Know that you have many choices of hosting services and number companies offering services is growing. Use information in this article as a guide. Don't be afraid to try BCC or free elist hosting services to get a feel for what is involved in owning an ezine. Personally, I've learned so much by going this route. Then as your ezine and ezine knowledge grows, change over to a paid service.

__Use BCC (blind carbon copy) area of your current email program. Never used this feature? If this feature were part of your email program, directions would be in "help" feature of program. By using this feature people won't see who your subscribers are and therefore won't be able to spam your readers. You will know that someone has sent you a message, using BCC, when "to" reads "unlisted recipients.

__Purchase a software program and maintain list yourself. ~~Infacta http://www.infacta.com/gm.asp ~~List of software companies http://list-business.com/list-software/

__Use Majordomo. This is not easiest alternative. Many times subscriptions are rejected because subscriber is using an email program with "HTML" text in message. For more information on this service visit: www.conveyanced.com/MajorCool/ www.google.com/search?q=majordomo

__Download free Common Gateway Interface (CGI) Scripts and use to produce your ezine. These programs usually contain limited capabilities, which is just perfect for many ezine publishers. To find these scripts, go to your favorite search engine, and do a search for free CGI scripts, such as www.bignosebird.com and www.CGI-Resources.com

__Many advertising and marketing companies provide "in-house" ezine services to their clients.

__Use one of free services to keep your elist members confidential. "Free" meaning there is an ad either at top or bottom of each note you send out.

For an ezine publisher it has been an exciting and eventful year. A growing number of budding e-publishers have hopped aboard ezine bandwagon. Just last quarter, sales figures for my ezine creating and publishing tutorial - EZINE LAUNCH - have shot up by over 380%

So what does future hold in store for ezine industry? I gaze into my crystal ball and I see....

1. ... EZINES BECOME MORE COLORFUL, GLITZY, INTERACTIVE .... and HUGE

HTML email newsletters have come of age. Increasingly more ezines are going this route. Subscribers too prefer them to drab, lack-lustre text-only ezines. In coming year we'll see more ezines being published in HTML. But for a different reason.

HTML ezines allow advanced tracking of results from advertising and allow newer and more elaborate forms of marketing. That - more than user preference - will convince publishers to create their ezines in rich text format. Large file sizes will however continue to remain a concern.

2. ... DOUBLE OPT-IN AND PRIVACY ISSUES TAKING PRIORITY

The growing concern about privacy and more aggressive activism against unsolicited bulk commercial emailers will guarantee that all responsible online marketers, especially ezine publishers, will take steps to avoid accusations of spamming. Double opt-in subscription processes will become norm - read my article on it here Privacy policies will become more stringent and will be implemented more seriously.

3. ... MORE EZINES MOVING TO PAYING-SUBSCRIBER MODELS

... but they're continuing to offer free versions too !

It's no longer easy to publish a quality ezine at low cost. Expect to see most content-rich ezines move to a paying-subscriber model. To retain existing subscribers and attract new ones, ezine editors will continue to offer free versions. But they will be 'lite' forms with a little content packaged with a lot of advertising.

4. ... EZINE PUBLISHING SERVICES BECOMING FEE-BASED

The larger free ezine services have merged into behemoths. Soon they'll start charging for their offerings. Topica has made first foray into this arena. Soon others will follow. They will be worth price for busy ezine publishers.

5. ... 'FULL-PACKAGE' EZINE CREATION SERVICES EMERGING