What is the difference between a "free host" and a "pay host"?
A "free" web hosting service is a service where you don't pay any money yourself to get your webspace. Why do they do this? Because instead of taking money, the "free" hosts plaster their advertising all over your website. They make money by selling your sites visitors products.
In addition, most "free" webhosts impose very tight limits on the amount of disk space and bandwidth that you can use. These limits are very easy to go over with a website getting even a few hundred hits a day. Once your monthly limit is reached for bandiwdth, your website is usually pulled down until the start of the next month, essentially leaving you high and dry.
Most "free" hosts also don't usually come with technical support, and come with very few features. Most come without email. The biggest shortcoming of which is the ability to have your own domain name. If you want to use a free service, be prepared to tell people that your website address is www.freewebsitehost.com/users/homepages/~yourname/yourpage.html instead of yoursite.com.
In the end, you get what you pay for.
