Originally posted Friday, July 27, 2007 (4 years ago)
You don't need to own your own server. I've found the folks at Total Choice Hosting to be very reasonable. Granted my website isn't doing Yeoodi-style traffic...
The velocity of Spanish is that many tables do not have sadness...
Originally posted Saturday, July 28, 2007 (4 years ago)
I'd avoid free sites things have a tendency to change without notice and you don't have a lot of recourse.
Before you do ANYTHING that lets members DO anything on the website, talk to people. Forums, ads, etc...they are all nasty targets for spammers (I use the most generic definition of "spammer").
There are teams in India, etc where they just go from forum to forum registering and posting ads for whatever (Viagra, porn, etc.). Capcha's (the annoying letter things you can't read) help with computer scripts, but not against real people.
Originally posted Saturday, July 28, 2007 (4 years ago)
Hey, sweet cheeks. I just found this great site for Viagra porn. It's called CKS 2. It makes your membership big and powerful! Best of all, it's FREE! See ya around, babe!
Originally posted Saturday, July 28, 2007 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "Beckto" Do you get your own server?
That's certainly an option, although it's typically the lesser choice for those just starting their venture.
Quoted from "Beckto" If so, how?
Basically, you'll need:
A web server
A couple name servers (computers that act like "phone books" on the Internet, telling other computers "out there" where your computer "lives" so they can visit you)
A router (a machine that directs and controls traffic coming to and going from your network)
A couple IP addresses (your machines' individual, unique identifying addresses on the Internet)
An service provider (most ISPs can provide service for your server)
A back-up of some sort (a mirror, RAID array, tape machine, etc.)
A good admin (most important!)
Other miscellaneous crap, doo-dads, wires, computers (like a firewall, mirror server, etc.), black boxes with blinky lights, blah blah blah, yada yada, et cetera, et cetera...
You can put together an on-site website on the cheap easy enough, using older machines, Linux/Unix, and so on. But it's easy to see why the next option is more popular with folks...Especially when you consider the time commitment to get things working to the point you can reliably sustain traffic and services with minimal downtime.
Quoted from "Beckto" If not, then what do you do?
The other, more popular option, is that you buy hosting from a hosting provider who already has all the equipment and will run it all for you. Basically hosts rent you space on their servers (some will rent you individual machines on their high-speed network if you want), provide you with IP addresses, and some will even handle your domain registration for you.
I pay 12 a month for 17 GB of space, 200-odd GB of bandwidth per month, infinite e-mail addresses, and a whole bunch of other features that I can't possibly remember. I successfully operate two separate websites, a forum, a photo hosting service, web and SMTP/POP e-mail hosting, a classifieds and an online shop--all on the same hosting plan.
Quoted from "Beckto" Does the vary with traffic?
Unless, by some miracle you've already got a multi-thousand member market base rip-roarin' and ready to go, you wont have to worry about eating up your monthly bandwidth for awhile.
However, once your site starts getting big time hits and you're seeing tons of traffic, you will almost definitely have to start paying additional bandwidth fees. How much depends entirely on your host, but it's usually like a few dollars extra per few gigs extra. Once you start getting traffic of the magnitude where you're eating several hundred gigs per month, you're probably gonna be looking at setting up your own shop.
Quoted from "Beckto" How do you have advertisers...
You can if you want, sure. I have a couple for my small side business.
Quoted from "Beckto" ...what's the going rate...
That depends completely upon the agreement you make with your advertiser. Starting out, you probably wont make diddly squat with advertising. A good goal though, is to try and cover your operating costs as much as possible. That said, the more traffic your site gets and the more influential your site becomes in your target industry, the more money you can logically command.
Quoted from "Beckto" ...and how do you get them?
I got my advertisers the easy way: they were already friends and associates in my target field.
As for scaring up new business, if your site becomes a major influence in your chosen industry, some of the advertisers will come to you. Using this forum as an example, I'd guess most, if not all, of the people who advertise here do so simply because yehoodi.com is a major Internet Swing scene and as such, yehoodi.com is the logical place to advertise Swing events.
