my gf has gotten into eBay and is looking for a reliable, very inexpensive (free or almost) host to link pictures to eBay auctions. Only needs a few megs of storage and maybe 500 megs/month transfer (at most!), but most of the free hosts we've found so far don't allow off-site linking because they generate revenue through banner ads.

She was using web1000 until recently when her pictures were not accessable for the last 24 hours of the auction, causing the item to sell much lower than normal.

Any suggestions?

I have DSL and a few spare computers, so if there are no reliable free hosts out there do you think it would be best if I tried to run my own server using the suggestions at http://www.dslwebserver.com ?

Try here: http://www.webhosts4free.com/power-search.php

To be honest though, if its pretty important that the pictures are available at all times then maybe you should consider a paid host because as with your Web1000 experience, free hosts can sometimes be quite sporadic.

Paying for a good host would be just part of the expense of selling at eBay.

surely it's best to find a cheap host ?

so there are no decent free hosts?

http://www.webhosts4free.com is alright, but it doesn't tell me which sites allow off-site linking.

I heard that with Geocities, if you rename the file extension to something like .txt, it'll trick the server into letting you direct-link your images. I don't use Geocities, but several friends have confirmed this for me.

Heavy selling on ebay? You should definately find a good pay host. I haven't had the best experience with free hosts for image hosting. Theres no guarantee it will allow image hosting either.

let's be real

if it's worth uploading, you get what you pay for

free hosts are good and fine, for learners and dabblers .. they do a good job in that area

if however you want reliability and accountability .... you buy it

:) Yeah, that would be your best choice for ebay selling.

Originally posted by Phoenix2k
Heavy selling on ebay? You should definately find a good pay host. I haven't had the best experience with free hosts for image hosting. Theres no guarantee it will allow image hosting either.

Who said heavy? I'm talking 2 or 3 a week, max.

hassi,

I've used ranchoweb (http://www.ranchoweb.com) for posting picts on eBay. It specializes on that. My experiences with them are good. Always fast and reliable. Only bad thing is that they don't offer FTP but their web interface is easy enough to use. :)

Jessica

Doesn't your DSL provider allow you a little bit of Free web space?.. most do.. i suggest contacting your provider and see if they give you any free space..

probably be best. :)

yes, you dialup/DSL provider would probably be the best option for you if don't wish to pay for hosting. Linking from an account to display images elsewhere is named 'leeching'. While perfectly acceptable on a paying account, free providers frown on this a great deal. Before Geocities et.al stopped it being possible I can imagine they lost a ton of money to the practise, with no compensation back for banner views.

Greg Moore

Originally posted by Woser
Doesn't your DSL provider allow you a little bit of Free web space?.. most do.. i suggest contacting your provider and see if they give you any free space..

probably be best. :)

true, but won't bidders be able to find the site by simply right-clicking the images or looking at the source? She'd like to stay anonymous.

www.boomspeed.com allows offsite linking. Many EZBoard members use it for hosting personal icons, etc. I believe the accounts are 1 MB, but you could always create multiple accounts. It's been reliable in my past experiences, and since it's free, it's worth a try.

Jenna

Originally posted by hassi
...

WANTED: Participants of the WHT forums to read the forum rules and post requests for web hosting in the:

Web Hosting Requests Forum

Here, I'll even provide a link:

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/forumdisplay.php?forumid=32

I could never be a moderator, this kind of thing would drive me nuts after a while. :-)

Thanks - Brian

Originally posted by bteeter

WANTED: Participants of the WHT forums to read the forum rules and post requests for web hosting in the:

Correct me if I'm wrong but I was under the impression he was after suggestions from other members on what free hosts could be used. This would mean that anyone can suggest a free host but no-one can advertise their own services (in this forum anyway). Isn't this what the majority of posters to this thread are doing?

Originally posted by Jessicam

I've used ranchoweb (http://www.ranchoweb.com) for posting picts on eBay. It specializes on that. .....
Jessica

Thanks for the link. I just got one of their free 1 meg accounts. I think it will work out great for ebay.

Hassi's comment about remaining anonymous has merit.
It is nice to keep business separate from personal stuff, and folks sometimes use their ISP webspace for family uses. For ebay and selling things online, I have a dedicated email account on yahoo, and now I have dedicated webspace for photolinking on ranchoweb.

Welcome. :) Ranchoweb is very reliable. :)

Jessica

Originally posted by Jim_UK

Correct me if I'm wrong but I was under the impression he was after suggestions from other members on what free hosts could be used. This would mean that anyone can suggest a free host but no-one can advertise their own services (in this forum anyway). Isn't this what the majority of posters to this thread are doing?

You're correct: I am not looking for hosts advertising themselves, I'm looking for suggestions from other members of the forum. Besides, I'm looking for a very cheap if not free host, and few of them would be here to advertise anyway, so this thread definitely belongs here.