Internet Basics: A Domain Name is Like a Ticket Stub
When it's time for the prizes, they stir up all the tickets and
pull one out. And did you win? How can they know for sure?
Simple.
They read that unique number out and you jump! That's how they
know who you are.
In fact, they can find you in the middle of the entire crowd,
and they don't need to know your name, or your face, or anything
about you. As long as you jump up when they call out that unique
number, they can find you. That's one efficient system.
That's what a domain name is like.
A domain name such as mywebsite.com is a unique identifier. Once
you own a domain name, nobody else can. Sure, they can buy
mywebsites.com or miwebsite.com, but not mywebsite.com.
And if anybody anywhere wants to find your site, all they need
to know is that your unique identifier is mywebsite.com. They
type mywebsite.com into their browser and your website jumps up.
The domain name connects people with where your website is
located, even in the middle of all the other websites, and all
because every domain name is unique.
But what if you want to buy the domain name coolstuff.com and
someone else already owns it? Well, you have some options:
•Buy a similar domain name, such as reallycoolstuff.com (if it's
available)
•Buy the coolstuff domain name but with a different extension,
such as coolstuff.org or coolstuff.ca (if they're available)
•Contact the owners of coolstuff.com and see if they'll sell it
to you. To find out who owns a domain name and how you can
contact them, simply type in the domain name at the following
page:
https://secure.registerapi.com/services/whois.php
At the end of the day, a domain name makes it easy to find a
single website amongst all the other websites out there.
And that's why a domain name is like a ticket stub.
Copyright (c) Grant Pasay 2005. All rights reserved. You may
forward this article in its entirety to anyone you wish.
About the author:
Grant Pasay is a writer, musician, moviemaker, and author of the
new eBook, "The Internet Is Like A Refrigerator: And Other Weird
Comparisons That Make it Easy to Understand Everything From AOL
to Zip Files."
Check out Grant's free/brandable ebook at:
http://grantpasay.com/refrigerator/
Check out Grant at: http://grantpasay.com/