Cold calling is also an option. The worst an advertiser can do is say "no." Maybe they'll say it with some colorful language, but it's still just "no" nonetheless. ;)
Quoted from "Beckto" How does a website that provides free exchange of information actually make money? Or does it?
I started my little business as an information exchange hub. Due to the nature of the subject, it didn't take long for a market to develop where I could sell equipment to support those active in said subject. Sorta like if yehoodi.com was selling Big Band CDs, dance shoes, good deodorant for leads, etc. People come here to talk Lindy, so there's a natural market to sell Swing and dance stuff here too. I also have a small array of site merchandise for sale as well, such as embroidered polo shirts, coffee mugs and so forth. This stuff also serves as passive advertisement, which brings in more traffic, which leads to more business.
Another tactic I use to make money is to sell different "memberships" on my site. Each "level" of membership, with an increasing cost, gains said member access to extra features on my site, such as a custom e-mail address on my domain, access to discounted services with my advertisers, etc. Of course, your advertisers themselves will provide you with income as well.
I also have willing donors who enjoy my site enough to just give me money to help keep it going. In donations alone, I raised enough to operate my site for the entire year, barring any unforeseen spikes in traffic. That translates to everything else being pure income for my pocket or of course, the expansion of services.
I should note that my business is very small. I created it to support friends and associates. I do see some growth, but I do not actively advertise elsewhere. All my additional business comes from word of mouth. I make enough to run things without dipping into my full-time income, plus a little to support the activities my business revolves around. Basically, I don't pay the mortgage with it, but it makes a hobby free.
Originally posted Sunday, July 29, 2007 (4 years ago)
GoDaddy.com is a very reasonably priced service for hosting and also offers a dirt cheap domain name service. If you don't have software for creating your website they also have a reasonably affordable template based create a website service. I've had very good luck with them so far.
"A revolution without dancing is a revolution not worth having" - V
Originally posted Sunday, July 29, 2007 (4 years ago)
I want to second the mention of "GoDaddy." I've used them any number of times and have always had problems dealt with easily. Occassional long hold times, but what else is new.
GoDaddy.com = 8.95/year (and they always have specials online, do a search)
Registrar.com = 35/year.
You do the math.
Some places are even cheaper, but I've heard stories about some of the other places.
Originally posted Sunday, July 29, 2007 (4 years ago)
Third on the GoDaddy. They have plenty of server space and constantly upgrade accordingly. And like Clint points out, are very reasonable.
There are cheaper servers out there, but the quality of support they supply is well worth the extra few dollars.
Beckto, if you are currently useing another service, they also make it extremly EASY for you to switch everything over to them. It's really convienient to have every domain and website under one account. They put everything you own in one, easy access list. :)
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
Current GoDaddy Charges:
Domain names start at 1.99 for first year and are all at or under 8.95.
Site hosting plans start at 2.80/month (Economy plan - 38 month contract) with a maximum short term (2 month) rate of 3.99/month. SQL Server database service is included in the basic plans and Coldfusion is available for an additional 1.99 a month. They also have "deluxe" and "premium" plans at a higher rate that allow for more disk space and web traffic ("monthly data transfer"), but these higher rate plans are rarely needed for a new site.
"A revolution without dancing is a revolution not worth having" - V
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
Oh sweet mother, get away from netsol (unless they've improved over the years). I'll jump on the GoDaddy bandwagon. But be careful if you start switching domains...the ones you're switching FROM sometimes make it really difficult to give you up if you're not paying attention.
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
I'll toss in another " 1" for GoDaddy too, I guess. I used them for a couple years and never had any trouble with them. However, if you're an administrator at an advanced level, GoDaddy's lack of secure shell access is a real hindrance to true site administration. GUIs and FTP can only get you so far (happily).
I haven't used GoDaddy for quite a while now, so if they now offer shell access, I retract the above potentially disparaging comment.
Quoted from "Beckto" I guess, some of my concerns are security...
