Virtually all of these hosts have very easy-to-use utilities to create very nice home pages. They let you edit right from your web browser, add pictures, even include nice things like guestbooks and counters. These utilities are a great place to start.

My advice is to just pick a provider and jump right in. Get your feet wet. Yeah, your first efforts may not be perfect, but you've got to start somewhere. Enjoy yourself and have fun.

If you find after a while that provider that you chose doesn't meet your needs, switch and start over with another one. Until you find a provider that you are happy with (fast, easy-to-use, up most of time) keep you homepage small. Once you find one you are happy with, go to town.

Now spend some time working on it. Do a little every day if you can, or at least a few days a week. Just keep working on it. When you get a version of site that's "done" (all pages finishes, no under construction signs, links working, etc) submit it to search engines (http://www.internet-tips.net/Advertising/searchengines.htm) so other people can enjoy your work. Remember that search engines take a few weeks or months to list your site, so don't expect visitors overnight. Then practice using some of other promotion techniques discussed in "advertising" (http://www.internet-tips.net/Advertising/Advertising.htm).

Now just keep working on your home page. Get as fancy as you like. You'll learn about graphics, HTML, and many other things. You've begun an adventure which has more rewards than you can imagine.

At some point you will begin to push limits of free host/web based homepage editing technology. You will start to get frustrated because something you want to do is difficult or cannot be done at all.

Now is time to begin to learn about new things. Now you will want to learn HTML, perhaps buy a nice HTML editor and go to town. Most likely, by this time you will want to re-create your site anyway, so pick an editor and go for it. If you don't want to do whole thing over, there are techniques to get your site down to your own hard drive (learn about FTP). Perhaps you will need to find a new host - there are hundreds and hundreds of them.

There is an added benefit to doing all of this - you are learning skills which will be of use throughout rest of your life. This will be useful in many jobs, and if you become good enough, perhaps you will have found yourself a possible new career. At very least, you may make some new friends and have a great adventure.

It's better than sitting at home watching television, isn't it?

There are many businesses that can use streaming video to their advantage. Companies that sell training materials are most obvious. Because streaming media can be played upon demand, employees and/or customers can view materials when they have time to concentrate on content. This is a valuable selling tool, especially if your customer has employees in remote locations. Your encoding company can also set up your materials to be password protected; this is especially attractive to corporations who would like to use Internet for internal communications.

Streaming video is also an excellent choice for product demonstrations, especially when product's features are difficult to explain using only text or still pictures. Caterers and restaurants can give potential customers tours of their facilities or show clips of some of their "special events" such as weddings. Hotels can show corporate accounts their meeting rooms, accommodations, and leisure-time facilities. Country clubs can take new members to golf course or have them take lessons from golf pro. Health clubs can show-off their gym facilities and amenities in locker rooms. Realtors can take interested buyers, especially those in cities far away, on a tour of town in which a property is located. Universities could showcase their laboratories, their libraries, or their dormitory facilities. The list could go on and on...

I hope that in these three articles I've whetted your interest in utilizing streaming media to enhance your web site. Just remember following: 1. Find a company that is reputable and understands what you are trying to accomplish at your web site. (For a list of companies that are members of RealNetworks Design and Production Agencies, see: http://real.com/devzone/solutions/design). 2. Be certain that samples of their own work meet your criteria for professionalism. (Warning: if a video pauses during playback, this is not fault of producer or of video stream. It could be net congestion or a heavy amount of traffic on site!) 3. Do not judge on price alone! Turnaround time, hosting capabilities, and technical knowledge have associated costs that are often overlooked.

Streaming media is affordable, enjoyable, and is only going to grow in importance to those of us doing business on web. Enhance your web site, your business, and profits at your bottom line with streaming media...it's a sound business decision.