Apr 29 2008
Jump On In, The Water Is Fine
You probably already know that blogging has been increasing in popularity over the last few years and shows no sign of slowing down. On the contrary, statistics show that more and more blogs are coming online everyday. So… there has never been a better time to get started, and the best part is you won’t need to spend any money!
There a lot options when it comes to choosing what software you want to use for blogging. The most important question you can ask yourself now is - will my choice today limit me in the future? Will I have to pay a monthly fee? How flexible will my options be?
In my opinion, there is only one answer and that is Wordpress. It dominates the market and for good reason. There are literally thousands of quality themes to choose from and an incredible variety of plugins that integrate with Wordpress to expand it’s capability even more. This blog you are reading now is built on Wordpress. What can you do with Wordpress? You can actually do more using Wordpress than you can with a regular HTML website, and as a web designer I know this well.
As I have mentioned before I have been designing web sites for customers for years, but when I found Wordpress my whole world changed — for the better. The options are endless. For example you can create an E-commerce site to sell products online, you can host a photo gallery, post videos, create an online book and of course write a blog. To make a good thing even better, recently I have seen some premium themes that make Wordpress look more like an online magazine or a high end Content Management System.
There are two flavors of Wordpress. One is the totally free version you can sign up for at www.Wordpress.com. Just register and start writing. It’s that easy. The second one allows you to use the Wordpress software on your own host. You can find this at www.Wordpress.org. Many web hosting companies even have a one-click install feature that will install the software for you automatically.
The other blogging software I would recommend is Blogger from Google. you can find it at www.Blogger.com. It is very, very simple to use but may limit you in the future when you start to stretch your wings.
I hope this post has shed some light on how to start blogging. We’ll cover more details as we go along. The most important thing I want to convey is to just get started. Once you do, a world of possibilities will begin to open up for you and you will be glad you did.
Stay tuned for the next post as we take a look at how to put things in order before you start. Having the right foundation will actually help to write more later on.
-vj
I can’t remember when the transition took place but it must have been a few years ago when I first noticed it. For a time I remember wondering if I was slipping away into the digital darkness until I figured out that what is “normal,” is to be who you are and do what you do best. It’s kind of funny because I live in between two worlds. My digital world, where I work and interact with friends and the world outside where the dogs still get hungry the car still needs gas 8-\