Below is some information on how to get your personal webpage online--free.

There are a couple of ways to build a website online for free. The first way is to sign up with an internet service provider that gives its clients free web space. To find out how this is done, you will have to contact your provider. If you work for a company, there is also a chance you may get free webspace through that.

However, if you do not wish to use or do not have access to a webspace provider such as this, there are several online webspace providers that will give you several megabites of space at no charge. As a bonus, you can usually build your webpages directly on the provider's website, instead of building it on your computer and then uploading it to your provider's server. On the downside, however, most online webspace providers place the banners or logos of various online companies on your website. (The rental of the advertising space allows them to make enough money to keep up the webspace service.) Also, some insist that you use HTML editors to put up your website, (instead of giving you space to write your pages in HTML), or do not allow you to upload images. Some also assign very lengthy and hard-to-remember URL's to your page.

When I first started creating my own webpages, I posted my site online via our internet service provider, which gave us five megabites of space, a long URL, and some very complicated uploading software we had to figure out how to use all by ourselves. After a few months of this, I discovered the world of online webspace providers and signed up for Tripod, which I have used ever since (with a brief period of a few months when I tried using Crosswinds, (which gave you an infinite amount of space and no banners, but was very slow and was often down altogether. It was also free back then.) I like Tripod because it allows you to write your pages in HTML, offers you fifty megabites of space, and its website is easy to navigate and understand. Among the other services it provides (though I don't use them), it also has a high-tech--though very limiting--HTML editor, a basic .GIF image editor, and a program for putting a photo album online.

A few other online webspace providers include Geocities, The Site Fights Communities, and Angelfire. You can sign up at any of the websites mentioned by clicking on the links, which will take you to the site's homepage.

Before continuing on with the HTML tutorials, I suggest you sign up for a webspace provider and start a new HTML page. (If you're using Tripod, this would be the "Freeform HTML editor".) If you don't want to sign up for a webspace provider yet or your provider asks you to upload your pages to their server, open a file in a simple word processor such as Notepad, which comes with (I believe) any form of Microsoft Windows.

Then click "next" below.