Well folks, here we are, five months after having arrived back to Dublin and to be perfectly honest I’m starting to think about what will come next already. I’ve been keeping my head down and getting on with work basically from the moment I arrived back and although things are going as well as I could hope in that area of my life, I can’t help but imagine myself moving on before either A. I get lazy and sit on my laurels for several years for the sake of comfort (if this ever happens I’m sure I’ll wake up one morning and completely flip), or B. I develop a drinking habit that can only be maintained in Ireland because anywhere else it would be considered alcoholism and I’d be expected to seek help. So now, all that remains is to decide what the hell it is exactly that I’d like to do. Sure, no problem.

What you have here is a scene that I have the pleasure of passing every day on my way to work. Quite ugly I know, but that’s what we like to call the ‘charm’ of Dublin. There’s actually quite a lot of that around here, mainly in the form of overturned cars in rivers, bicycles being stolen, buildings going on fire and of course the mindless violence of the delinquent local kids. Now you might say that those things don’t seem too charming but don’t fret, where other countries see serious social issues we see what really counts in defining a cities image - attitude, and plenty of it. Welcome to Dublin.

Is there anyone that can explain to me why the state of broadband in Ireland is so abymsal? In recent weeks I moved in to a new place that’s a stone’s throw from Dublin city centre. One of the first things I wanted to do was to get a decent internet connection for a reasonable price. As complicated as that sounds, I had hoped and nearly expected that it wouldn’t be much hassle to organise. How wrong I was.

The first obvious choice is the national telecoms provider, Eircom, but since they are intent on ripping customers off with an exaggerated line-rental fee on top of the monthly broadband charge I’ve decided to avoid them on principal. Unfortunately, the majority of other providers piggy-back on their lines so if you want another service you’ll still end up forking over the monthly line rental. The alternative, I thought, was NTL with their connection through the TV cable. Being just about a kilometer from their offices I thought they’d be on the ball but after giving them a call I found out that not only can I not get a web connection, but they can’t even provide me with cable TV.

One alternative comes in the form of those wireless router things that pick up the signal from a transmitter at the end of your street, but apart from the fact that they tend to be a load of crap, the area I’m in doesn’t pick up a good signal, rendering that option a complete waste of money.

And so I’m in a pickle, how can I possibly set up a good quality internet connection at home without having to pay disgracefully inflated rates? Any suggestions? I’ll be in the pub.

Trying to find some decent information about web-hosting is a bit like asking victims of a car crash what happened - everyone will have their own particular view thanks to a little thing called vested interest. It’s bloody difficult to get a straight answer on anything and if you do, then you should be extra-cautious as you go forward. What it comes down to is that there are many solutions and if you want to sum it up in one sentence, it would go something like this: “You get what you pay for“.

Now all that’s left is to decide why you want a web-hosting plan and how serious you are about making use of it. You could go for a free hosting plan, with which you get plenty of ads, no scripting or database support and a slow loading speed. As bad as it sounds, this would probably work for complete beginners who want to experiment a bit and will more than likely abandon their sites within a few weeks.

Shared hosting is the serious but non-profit option. It’s ideal for a personal site like this which won’t have big numbers of visitors and which don’t particularly need to be secure. There are tons of different providers out there and finding the right one could prove to be easier said than done. After checking out whats on offer and also getting a satisfied customer’s recommendation I reckon I’ll be going with Bluehost in the near future so I can stop piggybacking on the space that I’m using now! From what I’ve seen, they aren’t so big that you’re just another number and they’re not so small that they might just disappear tomorrow.

Finally, dedicated hosting is for hard-core users who want complete control, reliability and security. That generally means businesses, so unless you’re setting out to build a money-making empire, you’ll probably want the more reasonably priced shared option.