A domain name allows your customers to access your website by specifying "www.yourname.com". This is achieved by assigning an IP address to your website directory. This technique is known as setting up a "virtual domain". All domain names have, until recently, been assigned by Network Solutions Inc. (also referred to as InterNIC), which has been the sole authority to grant and manage Internet domain names of types .com .org and .net under contract from the U.S. Government. InterNIC and other newly authorized domain name registration companies charge up to $70.00 to register a domain name for a two year period. Thereafter, there is an annual fee of $35.00 to maintain the name as an active domain name. Please note that USPages.net, Inc. does not charge a markup above the InterNIC fee to register your domain name. Not all hosting companies have this policy. Recently, InterNIC competitors, such as USPNIC, are offering discounted domain name registrations for substantially lower than InterNIC's charge.