Prequel

A good host will:
Provide fast servers and support at reasonable cost.

Rule 1

Speed and Cost are tradeoffs
Your host can be fast or it can be cheap. It can't be both.

Rule 2

Speed is Traffic
The number of surfers who wait for your page to load drops rapidly after a few seconds. A slow host will cost you surfers every day. If you are serious about the web, you need a fast, professional web host.

Peering

Peering Agreements: The Critical Secret
A peering agreement is a contract that allows your host to send data directly to another private network, bypassing the slow "public internet." The more peering agreements a host has the better, but it is important to realize that less than 12 networks carry 95% of the traffic, so peering with those 12 networks is far more important than the total number of peers. (I'm working on figuring out which 12 that is, if you know please contact me. AOL is one.)

Conclusion

How to Choose a Good Website Host
Your choice of website host will probably consider money first. That's fine, but be sure you're buying the most speed for your buck. Compare hosts by peering agreements, it is the secret criteria that defines how fast a host is.

Follow up

Measuring Peering Agreements
Peering relationships are usually secret. You can ask the sales department, but the only way to know what a host's peering agreements are is to be hosted by them, then running "traceroute" from your machine to the other major networks. If the traceroute reveals direct data transfer from your host to another network, you can bet a peering agreement exists. Multiple measurements will need to be taken over many days to be sure.

Coming soon: PeeringAgreements.com, a host ranking system to help you choose a good host quickly and easily.

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