It may have a somewhat low-key presence on the Web, but don’t let that fool you: The under-the-radar business resource website EcomHelp.com has a nice variety of helpful articles geared toward providing advice for the start-up entrepreneur.

Most of the articles are basic, bare-bones business primers; but if you can get past the uninspired design and color scheme, there are also some gems to be found on the site, too.

One such gem is a piece by Tim North that attempts to put the hit-and-miss art of choosing an appropriate domain name into ten specific points. When paraphrased, his advice boils down to the following:

TIP #1: Keep it simple. “Good domain names are easily memorable and easily typed. Generally this means keeping them short.”

TIP #2: Avoid hyphens. They may make your domain name easier to read, but they also tend to create confusion. “The bottom line with hyphens is that most domains don’t include them. So, when you tell someone your domain, they’ll probably try typing it without any hyphens.”

TIP #3: Make it sound natural. Don’t be afraid to use plural formations: “If you’re selling toy trains, I’d go with ‘toytrains.com’ instead of ‘toytrain.com’.”

TIP #4: Take advantage of domain name search programs. At Aplus.Net, we worked hard to develop our search engine tool, and we made sure it had the power to provide useful alternatives in case your first choice is already taken. Click here to check it out.

TIP #5: Think globally. Most countries have their own domain name types, and if you don’t plan on doing most of your business in the U.S., find out the next best alternative. For example, if you’re in Australia, use “.au” instead of .com. “On the other hand,”writes North, “if you’re marketing your products or services globally (or if you’re in the US), use ‘.com’ as your top-level domain.”

TIP #6: “Don’t use words that are tough to spell. Similarly, don’t use words that are spelled differently in some countries.” For example, “color” in the U.S. is “colour” in Great Britain and Australia. Don’t risk missing out on customers by using such a word.

TIP #7: “Ensure that there will be no trademark or other legal problems with the domain name you choose.”

TIP #8: Don’t be afraid to use your brand name. Generic names seem better because they’re simpler, but that’s not always the case anymore. “These days, many analysts argue that a domain name that features your brand name is more important. For example, if you’ve invested time and effort building up your brand name (Toyota, for example) you’d be better of using Toyota as your domain name, rather than something generic like ‘GreatCars’.”

TIP #9: “Avoid domain names that are too similar to existing ones. Not only do you want avoid legal issues (tip 7), but you want your brand to be distinct from that of your competitors.”

TIP #10: Think in the long term. You don’t own your domain name, you’re basically renting it from a provider. After all the work you’ve done building your site around it, the last thing you need is for it to expire on you. (It’s not always easy to get it back, especially if a competitor has been waiting to snatch it away should the opportunity arise — not an uncommon scenario.)

Even with all these tips to consider, selecting a domain name can be a tricky, lengthy process. Then again, some of the best domain names tend to just pop in your head. What’s more, the hosting plan and web design you use often make more of a difference than the domain name itself.

Remember, if you need any help getting through the process, Aplus.Net representatives are always happy to help you in your search. You can reach us 24 hours a day at 1-877-275-8763.

Click here to check out Tim North’s original article, entitled “Ten tips for choosing a good domain name”.

For several weeks now, news has been spreading that premier technology website CNET is fighting efforts of certain key investors who seek to gain a controlling interest in the company, effectively taking it over.

According to a press release posted today on TradingMarkets.com, “Toward the end of 2007, Jana Partners, LLC, started buying up large swaths of CNET Networks stock. At the same time, Sandell Asset Management, another hedge fund, had also been upping its stake in CNET, much more than CNET brass knew.”

For such a takeover to work, fairly complex alliances and politics will be brought into play. But it’s certainly not an impossibility. The Baltimore Sun provides the relevant details:

Led by New York-based Jana Partners LLC, the mutinous investors hope to replace two of CNet’s current directors while also gaining shareholder approval to change the company’s bylaws to expand the board to 13 members, up from eight.

By increasing the board’s size, Jana and its allies think they can get another five directors elected to control seven of the 13 board seats.

The Jana group sued CNet yesterday in an effort to overcome the company’s resistance. The complaint, filed in the Delaware Court of Chancery, seeks an injunction that would override CNet and enable Jana to present its proposal to shareholders.

Jana will need the backing of other shareholders to pull off its coup. The group, which also includes venture capital firm Spark Capital and former Internet executive Paul Gardi, holds a roughly 16 percent stake in CNet, including derivatives that can be converted into stock.

