Primary Considerations
Domain Name
What's a Domain Name?
The Domain Name is the MyCompanyDomainName part of the url (Internet address) http://www.MyCompanyDomainName.com or the email address a.User@MyCompanyName.com
This name is registered as a legal document for you. The name is registered at the internic (or nominet for uk domains) and also needs to be name-hosted in a DNS account. Asperto.Net can set this up for you at an annual fee of a few £.
Domain Name: The Human-Readable Name
The Domain Name defines a human-readable pointer to the address your website occupies on the worldwide web. Web Servers (where your web-space resides) have numerical addresses. The DNS allows a cross-reference between that numerical address and a human-understandable address.
Why is the Domain Name so important?
It defines how your company is presented to the world. It provides a way of any Internet user locating your company. Care must be taken to secure your company name as a domain name - or spoofer sites could appear that purport to represent you or otherwise steal your company identity.
It is an important company document and should not be treated casually.
What is Domain Hosting?
Domain Name Hosting provides a kind of 'auto-switchboard' to listen for requests coming from www browsers asking for the name. When the name server receives a packet addressed to the domain, it passes the www traffic to the web server, and any mail traffic to the mail server. These servers may be physically anywhere on the Internet - not necessarily on the servers provided by thedomain name host. (Domain Name Hosting is not the same as Website hosting, although on small sites these two distinct items can both be hosted on the same account.)
Domain Name Ownership and Control
It is very important to own the domain name, control the Domain Name Registration account. It is vital to to place the website that the domain name points to on webspace to which your company owns the rights.
The Domain Name defines the address your website occupies on the worldwide web.
The domain name is constant and allows your company to change Internet Connection Provider (ISP) without losing your identity.
It is the address-base of your email system MyEmailAccountName@MyCompanyDomainName.com
Of course there are the TLD Top-Level-Domains like .com, .org, .net (and so on), and the national country TLDs like .uk.
Avoid Identity Theft!
Register the set of names:
If you have a worthwhile business your company should register all the main domains, otherwise junk sites can register the ones you leave for them and this can cause confusion. (Try Sportscotland.com. or sportscotland.org. These are spoof sites and the official site is Sportscotland.org.uk ).
Don't become someone else's subdomain!
Ensure that your people do not give away your company's identity by becoming a Sub-Domain of another organisation.
Example of how not to do it:
Here is a graphic example:
www.ClubsportEdinburgh.org (Click the link. You'll see it ends up on another site). Note how the sport organisation is subsumed into another organisation's domain name, site and jurisdiction!
The sport organisation now has a parent (parasitic) site that makes surreptitious click-thru banner profit generated by users of the the sport organisation site they have subsumed. There is no telling where these Adword links lead. (http://www.leaguelineup.com/welcome.asp?url=clubsportedinburgh). The parasitic site preys upon the victim site by putting uncontrolled Adword advertising lines in front of the user's face.
Who pays for this "free site" the sports organisation are so proud of obtaining? Yes, you are right. the exploited clubsport customer pays by being tempted off to yet another site to set up their own "Free" (It is only free if you accept the adverts) site.
How to solve the Domain Name Difficulties?
You can speak to David Cuthill of Asperto.Net about the best way to manage domain name registration.
Hosted:
Your Hosting Space:
Unless your organisation is an ISP or Hosting Company itself, you will need to rent hosting space in a server that is connected to the Internet such that it can cope with the demand for page requests from the world.
- Where is your webspace physically located? Is it secure, reliable, portable to another hosting company?
- Is it in the European Area? If not, is it in a country that has Data Protection regulations that are acceptable.
Asperto.Net provides hosting services from USA-Based Web-Farms (As does BT).
Asperto.Net can set up UK-Based shared or Dedicated hardware systems for your webspace at very competitive pricing, or can work to construct your foundations on your own hosting account (Windows Webserver and SQL Server).
Speak to David Cuthill of Asperto.Net about the hosting options available for your Web Space.
Control of your company data.
Data Protection Act
Your organisation is the Data Controller for your company data, and you must show that you have control of your data either directly, or via an auditable data processor agent such as Asperto.Net.