I was one of the lucky ones. I found freenetname by accident whilst surfing at work, and as soon as I got home, I immediately registered www.bruleo.co.uk with them.

At first I was very sceptical about a company offering free domain name registration, especially as many others (at the time) were charging rather a lot.

With freenetname you 'own' the domain name that you have registered: Indeed, I received my official certificate of ownership some 12 months after registering, although the small print says that they reserve the right to charge in the future. I did make the mistake of registering bruleo.com free with another (American) company and have since found that they retain ownership and now they are asking monthly charges for my continued use of it, so that is one I have lost.

Unfortunately freenetname have now withdrawn this offer, reasoning that they have reached full capacity. At least they didn't do what a lot of other ISP's did and allow over-subscription. I do hope that they manage to upgrade and allow more subscriptions in the future. Afterall, what good is a company name such as freenetname, that doesn't offer free net names?!

I have now been with freenetname for around 18 months and as a secondary ISP, I have never had a problem with them. Their connection is second to none with fast transfers and reasonable content on their homepage. The call always connects first time and I have never been disconnected half way through. The content includes a full HTML tutorial which was my starting point in the world of web creation and I found it incredibly useful. With the domain name, they can, if you wish, provide a guestbook facility to use on your site. There are also suggestions and links to other software that would help you on the road to creating your site.

There are a few drawbacks. You can only access your mail or update your website via their 0845 (local-call rates) number. They offer no we
bmail facility and only allow you to register just one dot co dot uk domain. The local call charges are obviously how they gain some of their revenue, so I suppose these few drawbacks can be excused.

Freenetname do now offer business upgrades and I think that this is an area where they will continually concentrate. I just hope that they do not neglect their personal users as so many other companies on the internet seem to be doing these days.

All in all, Freenetname administers a great service and I have a lot to thank them for.