I see a lot of posts at phpbb.com. In my role as a moderator I’m assigned to a few specific forums, but when I have time I spend time in other areas as well. One of the more popular posts recently has been how to add to a board. That’s not a problem… except when the person posting the question is using one of the many “free” phpBB hosts that have popped up over the past several years.

I blame Google. Why? Read on to find out.

Why would anyone bother to set up an environment where they give away the hosting for free? What do they possibly have to gain? Simple… many of these sites that offer free phpBB hosting do so because they get revenue from Google Adsense or other context / time-sharing advertising programs. In order to do that they have to control the format and presentation of their hosted forums. This generally means you have a limited number of templates or styles to select from, and you are prevented from making any specific changes that you might request. So there’s the first cost of a free host: limited options for presentation and styling.

They must also tightly control the code that is executed on their servers, therefore they do not allow ftp access. And you can certainly forget ssh or other shell access. There’s the second cost of a free host: extremely limited access.

These are both costs that many folks are willing to deal with. That certainly appears to be the case, given the popularity of some of the free phpBB hosts that I’ve looked at. But there is another hidden cost as well.

Many free phpBB hosting providers do not allow you to get a backup of your forum database. For one thing you may be sharing a database with other folks, with no easy way to extract your specific information. But I believe the true reason is that free hosts are not charities, as mentioned they are in the business of making money. They make more money off of successful forums as they will generate more page impressions and theoretically more advertising revenues.

So what happens if / when you start a board at a free host, and it gets popular? You might decide that you want to leave, but they don’t want you to go. They’re going to make it as difficult as possible. Some hosts charge for backups; some don’t allow it at all. So that, to me, is the worst “cost” of a free host. If you can’t get a backup of your forum database, then you either have to stay where you are or start over from scratch. The final cost (and most onerous) is lack of access to your data. Feel free to hum along as I sing the final verse of the Eagle’s song “Hotel California”:

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
’relax,’ said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
But you can never leave!

In my opinion, if you’re going to start a web site (with or without a phpBB board as a component) it’s worth getting a real host. You can find hosting packages for a couple of dollars a month. That’s a known cost, and one that you can plan for. If you start on a free host, be prepared to encounter plenty of hidden costs that you might not be able to plan around. Between the limitations on presentation, access, and inability to obtain backup files… trust me, a free host is anything but free.

This, like all of my posts, is just my opinion.