Security as in...Information security? Physical security? What kind of security?
Quoted from "Beckto" ...and loosing money on the deal. Breaking even is fine, tho.
Honestly, you probably will lose money when you start up. However, the trick is to scale your operation down to a level you can support on your own and expand your services as your site's popularity (read: financial support) grows.
It may help you to write down your goals for your version of the ideal, perfect site, including all the cool and fancy features and services. Think, "if I were a god and could snap my fingers and have exactly what I want with this site, what would it be?" Then, decide what kind of budget and time commitment you can make. Chances are, unless you're a wealthy, stay-at-home trophy wife or something, your ideal site concept and your budget/time commitment level wont match.
So, the trick is to look at your ideal site plan and scale it back to match your budget/time commitment. You may find that you can only afford, financially and time-wise, to operate a forum and nothing else. So, open a forum and let your user base grow. Meanwhile, over time, continue working on projects on your "ideal site" list and start collecting money, either in the form of donations, memberships, or in advertisement space, etc.
One thing I have learned, as humble as I try to be and as proud as I am, is to not be afraid to ask your membership for help. They come to your site because they like you and/or your site so they are usually more than happy to toss some money your way. Even the most destitute of Internet friends will usually be more than willing to chalk up 10 bucks for the cause. Got 12 users to give you 10? Well that's one year's worth of hosting right there, leaving the only expenditure out of your pocket, so to speak, to be your physical time at the computer admining.
Basically, as your membership grows, so should your income from the site, plus the services the site offers. It can be a tough balance to maintain, as one's ambition can easily outrun one's financial abilities. Conversely, it's easy to allow the site to stagnate by not moving forward often enough due to fiscal conservatism, too.
At anywhere from 7 to say, 20 a month for hosting that offers more features than you're likely to ever use even for your ideal site, hosting a basic website/forum is pretty cheap. It's the time commitment that's a killer if you wanna stay on top of things.
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
.... so yeah, and whatever it is that they all said and all that stuff...
Before adding more useless bandwidth I wanna know, big beck2, what is this site you are planning? Or is that like hush-hush secret stuff for your VC-proposal-portfolio only....
--R
y i no haz signature? Come on people, make with the funny.
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
Quoted from "swinginjay" Oh sweet mother, get away from netsol (unless they've improved over the years). I'll jump on the GoDaddy bandwagon. But be careful if you start switching domains...the ones you're switching FROM sometimes make it really difficult to give you up if you're not paying attention.
-j
Originally posted Monday, July 30, 2007 (4 years ago)
My website went online about two years ago. It took me nine months to build, but most of that time was putting together the history and picture galleries that went with it. The actual building of the site, the "how to do it" part wasn't all that bad.
When I started I didn't know how to spell HTML, let alone program anything with it. I had no idea how to begin, so I just started looking up different template and hosting providers.
I settled on AllWebCo and have never regretted it, not for a moment.
http://www.allwebco.com/
They have great templates to choose from, excellent on-line materials to get you up and running, and top-notch user support. They never failed to answer my questions, help me with a problem, or walk me through something I didn't understand . . . within 24 hours.
My site does not and will never have any public access in the way of posting messages, bulletin boards, an open calendar, etc. because I just don't need that kind of stress in my life. All of these things are available though if you want them.
The one thing you can't do is host your own streaming audio and video through their servers. At least you couldn't a long time ago when I looked into it. But with YouTube, Goggle, and other online video sources you can link to them all you want . . . and I do!
For my amount of traffic, 50-75 hits a day (mostly for the history pages), I am at the 17.95/month level that I pay in one lump sum per year. The Bad News: All out of my pocket. The Good News: I am beholdin' to no one; not through advertising or otherwise. I have never "broke even" pursuing my interest and love for Lindy Hop and doubt if I ever will.
