Getting online TODAY!

This post is specifically written for those in college media who have no online presence whatsoever, or who are using a static HTML page to post stories on occasion. If you have ever wondered how you’re going to get online, I’m here to take away your excuse. If you know of a college media outlet that doesn’t have an online presence, THIS POST is something you should e-mail to the adviser or student editor of that publication. Sure, it’s not going to be the most elegant solution, but it’s going to get you started. And that, my friends, is what I’m all about.

So let’s begin.

First things first, if you’re looking for something that is along the lines of a full-featured content management system, then I wrote a post several months ago that discussed some of those options. I’m gearing this post to those who are looking for a quick and easy method to get online now and worry about moving up the scale later. For this post, I’m using two popular weblog services to show you how to set up a hosted news site: Blogger and Wordpress.com. The reason I’m using these is that weblog systems are, at their heart, rudimentary content management systems. The backend of these systems will look very similar to the backend of any content management system - except with fewer bells and whistles. We use Wordpress on our servers to run the ICM weblog.

The first thing you need to do is go to the Blogger or Wordpress.com homepage and sign up for an account. It’s very easy to do, and you will set up a username and password. Once you’ve set up your account, you’ll be given a chance to name your site. I chose “testnewssite” for both of these as the first part of the URL.

Assuming that the URL name you chose is not in use by someone else, you’ll be taken to a page where you can choose a template. Blogger and Wordpress.com handle template systems slightly differently. While Wordpress.com has better looking templates, Blogger lets you control more of the actual HTML of your site.

Once you choose a template, you will be taken to another page. In Blogger, you will be taken to the writing page. Here is where you will copy and paste the material from your page layout program if you’re just planning to port material from your newspaper.

In Wordpress.com, you will be taken to the “Dashboard.” From the Dashboard, you can reach the “write a post” page. On both systems, after you have finished entering text and writing a headline for your story, you will click on a button marked “Publish.” That button will put your text/images on the web for the world to see.

And that’s really the easiest way to get online.

Don’t believe me? Here’s the two sites I published this afternoon. The bulk of my time was spent writing the cheesy copy and adding categories. Setting up the actual site took less than five minutes.

This is the blogger version of the site: The Test Tribune.

You’ll notice that I have five stories, and one story has a photograph in it. The photograph can be uploaded from your computer, and there are several options for presentation.

Now, this is the Wordpress.com version of the same site. Personally, I find the themes and control in Wordpress much more attractive, but that’s just me. You can try out both and see which one you like better.

Obviously, there is MUCH MORE that you can do once you’re online and experimenting. You can change the colors of your site, adjust the theme to your liking, add a header image (perhaps your paper’s nameplate), and change fonts and headline styles using CSS. But these are gravy compared to the actual pride you can now feel in having an online site where one never existed before.

And if anyone gets bogged down, read the online support documents, or just drop me an e-mail. scmurley -at- gmail.com. Oh, and if you do use this method to get online, drop me a line and let me know.

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