A "blog" is abbreviated from the term, "web log" which is a form of online diary or journal.

Since its advent a few short years ago, blogs have found numerous uses. Just to name a few, these include:

- teenagers putting their thoughts and ramblings online

- hobbyists giving updates about their interests and passion

- people staying updated with friends overseas

- professional bloggers updating specific niche products

- multinational corporations (MNC's) such as Microsoft & General Motors using blogs as marketing tool

Like a web site, a blog has global reach. However, it's far cheaper, quicker and definitely easier to maintain a blog than a traditional web site. A blog's contents can be easily updated by submitting short or long articles (commonly known as blog posts) through an easy-to-use graphical interface. As a blog's content is updated regularly, they naturally attract both human readers as well as search engines hungry for fresh content.

To set up a blog, we need some form of blogging software or platform. There are free software like Blogger and WordPress and there are paid platforms like Moveable Type and Typepad.

Blogger is owned by Google. It's free and perhaps the easiest way to create a blog and your first post, literally within minutes! Howeer, its features are somewhat limited.

Thus, WordPress is a good alternative if you are looking for free blogging software. As it is an open source software, it is literally supported by a huge community of users and developers that assists both new and experienced bloggers. Not only feature rich - it supports categories, pages and trackbacks, just to name a few - it is constantly being updated through its core software as well as through software plugin's which are bonus software components that extend the basic functionality of WordPress. For more information, visit WordPress.org

Here are 3 different ways to get a WordPress blog up and running:

1) Via WordPress.com

2) Via WordPress.org

3) Via CPANEL's Fantastico

VIA WORDPRESS.COM

Like Blogger, you can get your WordPress blog and first post up and running within several minutes through WordPress.com! This site is meant for people to get a taste of WordPress without having to go through the somewhat involved procedure via WordPress.org (see the section below). If this is the first time you are getting your WordPress blog up and running, you should definitely give this a shot.

It's as easy as going to WordPress.com, clicking the button that says "Get a WordPress Blog Now>>" or something like that and following the directions there. And then, you start posting!

In this case, your WordPress blog will be hosted on WordPress.com totally free. Therefore, you do not need your own web host. The only drawback is that there are limitations such as you can't install your own themes or plugin's.

VIA WORDPRESS.ORG

Instead of having your blog hosted on WordPress.com, you can install WordPress on your own web host. (Of course, in this case, you need to have your own web hosting account which preferably comes with a version of "CPANEL" - a an easy-to-use graphical control panel to manage your web host.)

Setting up of the WordPress blog comprises the 3 main steps below.

Step 1: Visit WordPress.org and download the WordPress installation files which are free (since it is open source software as mentioned before). As the files are in a compressed format, run your compression utility (such as Winzip) to expand the files to your hard disk..

Step 2: Run your File Transfer Protocol (FTP) program and connect to your web hosting account. Then upload the installation files to the domain (if you have multiple domains hosted) and folder that you want your WordPress blog installed.

Step 3: This step is going to be challenging for the non-techie type if they managed to survive Step 2! You log into the CPANEL of your web host and create and configure your MYSQL database. After this is done, you need to configure some files to complete your installation.

Next, launch your browser to access your blog and start making your 1st post by running the "wp-admin.php" script that has been installed.

As you can see, this is the "normal" but very tedious way of setting up of your WordPress blog.

However, the effort you expend is worthwhile as you can configure all aspects of WordPress like installing the theme you like and adding HTML codes to include Google AdSense on your blog to earn some profit, etc.

VIA FANTASTICO

Again, you install WordPress on your own web host but this time through FANTASTICO. In this case, not only would you need to have your own web hosting account, it MUST come with a version of "CPANEL" that includes "FANTASTICO" - an advanced script installer that automates a 1-click WordPress installation! (Actually a few clicks are needed.)

With FANTASTICO, all the 3 steps above are automated for you. All you need to do is to log into the CPANEL of your web host and then click the FANTASTICO icon, which is a smiley face.

In the next screen, click on "WordPress" and then click on "New Installation". FANTASTICO will open a form and you fill in a few things like which domain (if you have multiple domains hosted) and which folder to install to. Once you have typed in the information and pushed a button, FANTASTICO will install WordPress in a few seconds!

How is that possible? That's because the installation files are already at your web host. This saves you time as you don't have to download them from WordPress.org, expand them and upload to your web host. Likewise, the databas is also automatically created and configured for you.

Next, launch your browser to access your blog and start making your 1st post by running the "wp-admin.php" script that has been installed.

As you can see, this is the "preferred" method of getting a WordPress blog up and running, also within minutes.and yet you can have all the benefits of configuring all aspects of WordPress, such as adding Affiliate Programs easily (including Amazon.com) and Google AdSense to make a handsome profit month after month!

Copyright 2006 Roger Loh