Welcome to The Hosting 2013 Review
Hosting
The importance of Internet has been growing rapidly with a geometrical progression over the past decade and nowadays it is unthinkable to have a successful business without any Internet presence. At the same time individuals also linger to have a personal blog or a photo album available on the Internet to share emotions and experience with friends and family even when one does not have time to meet everybody in person or talk to them on the phone. And here comes the big question - what do you need to have your personal stuff on the Internet. The answer is simple - one thing you need for sure is reliable hosting.
What is hosting?
Most people that are trying to get their own site online for the first time would ask themselves that exact question - what is hosting? If you were to ask that question some 30 years ago, the answer you would get is simple - receiving or entertaining guests in a social or official capacity. Now on the other hand things are a lot more complicated when answering that question since people often perceive hosting as Internet hosting - storing information on an internet server.
What types of hosting are there?
The term Internet hosting is as broad as it gets since there are many different types of hosting that you can find on the Internet and I will try to explain most of them.
We have file hosting (also known as file storage) that allows you to store your files on an Internet server so that you can access them from any location. This is also often used for backing up important files in case something happens to your hard drive.
Another common type is the web hosting (also known as web site hosting or just webhosting) and this is a service that allows you to upload your own website on an Internet server - and not just any server but a web server that can render the site for visitors from any location with Internet access. So that you can rest assured the site is online 24/7 and accessible at any time you should find a professional web hosting company that will guarantee that.
We also have image hosting that allows you to upload your own pictures and albums on the Internet so that you can share them with friends and family even if they are half way across the globe from you. It is also common for professionals like photographers to upload their portfolio.
We must not forget e-mail hosting - as the name suggests it allows you to have your own e-mail address that you can use for sending and receiving messages. Such services can be part of a web hosting package or provided separately. You can even get it for free from providers like Google and Yahoo.
Speaking of which reminds me there is also free hosting - it is rather limited but hey, it is free! And there is nothing better for student projects or personal sites that you don't wish to pay for.
The so-called "warez" hosting is worth mentioning as well although it is illegal since this is the act of distributing unlicensed copyrighted materials like software, music and movies.
And last but not least is collocation hosting which allows you to store your own server (the actual hardware you purchased yourself) in the datacenter of a web hosting company. This is suitable for people or companies that have server administration capabilities and they need complete freedom in managing the server.