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The DMCA is an abbreviation for the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which was signed into law in 1998.  Now the big reason most people do no like this law is because it put in place questionable laws about circumnavigating copyright protection for personal backup use or the overall vagueness of the law in general.  However, that really has nothing to do with web hosting – so I will not be discussing this issue today.  The issue we will be talking about is the way the law made it easier for copyright holders to get stolen material off a website that doesn’t have the right to distribute it.

Are Web Hosts Protected in DMCA Cases?

What you might not know is that the DMCA has built in protection for web hosts, so they can not be held liable if a client is hosting a website breaking the DMCA.  In exchange, the web host has to promptly remove or block access to the content in question.

What Are DMCA Take-down Notices

If you go from web host to web host, you will see the pages detailing how they deal with the DMCA and DMCA take-down notices are very similar.  They will often ask for these details:

• The signature of the person claiming their copyrighted material was stolen
• Links or details about the copyrighted material that have been used elsewhere
• Your address, phone number and other contact details
• A statement by you that the copyrighted material is yours, and you wish for it to be taken down

Most of the time, in small claim situations, that is enough to get the infringed content off the website in question and you can go along your merry way.  However, sometimes this will lead into a legal battle between the two parties (especially when the copyright of the material is not clear) but at that point you need to really be talking to a lawyer, and not to me.

I hope that helps to explain what the Digital Millennium Copyright is and how it pertains to web hosting companies.

Want More? – Check out the rest of the DMCA conversation in Podcast 210!

Hello citizens of the web hosting world!  I know as of late updates have been few and far between, but I come with good news.  Rather than saying there will still be at least another week with no new podcast, I will say new podcasts will go back in production in May (next month, for those of you without a calendar handy). 

I have a few personal and career situations to be worked out first, and in the long run this will be good news for one and all, because I am going back to spending more time with all my great, wonderful listeners right here.

So, with that said if you have any podcast suggestions or questions you would like for me to answer on the show, please be sure to use the Submit Your Questions form on WebHostingShow.com and also make sure you are subscribing to the RSS feed so you never miss a week’s episode.  It is free to do, easy to do and most of all important to do if you want to get all the great web hosting and web development related tips, tutorials and more that are featured here every day.

Thank you all for your continue support, and you will be hearing more from me (yes, very literal pun) next month.

Anybody who has worked in technical support for a web hosting company will tell you that keeping all your tasks and windows organized on a day-to-day work schedule is very hectic and not a lot of fun.  You have to keep this window open to check out help desk tickets, you have to look over here for forum replies, you have to go way over there to look at the recent tweets coming in from web hosting customers.  It is enough to drive a person insane, unless you follow these simple organizational tips.

Divide Your Tasks, then Conquer Your Tasks

Most people multitask online by opening one Internet browser with multiple tabs.  While this comes in handy, your tabs can become overwhelming very quickly.  Rather than opening up one Internet browser with multiple tabs, I want you to open multiple browsers, with fewer tabs.  Look at your daily responsibilities and divide your running Internet browser windows up by that.

For example, if you are responsible for feedback inside the web hosting company you work for, one Internet browser could be dedicated to that. You would open up the feedback help desk, the forums for the web hosting business you work for, their Twitter account perhaps, and so on and so forth.  The next Internet browser window you could dedicate to another responsibility, such as support.  Inside there, you could load up the customer records in one tab, the help desk in another tab, and your quick replies in a third tab.   As you can see – you start to organize your work differently.  You organize it by the jobs you need to do instead of dumping everything into one single Internet browser.

Once you have mastered this web hosting help organizational technique, you will find yourself working faster and jumping between each task you are responsible for even faster than you were before.  Your supervisor will thank you, the customers will appreciate you, and all it takes is a little time and organizational skill.

Like This Article? Listen to it and more like it on podcast #200 of the Web Hosting Show!

However, many people might still be confused on how to get started with WordPress, so I thought it would be a good idea to go through the steps with you, to make you feel more at home with the process.

How to Install WordPress on Your Hosting Account

The first step would be to download and unzip the WordPress package to your computer.  I often like to put it on my desktop, as I use that as a workspace for all my various projects.

Setup the MySQL Details

Next, you will login to your web hosting control panel and create a MySQL database user, a MySQL database, and then assign that MySQL user to the MySQL database in question.  Various web hosts and various control panels will have different ways to get this done.  My advice would be to check with your web host, if you are unsure how to do so.

Now, open up that WordPress folder you saved earlier, and rename the file wp-config-sample.php to just wp-config.php.  Open the wp-config.php file, and fill in your database details (the database name, user name and the password assigned to the user).

Important: Never use a word processor like Microsoft Word for editing WordPress files! You need to user a simple text editor, such as Notepad.

Upload WordPress to the Hosting Server

After you have saved the wp-config.php file with all the settings it needs to use to connect, it is time to upload the WordPress files to their new home.

• If you want WordPress to show up under your main domain, be sure to upload all of the files into your public_html folder.
• If you want WordPress to show up under a folder (such as /blog/), be sure to upload all the files into a folder located in /public_html/blog/. I’m simply using “blog” as an example.  You could name the folder whatever you want to name it.

Last, but not least, run the WordPress install script by going to yourdomain.com/wp-admin/install.php, or if you installed it into it’s own folder, go to yourdomain.com/blog/wp-admin/install.php. Remember that “yourdomain.com” and “blog” are just examples here, be sure to change them to fit your own web site preferences.

