You can contribute to the world of blogging in just a few minutes. One way is to join sites like My Space at www.myspace.com or more specialised services like the Digital Divide Network at www.digitaldivide.net. There are many other hosting sites that support blogs, with one of the most popular places to start at Blogger.com. To join Blogger, just follow the following steps: 1. Enter www.blogger.com in your browser. 2. Click on that big orange arrow labelled "Create your Blog Now." At this point you will need to select a username and password that you will be using to access your blogger account. Remember to make the password interesting - include some numbers and mix the case. You will also need to think of a display name that is used to sign all your posts. This name can reflect your blog type, say SoccerMum or ArticExplorer, or something unintelligible like MxplOz4, which is more like a password than a username but you will see a lot like this. You also need to provide a real email address. Some people will create a blogger email account for this. 3. When you have identified everything, check the box that says you accept the terms of service then Continue to go to the next step. This is where you give your blog a name, something as simple as My Blog Report or as heady as My Philosophical Musings on the Nature of the Universe. What you call it is completely up to you. The hard part will be picking the URL address that people will use to access your blog. This can be anything you like as long as it is not already being used by someone. You want to make this concise and easy to remember. Be patient, it may take you a while to find something that has not already been taken, as there are thousands of blogs already in use. At this point you will also need to type in the word you have been shown to confirm your selections and to block automated blog creation. Click Continue to move to the next screen. You are almost finished. All you need to do is select from one of the template styles that Blogger provides. There are 12 of them, click on the radio button and then on the Continue Arrow. There will be a brief pause while your Blog is set up and then you are ready to go. Click on Start Posting and you are shown the posting screen with some other tabs for modifications. The Settings tab will allow you to make some changes ranging from your blog title, some access settings and to the deletion of this blog. You can restrict comments, create teams and lost of other stuff in this section. The Template tab is where you change the colour of your navigation bar or for the more adventurous you can use your HTML and style sheet knowledge to modify every part of your blog's appearance. Unless you are sure, best not to play in this area too much. The View Blog tab only works after you have created your first blog, so back to the Posting tab. Enter your blog title then enter in some text, add in some links and even some pictures if you wish. Then click on Preview to check what the final result will look like than when you are ready, and Publish. Now try the View Blog tab and there it is, your first blog. The really hard part will be to think of something new to post on a regular basis and of course to let everyone know about your blog's URL so that they can go and see it. If your blog becomes popular, be prepared for your first comment. This can range from a poor to well crafted flame from someone called Anonymous to a congratulations from your grandmother on passing your O levels. Welcome to the wonderful world of blogging.
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