How to get started: Blogger

Blogger and WordPress are the two major tools available to you that can host your blog, and they're the best to start with. But there's a word of caution to keep in mind: if the content of your blog is too contriversial, either site can and will shut you down. (Authors of erotica may want to carefully study the terms of service for both sites and look for alternatives if they're too restrictive.)

To start in Blogger, follow these steps:

1. Go to http://www.blogger.com/ and click the big orange button on the righthand side to create your blog.
2. Set up your account. Since Google purchased Blogger, it's a Google account, but you can use any e-mail address to set the account up, whether it's Gmail or not. (Gmail is Google's e-mail service.)
3. After you complete your account and click Continue, you just select your blog's name (it appears at the top of the page) and its URL. When you create the URL, you should use letters, numbers, and dashes, but you cannot use spaces. If your URL is taken, Blogger will suggest alternatives.
4. Click continue and choose a template. This blog uses the Scribe template.
5. Click Continue, then click Start Blogging.

The blog entry interface is like a limited word processor. When you publish, your text will be rendered using HTML, but you don't need to know HTML. Just use the button at the top of the text area and you'll be good to go.

Next entry: Blogger has a number of tools you can integrate with your blog. We'll cover them next time.