Now simply follow the on-screen instructions and you are all set!  I hope this tutorial comes in handy the next time you install WordPress on your own web hosting space.

Like This Article? Listen to it and more like it on podcast #200 of the Web Hosting Show!

Since I now have 200 podcasts under my belt, and with a new year coming up quick, I thought now would be the perfect time to introduce to you my new project.  I want to help you with marketing.

Mitch Does Marketing!

Now, I will not create a new podcast or a blog.  Instead I am going back to my roots, and diving back into producing another book – shades of the long forgotten Lockergnome’s Guide to Web Hosting, which was the inspiration for this podcast four years ago.

So what can you expect? I’m not really sure just yet, other than I am looking to offer to the public at large tutorials, tips and advice on how to market your web site or online business, with as little cost to you as possible.  Think of it as a good ol’ southern boy’s guide to marketing.

As soon as I have more information on the project, I’ll be sure to share it with you here.  I hope it is as successful as my other projects are, and that most of all, you will get plenty of use out of it.

Like This Article? Listen to it and more like it on podcast #200 of the Web Hosting Show!

You do not have to drastically change the way you do business though.  If you are successful in one area of business, do not toss it aside to do something else that is more popular.  I got a question submitted to me the other day from Matt, which touches on this very topic.

Here is what Matt had to say:

I run a free hosting site, and I’ve been at it for 4 years, and we’ve got very high rating, and uptime, and server speed, but I’ve still got this problem where everyone expects our service to be a sort of scam or not very good because of the price. If I start charging for it, I have to say goodbye to a lot of people who I’ve been helping for a long time, and if I don’t, it seems to me there’s always this group of people who wont choose it. I mean, if you want to pay money for your hosting, I’ll gladly take donations, and I have many people who do donate. If you have time, because I know you’re very busy, could you give me your honest opinion of our service and what we need to do to appeal more to small businesses and community organizations?

How can a free host become successful?

People are always skeptical when it comes to getting something for nothing, so as long as you give free services – you’ll always have somebody out there dismissing your claims of success because they think you’re a fraud.  Thankfully, they might also think we never landed on the moon or one of the muppets assassinated JFK.  The fact of the matter is there will always be somebody out there to complain.

My question is, do you have to pick one business plan, free hosting versus paid hosting, or can you have your cake and eat it too?  I would suggest you keep your free hosting in place, it sounds successful, and you have happy customers – which is something many web hosts, free or not, can not claim.  As a secondary service, roll out a paid hosting solution that offers a few perks over the free version.  It could be in features, support or anything else you feel like you could offer a little more of to the people willing to pay for it. Then, once that is in place, start marketing your new paid hosting service to those customers you do have, and let them know that it is an option you are providing for them.

Some might bite at the proverbial worm you are tossing out there, and others may say no thanks.  Past that point you can sell your new paid hosting option to the masses using the free service as a way to get your foot in the door, as far as seeing how great your hosting setup is.  You might even sell it as you are so confident they will enjoy their hosting with you, you are willing to give it away for free.

Thanks to Matt for the question, and to check out his web site – or maybe send some more suggestions his way, be sure to check out ismywebsite.com.

Like This Article? Listen to it and more like it on podcast #200 of the Web Hosting Show!

Download the Web Hosting Show, Episode 200!
Running Time: 15 minutes | File Size: 6.53 MB

Here are just a few topics from this week’s episode:

• Maximize Work Space with More Browsers – Learn how to simply reorganize your customer support responsibilities, to get more work done in less time.
• How Anybody Can Install WordPress – I am here to help you get WordPress installed for the very first time.  With WordPress 2.9 out this week, figured it would be a good time to reintroduce you to this great content management system.
• Mitch Launches a New Top Secret Project – In celebration of podcast number 200, I wanted you to be the first ones to learn about my new top secret project I have started production on.  Hear it here first!
• How to Turn a Complaint into a Feature - We help Matt take complaints about his free hosting business, and turn those complaints into a brand new feature to his online business.

Starting this episode, I am going to also give you one quick tip on each podcast to help you out with your web hosting ways.  Keep an ear out for them on each podcast from here on out.

Quick Tip #1 – Keep your domain name registrations and web hosting accounts separate.  This way if your business relationship fall through with one, it won’t effect the other.

Do me a favor and help thank our sponsor! Via Twitter, tweet to @LayeredTech thanks for supporting webhostingshow.com

Hope you enjoy the podcast.  If you do, drop in a comment and let me know or drop me an e-mail at mitch@mitchkeeler.com.  If you want to ask your own question on the podcast, it’s an easy thing to do – just go to the submit a question page, send me your inquest and I will be happy to help on next week’s podcast (plus give your web site a free plug!).

How would you like to drive down town and pick up a web hosting account?

The web host Slamdot hopes you’d very much like the idea of doing that.  They announced they will begin selling professionally designed web site packages very soon through a retail store.  The first store will be open in Knoxville, Tennesee offering web site design packages, support,  and in-store training.

Other specialty stores like this, such as the Apple stores across the nation have done very well because they not only give a local and familiar face to the product, but they also create a different sense of community that you can not give online. Dropping an e-mail to a support team is very different than walking into a store and asking for help.

This is the type of new, innovative, out-of-the-box idea I really like to see, and I wish them the best of luck.

To learn more about Slamdot, be sure to go check them out at Slamdot.com.

Like This Article? Listen to it and more like it on podcast #199 of the Web Hosting Show!