Anyone Ever Have Their Own Website?

[debmidge]

I have opportunity to start a website....I know nothing about no computers nor websites...

My site has nothing to do with celiac or gluten; it's hobby related.

Anyway, I know I have to get a company as a "server" but how do I register my site name? Don't I do that first? Should I get my idea "patented" first? I don't want anyone to steal my idea...

I am so excited but so scared!

[lovegrov]

I'm not real knowledgeable, but one place you can register your site name is godaddy.com.

richard

[Canadian Karen]

I have opportunity to start a website....I know nothing about no computers nor websites...

My site has nothing to do with celiac or gluten; it's hobby related.

Anyway, I know I have to get a company as a "server" but how do I register my site name? Don't I do that first? Should I get my idea "patented" first? I don't want anyone to steal my idea...

I am so excited but so scared!

I am useless at this stuff, but I do know one person who could be of great help. Contact Vincent..... I know he has his own website and knows alot about this stuff. PM him and he should be able to help...

Hugs and good luck!

Karen

[Guhlia]

I manage and designed our website, guhlmotors.com. I can likely help you out with any questions you have. Drop me a PM and I'll talk you through whatever you need to know.

[RiceGuy]

Well, being a server/site admin and having my own website (for my business) I can tell you that though it isn't required that you understand much if any of the details, it does help.

Take the suggestion of using godaddy.com for setting up the name, and I'd also suggest using them to host the site too. Their prices are quite competitive, and service seems good.

As for protecting the idea, that can be tough. Basically, patents can be applied to technology, while copyrights can protect ideas. A book can be copyrighted, and a gizmo can be patented. International protection is tricky at best, but cooperation from some countries is improving. Truly however, any protection you obtain is only for legal purposes. That is, it gives you legal leverage to take them to court. The hope though, is that it keeps someone from outright stealing it in the first place. Take a look at the Open Original Shared Link for more confusing jargon than you'd ever want to sift through. And here's a link to the site of the Open Original Shared Link.

[GeoffCJ]

Websites are very hard to protect. You can protect your design, and your pictures/text. But protecting your idea is nearly impossible.

Many places that host websites (servers) will also register your domain name, but it can make switching servers harder. I've been happy with 1and1.com, though doing a google search shows plenty who aren't. Yahoo isn't the cheapest hosting, but they have some excellent services, especially for novice website managers.

I build and design websites for a little extra $$ while in school. Feel free to email me at

Geoff

at

texaskilonewton

dot

com

with any questions.

[Guhlia]

Geoff, we use 1and1.com as well and have been very pleased with their service and their prices. I would definitely recommend them as well.

[GeoffCJ]

I build and design websites for a little extra $$ while in school. Feel free to email me at

Geoff

at

texaskilonewton

dot

com

with any questions.

BTW- I just re-read my post, and it sounded like I was soliciting business. That wasn't my intent, I only mentioned it to show I had plenty of experience. I'm happy to answer questions for free!

[tiffjake]

Geoff, we use 1and1.com as well and have been very pleased with their service and their prices. I would definitely recommend them as well.

I use oneandone also. I have 3 sites through them. One for work, one for personal (keeping up with family) and one for a Celiac Race in Austin (which, I don't think would be wrong to mention here!) www.GotGuts5k.com

[lorka150]

Do you want something free? www.Lame Advertisement.com is easy to work with.

[debmidge]

I am not necessarily looking for free server. I am confused about one thing...if I use an intenet web designer, how do they know without sitting alongside me, how I want my site to be arranged? Isn't it best to sit down face to face with the designer? (Forgive me I am of the generation BEFORE PCs and I am playing "catch-up" with learning about them). I am an 8-track woman in a celiac disease world!

[gfp]

I am not necessarily looking for free server. I am confused about one thing...if I use an intenet web designer, how do they know without sitting alongside me, how I want my site to be arranged? Isn't it best to sit down face to face with the designer? (Forgive me I am of the generation BEFORE PCs and I am playing "catch-up" with learning about them). I am an 8-track woman in a celiac disease world!

You can make mock-ups etc. but it really comes down as I said in the pm about what you want to do.

If you want it updating frequently or if its static.

Do you want users to be able to post or submit content etc.

If you are not sure then sitting down with someone is a good idea but they can just be a school kid... unless you do it yourself the process will be iterative.

If you can find sites that have elements you need/want then this can be looked into... the biggest step is if you need a merchant account (ability to process credit cards) ...

To put it another way you could ask how do I write a book or how do I build a model car from scratch?

You can buy pre-made car kits, you just assemble or you can have the pieces designed yourself etc. or you can make it all from wood and glue it together... it all depends what you want the model car to do...will it have an engine that works? etc...

