Determining Web Design Prices: Early IT Development for Career Development

Web design prices for blogs can be incredibly cheap depending on which designer you choose.  However some of the best ones can also be ridiculously expensive but if you have the time it’s something that most of us can do to a reasonable level.  Even if you think you don’t need a website, it’s worth encouraging your children to explore this interest.  If you want to improve their IT skills then this is something you need to consider.  Designing, setting up and running your own website can save you money but also allows you to develop useful skills.  After all, the world is slowly being run by computers so it is important for teenagers to develop IT skills early and one of the best ways to do this is to set up their own blog or website.

You may be surprised to find your children already have some sort of online presence.  Many teenagers will have social media pages, some will even have YouTube or TikTok channels.  Setting up a website or blog is just the next step, where they can improve those skills and expand on them. You can even use the two to complement each other, most successful websites will have a corresponding social media page and vice versa.

The Early Obstacles

At first, people get enthusiastic with the low initial costs. The common cost for a domain name these days is roughly $10. Upon seeing such prices most teenagers feel confident to pursue this endeavour only to start hitting one wall after another. First they’ll stumble upon the costs for yearly hosting, which can reach up to $200. Unless they have a part time job they won’t be able to sustain that except if they opt for blogging platforms with free hosting.

There are options to lower these costs though, you can even find some free hosting options like WordPress and Blogger although they do come with some limitations.  The important thing to remember that you can upgrade and switch options like this if your site requires it.  At  the beginning though, the cheapest, simplest option is usually sufficient for most needs.

If you want something specific and technical you may not find a WordPress option that works, but it’s fairly unusual.  A more technical site that provides some sort of direct interface like web scraping for things like finding hotels or even fast proxies may need something coding from scratch.

The Big Hurdle

The real issue though is with the web design prices. Even for a simple blog the base web design prices could cost at least a few hundred dollars. That is for a static website with no logo design, Flash integration, and special plug-ins. That might sound like a lot, especially for young teenagers just eager to get started, but there are ways around it.

Teenagers can instead work with free platforms like WordPress. These platforms will still require some work to get the most out of them, especially with minor upgrades and some design customization, but they are the cheapest a teenager can afford.  There’s no problem using platforms like these though, some of the world’s biggest sites are also built on top of a Content Management system (CMS) like WordPress.

Easier, Affordable Solutions

As mentioned above, teens need to get acquainted with the online world as soon as possible. With pretty much every business nowadays already focusing on online business models, it is a good idea to introduce basic web design and blogging. Web design prices might be a bit too high for a young teen but there are things you can do to keep the costs low.

What’s great about building using something like WordPress is that the basics are really taken care for you.  You can literally design and make live a web site in under an hour. Creating something visible online reasonably quickly is important for encouraging young people.  There’s limitless opportunities for improving a site but a basic WordPress install with a simple theme should look pretty good straight away.   Encouragement early on will pay dividends and drag them away from YouTube or watching TV online all day !

Why People Mask their IP Addresses in 2021

Everything you do online is based on one important piece of information, your IP address.  This is your number on the internet and at any one point in time is unique to you and you alone.  The full name is Internet Protocol address and you’ve probably seen this series of numbers like 192.1.1.1.  In fact every single device, every laptop, phone or tablet has an IP address when it’s connected to the internet.

The address is used by lots of people online in a variety of ways.  In places like China and Iran, your IP address might lead to a knock on the door by the police if you post the wrong thing online.  In any country, what do you online can be traced back to your computer using this address.  Logs are stored all across the internet in the memory of routers, at your ISP or the logs of the web sites you visit – all of them contain your unique IP address.

Of course unless you live in a place like Iran and are not some sort of cyber criminal – then perhaps this is not a concern for you.   Many people of course are concerned by this lack of privacy and even people in democratic nations are concerned about the lack of privacy there is online.  These people and of course those with something to hide will generally use proxy servers to hide behind a fake ip and keep in the shadows.

Other people will use these servers to hide their IP address for other reasons.  Sometimes web sites block access to people outside a specific country.  Take for example popular media site like Hulu, will only allow access to their site if you have an American IP address.  Many videos uploaded on YouTube are only accessible from specific locations again based on the IP address you are using.  Another popular example is the BBC who have one of the best media and TV sites in the world, again restricted by location.  Although millions do use a VPN to watch the BBC despite their efforts to block access.

In reality a whole host of people are learning about and using VPNs and proxy servers for a wide variety of reasons.  It’s not just hackers and dissident protesting against despotic regimes.  It’s also worth investigating this area if you’re running any sort of online business as multiple IP addresses may be useful for market research and promoting your web sites.

Although people have been using these methods for many years to watch things like UK TV, I personally have been doing this for about 14 years now.  You would have expected some pushback from all the companies who instigated these restrictions in the same place.  They’re do this for a variety of reasons but mostly it’s two – copyright restrictions or profit maximization, sometimes a mixture of both.  Many firms now implement anti-proxy or VPN blocking technology but nobody has figured out a way to block them completely.  The Chinese Government invest a fortune trying to restrict all VPNs and haven’t yet succeeded completely either.

The next generation of proxies and VPNs are set to be even more sophisticated at hiding their tracks.  The weak point of any of these proxies is the IP address, so newer proxies usually operate by loading addresses from a vast central pool.  This means that they can switch between different IPs and classifications as required.