Once you've decided on a name (and found that it is available) for your website you will need to register it. The intenet is based on a non centralised system of directories called name servers that direct a users browser to the correct address for a website based on it's name, or URL such as http://www.cyberneur.com.  These names are aliased to a set of unique numbers, called the IP (internet  protocol) address, made up of four sets of 3 digits such as 70.86.77.165 (which is the unique number for Cyberneur.com). When you register the name of your internet site it will be assigned to a set of these numbers. Initially these will be numbers provided by the service you register with. I personally have always used NetworkSolutions for this as they have been around a while and have good administration tools. 

Usually, these registration companies will provide you with some free web space when you register so that you can set up a basic web site.  However, if you want more sophisitcated facilities such as the ability to use a database or develop your own software you will probably find you need to utilise another company to host your site.

If this is the case then most registration companies will provide you the ability to change the name server that your site is pointing at. For example, if you use network solutions the default name server will be something like ns1.networksolutions.com, and this name server will be responsible for providing the ip address for your website. This name server can be easily changed though to point at a different one.

Your next decision is whether or not to host your site on a 'shared' or 'dedicated' server.  There are advantages and drawbacks of each: With a shared server, you will as the name implies be sharing the machine with other web sites (often a lot of them). This can obviously cause performance issues with your site if one of the other sites on the same machine becomes particularly busy. You will also usually be restricted on what you can put on to the server in order to protect others from rogue software. On the plus side you will not need to worry about the administration headaches associated with keeping the server running, and many services will also provide backup facilities for you.

The other option is a dedicated server. Usually the hosting service will ensure the physical hardware is always available and connected, and reboot the machine if required. However, apart from that the server is yours. You will have full control and be able to install any software that you want, as well as add hard disks and memory as required. The main decision when selecting a dedicated server will be the operating system, whether to use Windows or a flavour of Unix/Linux.

Your choice between the two will be determined by the amount of control you need over your website, the costs, what software you are intending to run, and what sort of services you need by way of databases, content management systems email etc. 

It is also worth noting that you will usually be better off hosting any website from the US. Even if your website is only targeted at the UK for example it will still run quicker on an end users browser if the site is in the US. This is because the biggest and fastest internet pipelines tend to run to the US from all the major backbones in Europe.

At Cyberneur we run on dedicated servers in order to provide us with the most flexibility and scalability. It also provides benefits as we develop more sites by being able to leverage the technologies produced for one, such as content management, banner advertising and email services.

For our servers we use Hostgator as our hosting service in the US who we have found to be very responsive and offer fantastic support.  Another service that has been highly recommended to me is Godaddy for both domain registration and hosting.