You can prototype things yourself, on paper even...

Finally .. what works on the internet financially is almost always ideas from techy people... sorry its the way it is... from Yahoo to Google, Amazon or any of the "Web2" companies nearly all of them started out as techy ideas. Many many very good ideas have been lost on the internet and today this is getting even more pronounced because there is so much there people gravitiate towards "accepted sites" which they feel are authoritive.

You should also check if your idea has been done... its likely it has and it just didn't get a critical mass. If it hasn't got a critical mass then it's unlikely to show up in google. Equally the sucesses today need a lot of start up capital OR the person doing it to be very capable themselves. If you have the capital you can pay consultants but otherwise its up to you.

I don't want to sound too discouraging ... but unless your site is specifically local you need to attract people to the site which means they have to find it... As soon as this is the case you are competing in a world market...and people have certain expectations in this.

As I said in the pm and others here have said the chance of you patenting the idea is slim to non unless you have a outstandingly brilliant idea commercially and have a 5-6 figure sum in reserve or backing for it. Even if you do you need to enforce it... which is equally expensive.

[RiceGuy]

The comments given by gfp are quite appropriate.

I've designed and maintained a number of sites as a profession. The viability can appear deceiving until you attempt to promote and profit by it awhile. Then reality sets in and you find your site lost in a sea of wanna-be successes, few of which actually make it.

And yes, sitting down with the designer would probably be helpful to you. Though having been the designer in such situations, I can tell you that I have usually regretted doing this with the novice site owner. They typically do not know what they actually want/need, and conversations often end with them saying "whatever you think is best" or "it's up to you". I'm also fairy certain you'd be paying quite a bit more for the privilege, unless the person you hire isn't earning a living at it.

Many hosting providers have a standard set of templates which you can use to get some pages and content on your site, but the flexibility to suit specific needs will likely be too limited. From what I've seen, such things are ok for things like blogs, scrapbooks, forums, etc.

A merchant account is usually quite costly for individuals to obtain and maintain. If you do need to automate the fulfillment/processing of sales, I'd suggest using something like PayPal. While it doesn't instill the same level of customer confidence, it's cheap to use, and gets the job done.

[debmidge]

Hi all thanks for the advices. I also know I need insurance on it (slander & libel coverage for those not so nice posts) well the deductible on that coverage alone is $25,000-$50,000. depending on site's rules.

(Rice Guy, I know exactly what I want in the site. No hesitations at all, no willy-nilly from me!)

But alas what I am looking at is too expensive, I need more than my mere "seed" money. So with regrets I have to say I can't do this.

[gfp]

Hi all thanks for the advices. I also know I need insurance on it (slander & libel coverage for those not so nice posts) well the deductible on that coverage alone is $25,000-$50,000. depending on site's rules.

(Rice Guy, I know exactly what I want in the site. No hesitations at all, no willy-nilly from me!)

But alas what I am looking at is too expensive, I need more than my mere "seed" money. So with regrets I have to say I can't do this.

The insurance can be bypassed by hosting it elsewhere.... (ask a lawyer but if you host it in Europe or somewhere then you're probably fine) the real problem is protecting your idea and from the way you don't seem to want to share it you must have a cracking idea??? The real prob is the patent idea just isn't going to work unless you have a lot of seed money..

You can also sell the idea...?? that might be another option...

Like I say I don't wanna be negative but I wouldn't want you to spend money and find this out later...

You can still find a high school kid and give it a try... keep it on a private server at home and you can do this easily for a couple of hundred $ including buying a seperate computer to test the idea...

[Nantzie]

My dad tossed around the idea of getting a few things patented at one time. We were actually lucky enough to get in email contact with someone in the department that was in charge of patent protection at a company that was well-known among inventors as being able to write and protect their patents very well. I can't recall the name of the company right now though.

He said that all a patent really gives you is a lisence to sue if someone trys to steal your idea. He said that they spend a huge amount of money every year just on suing various companies in order to protect their patents.

That being said, it was a company started by one guy who had one idea. So it can be done. It's just a lot more complex than just getting a patent.

That's why sometimes you'll see a neat product, and then two months later there are three others that are almost the same. Some companies just don't bother with protecting their patents. Some don't write their patents very well. Some take an idea from an expired patent. Remember when the Swiffer floor thing came out, and then a couple months later most of the other companies who make cleaning supplies came out with something similar? Yea, that's pretty much what happens. Either it wasn't their original idea (which I believe can't be patented in that case), they didn't write it so it was protected fully, or the legal costs just aren't worth suing everybody.

Just whatever you do, don't contact one of those inventor submission places from the infomercials.

Nancy