Free Web Hosting – Clearing the Haze

The very thought about having your own personal website can get you excited. But will paying for it offer equal excitement? Predominantly the answer will be – no. However there are websites that you can set up for free. To be more specific; there are free web hosting services that enable people to host their own websites for free.

Free web hosting – it sure does sound suspicious; someone spending all the money to host your website? A lot of them are asking for fees but this web hosting service does not? Like expected; seldom does anything ever come for free. So now we will discuss what are the problems that come along with free web hosting services.

To start with free web hosting services subject your website to a lot of restrictions. These restrictions can vary from – restriction of multimedia to unavailability of special programming scripts. The most general of restrictions is the restriction put on web space and band width. These restrictions make your web site look rather bland and less professional. On the other hand reduction in bandwidth can mean a highly inefficient website or a totally frustrating navigational experience.

In that case what is the very purpose of these free web hosting services or to better put it why do they spend money to host some random person’s website for free? The answer lies in the fact that free web hosting companies require you to have ads on your website. These advertisements can be in the form of normal internet ads, pop ups, banners etc. Most of the time you hardly have any choice with regard to what kind of ads are posted, where it’s posted etc. The setting up of these ads enable the free web hosting company to earn a small advertising income through your website.

Other methods that are used by free web hosting services include – the selling of your email address to advertisement agencies, subscription to their ads, posting on certain forums etc.

What is important here is that free web hosting services are out there with the intent to make money. Thus it is no surprise that when you wake up next morning – your website as well as the free web hosting company have both disappeared for good. Most importantly you can’t complain because it’s free.

However there are free web hosting services that offer certain advanced features like – email addresses, ftp, advanced programming scripts etc. Usually free web hosting companies work by making tradeoffs between these features – so that suitable people register with their free web hosting services.

Then again a more common feature for free web hosting services is to offer upgrades for paid membership. This is good if the service is good. However read the Terms of agreement as there may be clauses that require you to make separate additional payments for each additional feature etc. Other free web hosting services would offer to remove their ads for a certain fee – the essence being; it’s no longer free now.

About the Author

Dhruv Patel is a happy DreamHost customer. He has a web site to promote DreamHost. Use the
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