How To Start Your Own Blog

I have been on a blogging buzz lately and am really enjoying it, but up until now I had never actually hosted my own site. Previously I was using a friend’s hosting account and had never actually set one of these up. When I set out to launch mattshadetek.com I learned how easy it actually is. I am not a super programmer web-developer guy and I was able to get this site up in about half an hour. The platform I’m using is WordPress, which is a super popular and awesome, easy to use blogging platform. In a nutshell, these are the steps:

  1. Choose a domain name. You are NOT stuck with this name permanently but will have to pay for any additional domains yearly at between 15-25 bucks a year. But outside of that you can have as many as you want! Register parrots-on-prozac.com or broke-hungry-mermaid.com (still available as of this writing!) The possibilities are endless!
  2. Choose a hosting service. I am using Just Host since they make things VERY easy to set up and offer a lifetime domain registration with your hosting, plus a bunch of other stuff. Also, if you sign up with them using my banner below, I make a little money. It’s a great way to support me and this site and GET YOUR OWN BLOG! Cool! (Note: this tutorial is for their service, it will be slightly different if you use someone else)
  3. Once you’ve signed up, you’ll get a link to their ‘cPanel’ app, sign in with the info they email you and choose the ‘WordPress’ install icon.
  5. Then on the next screen hit the ‘New Installation’ Link:
  7. Next input the information on this screen.
  9. For my site I typed in ‘install in directory’ ‘blog’ so that my site lives at http://www.mattshadetek.com/blog/ in case in the future I want to put something else at http://www.mattshadetek.com/ but I setup a redirect so that for now when you hit that URL it takes you straight to the blog, also easily done in the cPanel. You can leave it blank too and it’ll put it at the top level of your site so that ‘example.com’ takes you straight there.
  10. Admin access data is just a user and password you choose so that you can access the back end of your blog and type posts, add plugins, etc. The post creation part is also REALLY EASY. Basically you just type what you want in a box, add images or links using their graphical interface and then hit publish.
  11. Admin Nickname is the name that will appear any time you write a post, like ‘by Matt Shadetek’ on my site.
  12. For the admin email you should choose whatever email you really use, when you start getting comments and stuff it will notify you there.
  13. The site name will display at the top, it can be whatever you want mine is “Matt Shadetek”.
  14. The description will be right beneath that, so in my case it’s “Matt Shadetek talks music production, creativity and life in the internet”
  15. Hit ‘Install WordPress’
  16. On the next page you’ll see a confirmation page outlining what it’s about to do, review it and then hit ‘Finish Installation’.
  17. Done! Now in the page that displays just tell it to email you the details, at the bottom which will include the password, etc. and you’re ready to get started blogging!

Now, keep in mind, this does cost money. Although relatively very little. At $3.45 a month you could basically choose not to buy one coffee and danish, 2 subway rides, a single (cheap) magazine a month and make this savings. The main reason to do it is that if you are on a hosted free site you and all the hard work you put into your blog are controlled by a giant corporation like Google who may at some point decide they don’t like what you’re doing and delete your data, change the rules, start charging you, or WHATEVER THEY WANT TO DO. Owning your own server is like buying your own tiny island in the internet. Outside of doing something really egregiously illegal (and evil) like hosting child-pornography, you can pretty much do what you want and it will be a lot harder for people to mess with you. Self reliance! Internet independence!

For an example of what can happen read this post by DJ /Rupture about what happened to our friend’s blog Masalacism and why they quickly got their own hosting afterward.

Sign up via my banner and help me make some money!