This may have been posted somewhere else but, in case not…
I’ve been doing my due-diligence on web hosting companies to get away from “we charge for every little thing” GoDaddy and seem to have found a great solution/option: There’s a referral program for HostGator that is awesome:
Unlike G.D. (which I just cancelled) HG offers free SSL certificates for every domain you host with them. And with the referral link above it’s a no-brainer on the cost savings. At least for me.
The offer looks great, but all what I can offer here is you get what you pay for. With all this cost-cutting hosting services something has to give because it isn’t sustainable! Admittingly there are hosting services out there that price gouge big time!
So the example above… at the moment you get 60% off plus for the first term you get the package for a reduced amount (they don’t indicate how much?) so when I reverse engineer the pricing of the “Baby Plan” say, it becomes $6.32/mth + whatever the first term reduction is - I found a blurb stating that this reduced rate will be displayed in your cPanel after you sign up… wow, that is not transparent!
The also unlimited bandwidth they offer on their shared hosting plans, which is impressive when they compare it to the other ones out there… straight away I’m thinking will some of those big websites that I share my hosting with be gobbling up the bandwidth that I need to run a fast loading website, or is it regulated but just not mentioned? When last was their shared hosting datacenter updated? And the big one is customer care - I would need to check the reviews!
When it comes to hosting there is so much smoke and mirrors that even I get caught out, but having been in the game for a while now I never choose a hosting service based on price, because I know you get what you pay for!
[PS: @producerguyaz, my response is not a put down to what you have found, just my take on it.]
First of all, you must forward your domain’s DNS addresses.
Afterwards, you must enter your ftp username and password in Publish to Web section on Sparkle.
You can get support from Mochahost live chat for DNS forwarding and Ftp user information.
It’s best to host your website outside the U.S. in a country where the U.S. government can’t seize your site or domain or siphon off your network data, wether residing there or not. There is no longer such a thing a freedom or security in the U.S (just ask Apple, Huawei, or Tencent - owner of TikTok and Wechat).
The top five countries are Iceland, Luxembourg, Georgia, Singapore, and Malaysia. Your hoster doesn’t have to be headquartered in these countries, just have a datacenter. The best hosters have multiple data centers and allow the choice of which datacenter should be primary for the website. With multiple data centers, a good hoster will back up a site to its other data center(s) in case the primary location has problems.
As a side note…If you have an app in Apple’s App Store, Apple will host a site for free.
Those are all billion-dollar+ companies that have had serious anti-trust issues filed against them. Nobody using Sparkle or posting to this forum will ever have to concern themselves with such issues. We’re not big enough nor promoting anything illegal to gain attention from any government, US or other.