To see an example of how a corporate.business looking template was turned into a Lindy Hop website you can click the link below. This is the closest template they now have to the one I started with two years ago. Mine was the "drop down menu" version of their "Executive Blue:"
http://allwebcodesign.com/templates/tempT27BG/
Their current drop down menu version has been jazzed up and is now called "Executive Chrome Blue:"
Listen 24 hours a day! Weekly updated shows
Owning a public website 101
How do you produce/maintain a public-resource website?
Like if someone wants to start a website for people to use as a single resource for one specific thing, how do you run it?
Do you get your own server? If so, how? If not, then what do you do? Or how much do you pay? Does the $ vary with traffic?
How do you have advertisers, what's the going rate, and how do you get them?
How does a website that provides free exchange of information actually make money? Or does it?
Yehoodi Featured Topics
(15 items total, 30 per page)
You don't need to own your own server. I've found the folks at Total Choice Hosting to be very reasonable. Granted my website isn't doing Yeoodi-style traffic...
The velocity of Spanish is that many tables do not have sadness...
Microsoft Office Live will give you a site for free provided you are using Windows and IE when you log in.
I'd avoid free sites things have a tendency to change without notice and you don't have a lot of recourse.
Before you do ANYTHING that lets members DO anything on the website, talk to people. Forums, ads, etc...they are all nasty targets for spammers (I use the most generic definition of "spammer").
There are teams in India, etc where they just go from forum to forum registering and posting ads for whatever (Viagra, porn, etc.). Capcha's (the annoying letter things you can't read) help with computer scripts, but not against real people.
I'm babbling, so I'm going to shut up now.
Hey, sweet cheeks. I just found this great site for Viagra porn. It's called CKS 2. It makes your membership big and powerful! Best of all, it's FREE! See ya around, babe!
That's certainly an option, although it's typically the lesser choice for those just starting their venture.
Basically, you'll need:
A web server A couple name servers (computers that act like "phone books" on the Internet, telling other computers "out there" where your computer "lives" so they can visit you) A router (a machine that directs and controls traffic coming to and going from your network) A couple IP addresses (your machines' individual, unique identifying addresses on the Internet) An service provider (most ISPs can provide service for your server) A back-up of some sort (a mirror, RAID array, tape machine, etc.) A good admin (most important!) Other miscellaneous crap, doo-dads, wires, computers (like a firewall, mirror server, etc.), black boxes with blinky lights, blah blah blah, yada yada, et cetera, et cetera...
You can put together an on-site website on the cheap easy enough, using older machines, Linux/Unix, and so on. But it's easy to see why the next option is more popular with folks...Especially when you consider the time commitment to get things working to the point you can reliably sustain traffic and services with minimal downtime.
The other, more popular option, is that you buy hosting from a hosting provider who already has all the equipment and will run it all for you. Basically hosts rent you space on their servers (some will rent you individual machines on their high-speed network if you want), provide you with IP addresses, and some will even handle your domain registration for you.
I personally use JaguarPC for my hosting needs.
I pay 12 a month for 17 GB of space, 200-odd GB of bandwidth per month, infinite e-mail addresses, and a whole bunch of other features that I can't possibly remember. I successfully operate two separate websites, a forum, a photo hosting service, web and SMTP/POP e-mail hosting, a classifieds and an online shop--all on the same hosting plan.
Unless, by some miracle you've already got a multi-thousand member market base rip-roarin' and ready to go, you wont have to worry about eating up your monthly bandwidth for awhile.
However, once your site starts getting big time hits and you're seeing tons of traffic, you will almost definitely have to start paying additional bandwidth fees. How much depends entirely on your host, but it's usually like a few dollars extra per few gigs extra. Once you start getting traffic of the magnitude where you're eating several hundred gigs per month, you're probably gonna be looking at setting up your own shop.
You can if you want, sure. I have a couple for my small side business.
That depends completely upon the agreement you make with your advertiser. Starting out, you probably wont make diddly squat with advertising. A good goal though, is to try and cover your operating costs as much as possible. That said, the more traffic your site gets and the more influential your site becomes in your target industry, the more money you can logically command.
I got my advertisers the easy way: they were already friends and associates in my target field.
