Emptybottle.org

This is kind of an odd thing to post about, for me, but I'm all about the sharin' and the carin'. If you want or need a new webhost, one with a good reputation, and want to pay $9.24 for an entire year, including a free domain registration, read on.

About a year back, I begged for a few bucks from you, friends and neighbours, so I could pony up for another year of hosting, and was overwhelmed with your kindness. The fee was about US$180 for the year, which my friend Allan (as a reseller) generously dropped down to $150. Once I'd sorted out the Paypal stupidity -- if I had a credit card, I'd use it! -- which made me inconvenience Allan enormously, forcing him to wait months for the cash, all went swimmingly, and the few bucks left over I saved to use for the next year.

But this year I've found a pretty amazing deal at Dreamhost. I'm going to cut over to them soonish, and I want to share my good fortune with you (with apologies to Allan, but I'm sure he'll understand). On the 'Crazy Insane Domain' plan, you get

• 2400 MBDisk Storage
• 120 GB Monthly Bandwidth
• Unlimited MySQL Databases
• 600 E-Mail Accounts (POP / IMAP)
• 75 Shell / FTP Accounts
• 1 Free Domain Registration
• 3 Domains hosted
• 15 subdomains hosted
• unlimited domain forwarding

and all the other usual good stuff that most good hosts offer these days, of course. These numbers blow away anything I've seen elsewhere, and they throw in a free domain registration for you (which stays free forever, if you continue hosting with them)! It was easier to set up the latest version of Movable Type than I've ever had it before. Flawless, first time, no tweaks necessary.

But this is where it gets good. The normal 1-year prepayment price for this is $9.95 a month, no set-up fee. That's about $120 for the year, which ain't bad.

If you enter this 7-year birthday code -- 777 -- in the Promo Code, then hit update, you'll get the same huge hosting deal, which at $120 would be much cheaper than I paid last year (for a less kick-ass service), for $9.24.

Yep, $10 for a domain and some stonkin' hosting, for a full year. Their support has been miles better than what I was accustomed to at my old host as well, and though they don't use the popular CPanel as their admin interface, I actually like their toolset better.

If you go for it, I have one request. If you sign up (and I've just gotten my drinking buddy J signed up) please please use the ID stavrosthewonderchicken when it asks you for a referral, and I'll get a bit o'cash that will help the 'bottle (and my other upcoming projects) stay on the web for years to come, without having the 'bottle get all weird and lucre-besmirched again.

(Because I signed up with the promo code as well, I might not actually get referrer money, which is fine if true, but it's worth a try. Either way, you guys get a hell of a hosting deal, and, like I said, I'm all about the sharin' and the carin'...)

[Update : apparently the '777' deal ends on February 28 2005, so if you're going to go for it, this week is the last chance.]