Read The Weblog FAQK.
So weblogs are all about disaster and war?
Gosh Jesus no! Weblogs cover a wide range of topics, such as other weblogs, what the mainstream media are saying about weblogging, new weblogs, advances in weblog publishing, books about weblogging, the future of weblogging, and that one naked guy painted up like Spider-Man.
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Would you mind recommending a few sites that deal with starting a bloggin site? I’m unfamiliar with the Moveable Type that’s used.
WHAT DO YOU WANT?
Step one is figuring out what you want a blog for.
If you want a way to periodically post information/links/etc. and have it organized in some sort of time-ordered fashion (and, with some tools, by category), blogging is the right kind of tool.
If you’re looking to build a website for business purposes, or as a static display of stuff, you can do that with blogging tools — but that’s not the best fit.
BASICS OF WHAT BLOGGING TOOLS DO
What this all means is that you need a repository for the database of info you post, web space for the info to be posted to, and programs to do the input and posting.
Depending on your technical sophistication, you can completely roll your own, you can get free tools to do this on your own web space, or you can use services that host the database, tools, and/or web space.
WHAT TOOLS TO USE
While a lot of people bitch about its reliability, probably the simplest thing to do is to start with one of the sites that “does it all for you.” To that end, Blogger is probably the best bet. And if you don’t have web space that can be published to, you can use the free (with ad banners) Blogspot site. That combination is how a lot of folks get started.
MovableType (and others) depend on your being able to do some site administration and getting into the innerds of your web site a bit. Not a whole lot — and you can, in fact, hire the MT folks to install it for you (assuming you don’t have the technical knowledge for it already), but its still not something I would recommend for folks who don’t have that web/UNIX/FTP/IT sort of background.
Once you have some time under your belt with Blogger, most folks usually go on to something else.
(LiveJournal is another hosted service, though I don’t know anything more about it.)
I’m sure there’s lots more stuff out there. This is very much the mini-primer. I hope it helped. Ask more questions if you’ve got ’em.
Thank you for the information and links.
I was thinking of a combination of the two: Some static information and some posting of link & topics of interest. I talked to Rey yesterday and he spoke highly of using MT.
MT is way cool. If you’re comfortable doing CHMODs on your web site (or even understand what that means), you’re probably cool to use MT.
It’s not as convenient for doing static info. There are ways to do it, but it’s probably easier, for most purposes, just to use a simple HTML editor for those pages.
CHMODs are not a problem. Any little quirks or peaves about MT that you wouldn’t mind passing along?
Not off-hand, no. It’s a slick little package, well-worth supporting, with a vibrant community of users and a constant stream of responsive upgrades.
The only fundamental thing I wish is that there were a desktop client that I could write to and then publish from when I get back on-line, for those times when there’s no connection available. The rest of my wish list is just frosting on the cake.
Not off-hand, no. It’s a slick little package, well-worth supporting, with a vibrant community of users and a constant stream of responsive upgrades.
The only fundamental thing I wish is that there were a desktop client that I could write to and then publish from when I get back on-line, for those times when there’s no connection available. The rest of my wish list is just frosting on the cake.