As for scaring up new business, if your site becomes a major influence in your chosen industry, some of the advertisers will come to you. Using this forum as an example, I'd guess most, if not all, of the people who advertise here do so simply because yehoodi.com is a major Internet Swing scene and as such, yehoodi.com is the logical place to advertise Swing events.
Cold calling is also an option. The worst an advertiser can do is say "no." Maybe they'll say it with some colorful language, but it's still just "no" nonetheless. ;)
I started my little business as an information exchange hub. Due to the nature of the subject, it didn't take long for a market to develop where I could sell equipment to support those active in said subject. Sorta like if yehoodi.com was selling Big Band CDs, dance shoes, good deodorant for leads, etc. People come here to talk Lindy, so there's a natural market to sell Swing and dance stuff here too. I also have a small array of site merchandise for sale as well, such as embroidered polo shirts, coffee mugs and so forth. This stuff also serves as passive advertisement, which brings in more traffic, which leads to more business.
Another tactic I use to make money is to sell different "memberships" on my site. Each "level" of membership, with an increasing cost, gains said member access to extra features on my site, such as a custom e-mail address on my domain, access to discounted services with my advertisers, etc. Of course, your advertisers themselves will provide you with income as well.
I also have willing donors who enjoy my site enough to just give me money to help keep it going. In donations alone, I raised enough to operate my site for the entire year, barring any unforeseen spikes in traffic. That translates to everything else being pure income for my pocket or of course, the expansion of services.
I should note that my business is very small. I created it to support friends and associates. I do see some growth, but I do not actively advertise elsewhere. All my additional business comes from word of mouth. I make enough to run things without dipping into my full-time income, plus a little to support the activities my business revolves around. Basically, I don't pay the mortgage with it, but it makes a hobby free.
Hope all this helps. :)
GoDaddy.com is a very reasonably priced service for hosting and also offers a dirt cheap domain name service. If you don't have software for creating your website they also have a reasonably affordable template based create a website service. I've had very good luck with them so far.
"A revolution without dancing is a revolution not worth having" - V
I want to second the mention of "GoDaddy." I've used them any number of times and have always had problems dealt with easily. Occassional long hold times, but what else is new.
GoDaddy.com = 8.95/year (and they always have specials online, do a search) Registrar.com = 35/year.
You do the math.
Some places are even cheaper, but I've heard stories about some of the other places.
Third on the GoDaddy. They have plenty of server space and constantly upgrade accordingly. And like Clint points out, are very reasonable.
There are cheaper servers out there, but the quality of support they supply is well worth the extra few dollars.
Beckto, if you are currently useing another service, they also make it extremly EASY for you to switch everything over to them. It's really convienient to have every domain and website under one account. They put everything you own in one, easy access list. :)
Current GoDaddy Charges:
Domain names start at 1.99 for first year and are all at or under 8.95.
Site hosting plans start at 2.80/month (Economy plan - 38 month contract) with a maximum short term (2 month) rate of 3.99/month. SQL Server database service is included in the basic plans and Coldfusion is available for an additional 1.99 a month. They also have "deluxe" and "premium" plans at a higher rate that allow for more disk space and web traffic ("monthly data transfer"), but these higher rate plans are rarely needed for a new site.
"A revolution without dancing is a revolution not worth having" - V
I've used GoDaddy before. I typically use Network Solutions.
I guess, some of my concerns are security and loosing money on the deal. Breaking even is fine, tho.
Oh sweet mother, get away from netsol (unless they've improved over the years). I'll jump on the GoDaddy bandwagon. But be careful if you start switching domains...the ones you're switching FROM sometimes make it really difficult to give you up if you're not paying attention.
-j
I'll toss in another " 1" for GoDaddy too, I guess. I used them for a couple years and never had any trouble with them. However, if you're an administrator at an advanced level, GoDaddy's lack of secure shell access is a real hindrance to true site administration. GUIs and FTP can only get you so far (happily).
