The Web For RC #1: Free Web Host

In the first article of the series I’d like to tell you about the many, many ways you can publish your content to the web; but I can’t, so instead I’ll point out the best free web service for publishing your website. It’s my personal favorite. On another article I will cover the same examples using other services such as Webs.com, Wikispaces and so on. For now, WordPress.com is where you need to point a new browser window.

WORDPRESS.COM

I LOVE WORDPRESS. I cannot say that enough! WordPress.com is my favorite free web host. Before we get into why WordPress.com is the easiest and best free method to publish on the web, lets go over what WordPress is. WordPress started in 2003 as a free and open-source blog software. It has evolved into one of the most widely used Content-Management Software in the world. WordPress.com started offering free hosting of WordPress blogs back in 2005. Today, you can sign up for an account and host an unlimited number of WP sites. I’ll go over basic examples of setting up a simple website to be ready for publishing.

Scenario

Lets say you’re a builder of RC foamies and you’d like to document your daily (or weekly) adventures with RC airplanes. You have a YouTube account and would like to show videos within your articles and pages. Lets assume you use Twitter too and would like to implement some kind of connection between your website and Twitter account so that your followers can be updated about website changes and new videos. Maybe you’d like to interact with and receive feedback from your website visitor and have them share (or spread) your content on their social media accounts. This is all basic stuff even though it may seem like advanced features.

Step 1: Sign Up

First, lets create an account at WordPress.com, if you don’t already have one. This should be easy and I’m not going to go into details. Next will be creating a new blog. If you’re creating a new account, you will be prompted during the signup process to create your first blog – do not be fooled by the name “blog.” At first, it may seem like you’re creating nothing more than a blog, but I will take you step by step into making much more than a blog, Just follow along.

If you already have a WP account and are logged in, you can also create a new blog by using the My Blogs menu at the top of the page and Register a New Blog. I have created one just for this tutorial series. See it at rcwebsite.wordpress.com.

The Blog Address is the address where your website will be found. For my sample site it is ‘rcwebsite.’ Next add a Title to your website/blog. I used ‘Sample RC Website.’ Pick a Language, privacy setting and click Create Blog.

The Dashboard

When you’re assure that your blog address is yours, proceed to the Dashboard, the center of operations. From here you can control every aspect of your website including the way it looks, privacy options, adding and editing pages and posts, everything. Nothing about your site can be controlled outside the Dashboard. Get familiar with it as you go through this tutorial and it will be your best friend.

Now that you have created your website, feel free to mess around with the dash board. Look around and try new things. Don’t worry about breaking anything. Just don’t save anything. Next we’ll be looking at setting the Settings. That’s right; privacy, timezones, etc. It’s important so read on… (Next Article coming soon…)

Comments or Suggestions?

Give me feedback using the comments section below. I’ll be happy to explain further and use that info to update the article.