My blog’s new home
I just migrated my blog from the free WordPress site to a self-hosted pay service. This blog has been all but abandoned… why would I pay for a new server when the free one did all I need? Short story, I got a new blog & forum. Why move after 18 years with one company? Well, that is a long story…
Long history of my old ‘personal web page’
It starts in 2000/2001. When Bigfoot shut down I needed to find a new email service. Bigfoot was the original email host, so you did not need your service providers email. So, I got my own domain with tons of storage, email, and amazing bandwidth. I moved my personal webpage from GeoCities.
GeoCities was a great service for personal webpages. Kind of a social hangout online. A personal webpage is what we had back in the day, before weblogs. Weblogs were what we called blogs, before the name got shortened to blogs. Blogs were what we used before vlogs.
On my personal webpage I had photo albums, had some game guides for Ultima Online. Ok, Ultima Online was the original MMORG. That is a mega multi-player online role playing game (hi Sunsword and Mr Tact). It was awesome. We could actually play a game with people from all over the world!? Yeah, 1997 was awesome like that.
On my personal webpage I talked about my hobbies (including UO, chain mail jewelry making, HO model trains, travel… I have hobby ADD). Along with the personal webpage the domain allowed me to have my own email addresses, so I could change service providers and not have to change my email address. Someone should invent a service for that.
I stored and shared pictures from my domain as well. Someone should make a service for online storage of files, too (I had some good ideas – I should have marketed them). I shared them to web forums. Ok, a web forum is what we used after Newsgroups but before MySpace.
Ok, MySpace is what we used before Facebook… but I digress…
Ok… I am old… give me a break (and get off my lawn!).
So, after 18 years with the same domain hosting company – I find out they are going out of business. 18 years?! I never had a job that lasted that long, or a house, or a marriage, well 18 years is a long time. Good company, I will miss them. (Infinology)
Having to find a new home for the blog & forum
My personal webpage does not get updated much these days, as you can expect. But if I let the domain go, I will have to get new email addresses. Yeah, I got some gmail accounts, but my old email is used by so many people & companies I dread having to change it with everyone. I’ve had the same email for 18 years, man. Easy enough to get a new host company. I was paying $95 a year for the service.
At the time that was a really cheap price for the storage and bandwidth I had. Later it was an amazing price! Prices increased, then years later prices dropped – a lot. The hardware and memory is cheaper, so they can offer more service for less money. I thought about moving to a cheaper company but Infinology was rock solid, like 99.9999% uptime, so I just stayed with them forever. But they are going out of business… (the price never changed but they kept adding on more & more service)
I looked around at a bunch of companies and ended up with Zettahost. There are a lot of companies but these guys had good reviews, and live chat customer service – before purchasing! A couple other companies I looked at had customer service only after logging in (purchasing). They have a very good free host package, and the pay services are really inexpensive, and full featured. I was paying $95 a year for infinology and for $25 a year I have way more storage, bandwidth, domains, everything.
Moving the blog and making a forum
Which brings me to why I moved my all but neglected blog. I was paying to move my old domain, and Zettahost allows for multiple domains (unlimited for the $25/yr plan). So, why not? I was moving my old domain, really just to keep my old email addresses. It cost me nothing extra to host my own blog. So I setup a new domain (https://titotim.com – you are here now), and migrated my blog from the wordpress.com (free host, but limited).
Now I use the software from wordpress.org. It is still free, but has much more tools & features – you just have to find a host site… which I had. So, yeah short story long, that is why I migrated my blog over here. As a bonus (to me) I got to add a forum to the new blog!
I mostly make videos on YouTube, but will try to keep this page fresh as well. There are “follow” icons on this page for YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook. Please follow me online, and join the community. YouTube is doing well, I am trying to build up my FB page.
Zettahost – great service – very inexpensive
While setting up my domain here with zettahost, I ran into a couple issues… as one does when migrating servers. I put in a couple trouble tickets and the response time was extremely fast. I had no issues with migrating the WordPress site (well, tons of crap, but nothing was the fault of the host ha ha… just wordpress issues). The old domain, with the defunct company took some doing – but these guys got me going! They got me my SSL Certificates very easily and quickly, too.
Good service so far. They do offer a great free package and their pay services are very inexpensive and full featured. I immediately signed up for their $3.99 a month plan (the free service would have done everything I needed). Here are there current prices:
I am including a couple affiliate links below – mostly because I want to see how they look (text only? there should be banners). If you need some good hosting give these guys a try (even the free service!)
Powered by zettahost.runhosting.com
Oh, the post thumbnail picture? That is just a lady hanging out in the Philippines. Nice pic, but has nothing to do with this post ha ha