One major investor, Sandell Asset Management, has already pledged to support the rebellion. Sandell owns derivatives that could be converted into a 5 percent stake in CNet.

The call for change at the San Francisco company will resonate with many shareholders, predicted Pacific Crest Securities analyst Steve Weinstein. The company “definitely needs to be doing more than it has been doing,” he said.

Theories abound as to why these interests want to take over CNET and what would be gained by such a move — as well as just what the impact would be on the tech media landscape. According to the TradingMarkets.com press release:

One possible motivation for Jana, et al, is some of the valuations that e-media companies have been getting in the past year have been off the charts (see DoubleClick, Facebook, et al). CNET’s valuation has been hovering around what the B2B media industry would expect for a company of its type: about 23xEBITDA based on revenues of about $400 million and an EBITDA of about $58 million.

Gardi and Jana certainly know that there’s a huge difference between a content creation company and a rapidly growing social networking site that generates tens of millions of page views a day. But there is untapped potential in CNET–beyond cost-cutting and a different, more search- and aggregation- oriented business model. The adoption of these things might help EBITDA, but would not inspire a potential buyer to offer more than a cherry 23x multiple. What could push the multiple higher is the incubation and development of high margin businesses that could be acquired and integrated or grown at CNET. Some examples are:

1. Data. CNET collects a huge amount of data from its audience that it could use to act as an Amazon-like infomediary. CNET’s editorial side also collects and develops data that can be turned into easy-to-maintain and sell databases.

2. Social Networking. As a trusted source of information, CNET has an audience of interest invested in its content. Additionally, this audience is a population of highly active computer and Internet users and early adopters. There is an opportunity for the creation of highly engaging and highly vertical social networks and applications.

If CNET does get sold for a significantly higher valuation than it is currently getting on the open market, that might affect the valuations for some e-media businesses that traditional strategics will look to buy in 2008/2009, which could mean that the B2B media M&A outlook in the next 6-18 months could become very muddled.

This week, we at Aplus.Net announced that we’ve made comprehensive changes to our line of award-winning shared hosting plans in an effort to better accommodate today’s knowledgeable and discerning consumers. The rebranding also coincides with our ten-year anniversary of providing shared web hosting, as well as our exciting new promotion to waive the set-up fees on these upgraded plans.

“For more than a decade, Aplus.Net has prided itself on being the ultimate online partner for everyone from business owners to the everyday consumer,” commented Gabriel Murphy, our President and CEO. “To further demonstrate our commitment to our valued and loyal customer base — as well as our responsibility as a hosting industry leader — we’ve not only simplified our plans to make them more intuitive and understandable, but we’ve also added additional features, thereby maximizing the value to the consumer.”

The principal change involves condensing Aplus.Net’s eight original shared hosting plans into four renamed platforms: the Personal Plan, the Business Class Plan, the Pro Plan, and the eCommerce Plan. Each plan is available in both Unix and Windows formats.

The strategy of replacing existing plan names with more straightforward identifiers is intended to simplify the selection process for consumers, while making the plans themselves better focused and easier to understand. We’ve also expanded some applications and features, including ramping up the SQL offerings on many of these plans.

These improvements were launched earlier this week, with no corresponding price increase. In addition, to help kick off the revamped hosting plans — and as part of our celebration of ten years as a shared hosting provider — we at Aplus.Net have announced that we’re eliminating all set-up fees on the new hosting plans.

“We view this move as the next logical step in growing our company,” said Mr. Murphy. “Times have changed since Aplus.Net first got into the shared hosting game in 1998, and we’re making the necessary modifications to stay competitive. But more importantly, all this will ultimately make it easier for consumers to navigate our website, making the Aplus.Net shopping experience as user-friendly as possible.”

About Aplus.Net

A recognized industry leader since the Internet’s commercial start, Aplus.Net specializes in helping small businesses build an online customer base with a comprehensive range of services that includes web hosting and design, dedicated servers, online marketing, eCommerce, domain name registration, and much more. Aplus.Net has been awarded many honors for excellence, including the prestigious CNET Editors’ Choice Award, and has been featured in top U.S. business publications such as Forbes, Entrepreneur, Black Enterprise, and PC Magazine. For more information about Aplus.Net, please visit www.aplus.net.

Google has not only become the dominant company in Internet business, it’s also a household name and a force unto itself in the American economy. Not bad for a company that was launched just ten years ago.

