It’s quite possible you’re reading this blog, even though you don’t have one, maybe because you’re thinking of getting one, or maybe you have used one of the lesser services such as MySpace and would like to use something more flexible. There’s plenty of choice, and things are not always obvious, so this article will help you to get started with blogging. In my opinion, the best way to do this is to use WordPress (WP). WordPress is a completely free (and ad-free) open-source blogging system. Once installed, you can choose a theme (template) that you like, write a post, click ‘publish’ and the software does the rest. If you can use email and a word processor, you can use WordPress. The software saves all of your posts, allows comments from other people and makes things like adding links etc. intuitive and very easy.

There are two ‘flavours’ of WordPress, both from the same people, but with important differences.

WordPress.com which is hosted by WordPress, on their webspace & is extremely easy to use. You sign up for an account, choose a blog name & off you go.

WordPress.org is the same blogging software, only you need to have your own webspace to host your blog. But, the advantage of WP.org is that you have complete freedom to do what you want with your blog – post about what you want, limitless change of appearance, name, URL and you can use any money generating system you like. Many, perfectly legitimate, sources of blogger income are banned from WP.com.

This blog is a self-hosted WP blog, and as I can’t recommend the WP.com option, I will tell you how to go about setting up a self-hosted blog, both free or paid as you choose.

To run a self-hosted WP blog, you will need the following resources, all of which can be obtained free if required:

  • A domain name (Doesn’t have to be the same as your blog, but helps if it is similar).
  • Webspace (hosting) Must offer you 1 SQL database per blog you wish to install.
  • FTP client – File Transfer Protocol software – effectively an easy way to transfer files to & from your webspace.
  • A copy of the WordPress installation files (Unless your host can install for you: see below).

Webspace:

Free: There’s plenty of choice of free hosts, but it is certainly true that you get what you pay for. Whilst they’re getting better, and offering more services, there will be (has to be) restrictions. Typically these include: restricted services (only 1 SQL database), banned words (no linking to Paypal or Amazon), many users on one server slowing things down, long downtimes with no expanantion or support.

I have used two free hosts: Awardspace & 110mb.com. I can’t honestly recommend either, although I don’t believe other free hosts are that much better. Awardspace suffered from sudden service outages lasting days, with no notification, through to their ‘banned words list’. This is designed to stop ‘phishers’ & other criminals using their site, and consisted of a list of dozens of words that they would not tell you about. If one of your readers innocently used the word ‘Ebay’ for example in a comment, your blog would disappear, until you could track down the offending word & delete it. 110mb.com are trying, and improving their service, but again my blog would disappear for a couple of days, or be very slow & this is useless when trying to attract readers. There’s plenty of choice, all I can advise is to do plenty of research.

Paid: Again, the choice is endless & research is your best option. However, WP.org does recommend a few hosts, and I went with one of them: AN Hosting. So far, I have been very impressed: I could theoretically install 999 blogs on this webspace, and the traffic levels are much higher. Both blogs load extremely fast, there are dozens of features & tools to be used, including one (Fantastico) that will setup a WP blog, ready to use, in seconds. Their support has also been excellent. I have mailed them questions during signing up, ‘reassurance’ questions while transferring my blogs & other technical questions, and each time, a polite, helpful response has come back in less than 30 minutes. Including one sent late on New Year’s Eve. All this for $6.95 a month inclusive.

Domain name: If you go with free hosting, you will get a free sub-domain of the host. E.g. your URL would be something like ‘myblog.awardspace.com’ or ‘myblog.110mb.com’. By far the best option is to buy your own domain name, as you can use it on both free & paid hosting, and if you switch hosts (as I have done) the name comes with you, and you don’t lose readers. I used 123-reg.com, but there are plenty of domain registrars to choose from. Thermalblog.co.uk cost me £6 ($12) for 2 years, while Blog-Op.com cost me £11 ($20), also for 2 years. Your blog can have a completely different name from your domain: Your choice of domain will be limited according to what has already been taken (This is why I chose thermalblog instead of thermal, which belongs to someone else.), but I would advise getting something similar.

FTP Client: Your blog files will initially be on your hard-drive, along with photos, videos, graphics and other things you may want to include on your blog. All webhosts offer a form of file manager to upload these files to your webspace, but typically you can only do 5 or 6 files at a time. WP alone comes with a hundred or so, so this would take a while! The easy solution is an FTP client, the best that I have used is Filezilla, which is also completely free. Connect to your webspace with this program (very simple) and you can then drag and drop single files, multiple files or even whole directories from your PC to your webspace, or vice-versa. Essential & massively useful. I have written some installation instructions if you need them.

WordPress installation files: Get them here from WordPress, unless you’re host offers an installation script such as Fantastico in which case you won’t need them.

Part 2 of this article can be found here, and includes information on the installation and configuration of WordPress.

If you have a correction, or would like some more information, please leave me a comment below.