I am a webmaster for about 10 years now. If you weren't born yesterday, you know that the term "offshore" means "OFF THE SHORE OF THE US".
Why? Because the network in the US was WAAAAAAY cheaper and faster, and the US hosters were something like a "standards setter" when it came to hosting and servers.
Offshore hosting started in the Netherlands, thats where we hosted our warez sites back then.
OFFSHORE can mean anything, but this is where it originated.
Take the term "States", you automatically think "United States of America". Are these the only states? No. But everybody knows them that way.
Sorry OP for ruining your thread. :D