Yes, I hate that

Well Nathan,

There are a lot of companies out there that will register your domain name for you. I've found that it can go for as low as $10 a year, and generally it's less than $20. The one I've used most recently is www.mydomain.com. The site includes a search tool to find out if the domain name you want is available.

The next step is to get a hosting service. You might have some space with your ISP, the domain name registration site might offer hosting services, or you can do what I did and find another company that will provide your hosting. I have used 1dollarhosting, but for insanityinc we use Exist Hosting ( www.existhosting.com ). They have decent rates for lots of space.

The final step is to let your domain registration site know (usually through a web form) where your space is, so they know where to point the name to. Your host will tell you what that information is. It's the name of the proxy servers for web and email.

And that's it. There's probably better explanations on the web of how all that works, but there's my version, composed with less than half a brain (tonight anyway... I'm rapidly shutting down).