that you carry their advertising
or offer you a limited time for the free service,
usually a year. On the up side of this, many of these
companies do supply quality hosting with many services
in exchange for having their banners served up on
your pages. We did find that many of the non-banner
supported free options were hosted on very slow servers.
In a number of cases, the server failed to respond
at all! How do non-banner free hosting companies make
their money? These companies try to survive by enticing
the freebie customers to take out their paid hosting
space options, which is fair enough. Quite often,
their paid hosting options are quite cheap. You'll
find that if you utilize this kind of free site hosting,
the services available are rather limited and you'll
need to pay for things like Front Page extensions
and access to the cgi-bin for scripts. The other way
that they survive is through regular newsletters containing
offers from companies that pay them for the ad space.
Strategies in using non-banner supported free hosting
options One of the common patterns for these companies
is that when they first set up shop, customer support
is fantastic, server response times are great, shared
scripts function well and file transfer interfaces
are reliable. But as time goes on, "gold fever"
hits, and people begin flocking to these companies
with inevitable results - things start slowing down
and falling over.
If you do find yourself in the position of needing
to use free space due to financial restrictions; here's
a couple of things you can do: Buy a domain name first
Register a domain name first - Many domain name registrars
give you a stack of free services with each name registered.
Costs for domain name registrations can be as little
as US$10-$12 per year. One of the services that you
want to look for is a domain name control panel and
free http/URL forwarding or framing. This allows you
to redirect the name as you wish, changing its destination
every day if you want to! If your free web-hosting
provider goes belly up or isn't functioning correctly,
you can move your site to another provider and redirect
the domain name to point towards it.
A word of warning - be very careful whom you register
your domain name with. We recently assisted a client
who registered a domain name for a couple of dollars,
but had very little control over the name without
having paying huge fees to the registrar. It took
approximately 2 months to wrest control away from
the rabid registrar and transfer the name to a more
ethical company. Always read the fine print. What
if I can't afford a domain name? You could always
use a free, no-banner, no-popup URL/HTTP redirection
service from providers such as:
http://www.shorturl.com/
http://www.has.it/home.php
http://www.777i.net/
http://www.ipfox.com/home.html
The only issue with using these free URL redirection
providers is the question of continuity of service.
Also bear in mind that when it comes to being listed
on the search engines, nothing beats having your own
domain commercially hosted, rather than a redirection
to one. Free web space may be right under your nose!
When you sign up for Internet access, it is not uncommon
for you also to get some free web space thrown in
with the deal. We receive 10 Megs of space, including
Front Page extensions from our Internet Service Provider
which has been invaluable for creating a mirror /
backup version of Taming the Beast. Net. Email your
ISP to check out what is available to you.
Ok, back to non-advertising supported, free web hosting
options. While we won't personally recommend any as
we haven't used them and there were too many conflicting
views, the following free hosting directories may
assist you in finding some no frills, no banner web
space. Remember to read the fine print before signing
up for any service:
As you can see, there is a number of alternatives
to get you started. It should be noted that nothing
matches paid site hosting. But if price is an issue
and you want to get your site up quickly, by all means
check out the free service being offered. It may not
supply much such as web space or bandwidth, but you
would have taken the first step towards your online
career. The most important thing to realize, is don't
certain factors detain you from your goal. If money
is an issue, you now have some free services to get
you started.