Part of the secret behind the company’s success is its ability to innovate, combined with a spot-on sense of where to take the market it now leads. Recent years have seen it diversifying out of its powerhouse search engine comfort zone and into more elements of consumer technology, starting with applications related to SE technology, like mapping and shopping software. Lately, though Google’s announcements have been getting more and more ambitious, culminating most recently in its plans to dip its toes into the world of consumer cell phone technology.

Going hand-in-hand with this product innovation is Google’s growing presence as a sheer market force of nature. And again, the company knows how to play it smart: Like any company of enormous size and market share, it’s looking to the future not only in terms of what consumers like, but what the law will allow. That’s why, back in 2005, the company set up shop in Washington, D.C. to take a hand in lobbying.

The world is beginning to see some of the results of that effort. From today’s Los Angeles Times:

Google’s expanding lobbying operation scored two significant victories last year: It convinced federal regulators to approve its $3.1-billion purchase of online ad company DoubleClick Inc., and to partially open new wireless airwaves so the company could more easily make its products available on them.

Though D.C. veterans say Google has a long way to go before its lobbying clout matches its market valuation, the company is no longer viewed as a wide-eyed Washington freshman.

“This is a company that understands what they’ve got to do, and they’re in the process of doing it,” said Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a Washington think tank. “You can’t just get by on good looks.”

Google is making a major statement about its intention to be a player in the nation’s capital. Chief Executive Eric Schmidt today plans to christen Google’s new Washington offices: 27,000 square feet in one of the city’s trendiest new environmentally conscious buildings.

Lobbyists for the Mountain View, Calif., company will work at the site, which is complete with standard Google perks such as free gourmet lunches, a vibrating massage chair and a game room stocked with an Xbox 360 and pingpong and Foosball tables. It’s also a place to show off technology to policymakers on enough large plasma screens to fill a Circuit City showroom.

“We’re creating a little microcosm of Google in downtown D.C.,” said Alan Davidson, who heads the office as the company’s senior policy counsel. “We are here to stay and to have a positive presence in Washington.”

Of course, lobbying is becoming something of a frowned-upon enterprise here in America today, which may help to explain the company’s recent philanthropic efforts. At any rate, it’s safe to say that the company is taking the necessary steps to ensure its ten-year total market domination is not short-lived but the model for future growth. Will any ever out-Google Google? It’s hard to see that happening from where we stand now. But the future, as always, is unpredictable.

As the latest development in their ongoing efforts to dazzle the marketplace by taking popular marketplace trends to all-new highs, Apple’s Steve Jobs unveiled the “world’s thinnest computer” at yesterday’s Macworld Expo in San Francisco.

The trend being capitalized upon is making consumer products that are smaller, thinner, more lightweight and more transportable than any that have come before. (See also: iPods, digital cameras, cell phones.)

To that end, the new MacBook Air “tapers in thickness from .76 inch down to .16 inch. The circuit board is about the length of a pencil” (according to the New York Times’ John Markoff). What’s more, it weighs just 3 pounds.

However, such a dramatic size reduction in a laptop has made for an interesting sacrifice: The new MacBook Air will feature no CD or DVD drive, something that has given many observers pause. Forget music and movies — how will new software be installed? Is the owner expected to download everything? Is this perhaps pushing consumers towards an all-download diet just a bit too hard (or soon)?

Apple’s response to this is the Apple MacBook Air SuperDrive, which “connects to your MacBook Air computer with a single USB cable and fits easily into a travel bag. It lets you install software and play and burn both CDs and DVDs, including double-layer DVDs.” It’s only a $99 add-on — not too expensive — but don’t extra components such as this sort of defeat the purpose of having a super lightweight and portable laptop in the first place?

That’s absolutely a matter of debate. Initial reaction at the unveiling has so far been fairly positive, but it will be interesting to see how the market reacts to the new product. As of today, the announcement hadn’t helped stop Apple shares from continuing their current Wall Street slide, reports MarketWatch today. (It should be noted, however, that most observers attribute this recent slide to Intel’s problems, and not directly to Apple.)

As some have been quick to point out, Apple received a similar level of skepticism way back when they announced that their Macs would not have floppy disk or diskette drives. And that not only failed to hurt the product, but in fact may have given it an aura of modernity that wound up helping sales.

Yet, this is admittedly somewhat different. With no built-in optical drive whatsoever, the MacBook is asking a bit more from the consumer. Then again, that’s just the sort of market anticipation that Apple, and Jobs himself, is best known for. It should be noted that this is a type of bet that the company usually wins.

What do you think? Are you excited about the new MacBook, or less than thrilled? Sound off in the comments section and let us know your thoughts.