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The world wide web is an enormously diverse place. It's a place where people interact on many levels. Some are making statements, others are selling their widgets, collaborating, playing games, sending mail, sharing pictures and music, getting educated, dating, dieting, reading and writing! What a place! So now you think you'd like to claim a piece of internet real estate for yourself. You're ready to build your own web site!

PURPOSE:
The first question you need to ask is "What will be the topic of your web site? What do you want to communicate or provide? What outcome will you desire? Do you want a place to display your art, your photos, your poetry and your wit? Are you hoping to make your fortune in internet commerce? Is there a cause you've been wanting to promote or a person you've been wanting to honor? The first thing you have to know is what the site is about. Think through your idea enough to be able to make a guess at how many pages you will need, and what kinds of media you may want to place on your site.

HOSTING
Once you know what your site will be about you'll need to acquire a domain (yourname.com)or a sub-domain (yourname.theirname.com). The name you choose should be related to your project. The domain name can be anything, but if it has something to do with the content, the search engines may give it a slightly higher rating. For a name, you'll go to a hosting company. Free hosting is available from places such as awardspace.com, freehostia.com, gigacities.com, or any one of thousands of other hosting companies. Most have a free hosting plan with a sub-domain address. Some charge for hosting but give you a free domain name. You should make sure your free space will allow sufficient room for the pages you will be planning. Try to get one that does not place ads on your site in return for free hosting.

If you plan to sell things from your website you may want to spend a little cash on your monthly hosting to get access to a pre-installed e-commerce script. Marblehost.com, Downtownhost.com and many other hosting companies provide access to e-commerce scripts at an affordable monthly cost. Their script libraries also contain educational modules, blog scripts, classified ads, chat rooms, polls, guest books and site statistics. If any of these would be helpful on your site then you may want to start with a little more investment in order to get some great modules that you can build into your website. If your hosting company offers the "Fantastico Script

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