I haven't used GoDaddy for quite a while now, so if they now offer shell access, I retract the above potentially disparaging comment.
Security as in...Information security? Physical security? What kind of security?
Honestly, you probably will lose money when you start up. However, the trick is to scale your operation down to a level you can support on your own and expand your services as your site's popularity (read: financial support) grows.
It may help you to write down your goals for your version of the ideal, perfect site, including all the cool and fancy features and services. Think, "if I were a god and could snap my fingers and have exactly what I want with this site, what would it be?" Then, decide what kind of budget and time commitment you can make. Chances are, unless you're a wealthy, stay-at-home trophy wife or something, your ideal site concept and your budget/time commitment level wont match.
So, the trick is to look at your ideal site plan and scale it back to match your budget/time commitment. You may find that you can only afford, financially and time-wise, to operate a forum and nothing else. So, open a forum and let your user base grow. Meanwhile, over time, continue working on projects on your "ideal site" list and start collecting money, either in the form of donations, memberships, or in advertisement space, etc.
One thing I have learned, as humble as I try to be and as proud as I am, is to not be afraid to ask your membership for help. They come to your site because they like you and/or your site so they are usually more than happy to toss some money your way. Even the most destitute of Internet friends will usually be more than willing to chalk up 10 bucks for the cause. Got 12 users to give you 10? Well that's one year's worth of hosting right there, leaving the only expenditure out of your pocket, so to speak, to be your physical time at the computer admining.
Basically, as your membership grows, so should your income from the site, plus the services the site offers. It can be a tough balance to maintain, as one's ambition can easily outrun one's financial abilities. Conversely, it's easy to allow the site to stagnate by not moving forward often enough due to fiscal conservatism, too.
At anywhere from 7 to say, 20 a month for hosting that offers more features than you're likely to ever use even for your ideal site, hosting a basic website/forum is pretty cheap. It's the time commitment that's a killer if you wanna stay on top of things.
.... so yeah, and whatever it is that they all said and all that stuff... Before adding more useless bandwidth I wanna know, big beck2, what is this site you are planning? Or is that like hush-hush secret stuff for your VC-proposal-portfolio only....
--R
y i no haz signature? Come on people, make with the funny.
What was your experience with NetSol?
My website went online about two years ago. It took me nine months to build, but most of that time was putting together the history and picture galleries that went with it. The actual building of the site, the "how to do it" part wasn't all that bad.
When I started I didn't know how to spell HTML, let alone program anything with it. I had no idea how to begin, so I just started looking up different template and hosting providers.
I settled on AllWebCo and have never regretted it, not for a moment.
http://www.allwebco.com/
They have great templates to choose from, excellent on-line materials to get you up and running, and top-notch user support. They never failed to answer my questions, help me with a problem, or walk me through something I didn't understand . . . within 24 hours.
My site does not and will never have any public access in the way of posting messages, bulletin boards, an open calendar, etc. because I just don't need that kind of stress in my life. All of these things are available though if you want them.
The one thing you can't do is host your own streaming audio and video through their servers. At least you couldn't a long time ago when I looked into it. But with YouTube, Goggle, and other online video sources you can link to them all you want . . . and I do!
For my amount of traffic, 50-75 hits a day (mostly for the history pages), I am at the 17.95/month level that I pay in one lump sum per year. The Bad News: All out of my pocket. The Good News: I am beholdin' to no one; not through advertising or otherwise. I have never "broke even" pursuing my interest and love for Lindy Hop and doubt if I ever will.
To see an example of how a corporate.business looking template was turned into a Lindy Hop website you can click the link below. This is the closest template they now have to the one I started with two years ago. Mine was the "drop down menu" version of their "Executive Blue:"
http://allwebcodesign.com/templates/tempT27BG/
Their current drop down menu version has been jazzed up and is now called "Executive Chrome Blue:"
http://allwebcodesign.com/templates/T27dChromeBlue/
To see what templates like this can turn into in the way of a Lindy Hop website, go to: http://www.kclindyhop.org/
(15 items total, 30 per page)
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