Owning your own domain on the Internet adds panache to your enterprise – imagine having an automated system to respond to e-mail requests for information about your company. Now's a good time to stake a claim on the Net; if someone else registers your dream domain first, you're out of luck.
The usual way to set up your domain is to pay at least a couple of hundred dollars a month to a local service provider for a connection. For many, this is expensive overkill.
A price-competitive and easy alternative is HoloNet's Personal Domain Name Service, a service you can access with just about any computer and modem. This is the first time I've encountered a network where you get to maintain your own domain so inexpensively (US$25 sign-up; $6 monthly fee applied toward your hourly charges; $2 to $11.50 per hour depending on the time of day and the geographic location of the incoming phone call). Your domain can be assigned additional users ($25 each) or can be instructed to accept all messages sent to your domain, regardless of how they are addressed. This useful feature comes in handy when friends want to receive messages at your domain temporarily.
A combination of services, along with the inexpensive pricing, makes HoloNet quite the cool place. While you're on HoloNet checking your mail, you'll also be able to take advantage of an impressive array of Internet services. Also, one of the surprising advantages of HoloNet is the considerable number of access numbers across the country. And HoloNet will tell you whether the domain name you choose has already been taken. Incidentally, anyone with Internet access can register a domain for free by connecting to hostmaster@internic.net.
There are some limitations: Automated response costs extra and you must log on to get your messages – more expensive connections send messages to your system as they come in. When you exhaust the capabilities of this type of setup, you can upgrade to more advanced connections or take your domain with you to another provider. Once it's recorded at the Internet Registry, it's yours forever.
Information Access Technologies Inc.: +1 (510) 704 0160, BBS: vt100, 8N1, +1 (510) 704 1058, e-mail support@holonet.net.
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