I have always been passionate about motivating new bloggers to blog. The best that I can do though, is to link them to my various blogs, and then introduce them to my generous circle of friends. The rest is mostly up to them.

In this post, I’m extremely excited to introduce this “newbie”.  She’s a promising writer, having written and directed short plays in her school. She is also an excellent story teller, orator and is a math wizard (Best in Math); she is one of her school’s representatives in the inter-school math quiz bee contests, because of her Kumon advance math knowledge, in which she had earned a silver medal among kids older than she was.

Ryzen Reigne Mergal

By now, you have an inkling that she’s very young, and you’re right; she’s only 9 yrs. old, and in grade 3. Imagine what and who she would turn out to be after a few more years.

Ryzen Reigne Mergal is the daughter or RRchard and Zeny, both brilliant professors in the academe.  Ryz has been a consistent A-1 student in school. She has earned numerous medals in Math, Science and English – a gifted and talented child.

She had started to blog when her creativity could no longer be contained in her notebooks. She has been telling her father though, that nobody would be able to read her posts. Well, guys, let’s show this very young blogger the generous and wonderful side of the blogosphere. Let’s give her the readers that she deserves. Let’s give her the encouragement that she needs.

Do visit her blog – RYZ - and leave your comments. All writers need to know that they are read and appreciated.

Kudos to you Ryzen, welcome to the blogosphere, and keep blogging!

I had been searching for a webhost that was affordable and with great features as well that it took me a long time to decide which one to use.  I researched online for users’ documentation of the pros and cons of each webhost.  Finally, I decided to try Host Gator.

BAPTISM OF FIRE

It was a baptism of fire for me and Roy dela Cruz as our blogs both got infected with an Iframe virus when I asked for his help to transfer my files from my free webhost to  Host Gator.   We were not successful though and I was about to throw in the towel when even after several days, my site was still down.  I had eyed warily the buttons and tabs not knowing what to do next.  I was clueless as Jan Geronimo would describe.   I knew nothing – nada – zilch!

I knew I had to go on, though as I couldn’t remain forever depending on my friends to do the heavy tasks of a webmaster.   If I wanted to “grow” in blogging then I have to graduate from the ABCs of elementary blogging and proceed to “high school”.

THE INEVITABLE DECISION

I was certain, it would take me forever, but I had to DO IT myself or I’ll never learn!  Through the motivation of my friends, DiTesco, Holly, Heather and the rest of the group and with the technical support personnel of Hostgator, who were most helpful and quick in their response, I was able to transfer my files to my public_html.   See? Now I know what it is…he he he.   Through their video tutorials and their online chat system, I also learned how to edit my wp_user, “tinker” with my file manager,   tweak my MySQl@ and breeze through my cpanel with at least a modicum of expertise.

THE ICING ON THE CAKE

Photo courtesy of Nikes Alviz

What more, I learned now how to use the basic wordpress tabs and “commands”.  Whew! I am now slowly bringing in more “furniture”.  I had changed my theme 5-6 times before I settled for this green one.  Green and blue are my favorite colors!

I hope you’ll drop by my new home too as often as you visited my previous blogs.  Don’t worry coffee, san mig light, chocolates and shakes are always ready for you!

A code of conduct is almost always established in any civilized, social community. The blogging world is similar to these social structures.

It is in this context that an international blogging code of conduct should be promulgated to set the ground rules for proper blogging decorum and conduct.

Although bloggers observe an unspoken rule in the blogosphere, several blogging communities established their own rules, because of a few, bad eggs who threaten to spoil the booming and dynamic blogging industry.

Several groups like the HP bloggers, the Blogging Wikia and many more have already established their own ethical standards.

Websites have their own guidelines that you have to accept and comply with before you could join their sites.

The rules of conduct that they have adopted have basically the same thrust – the respect for self and respect for others. i.e. be cautious and responsible of your words, respect the intellectual property rights of other people, etc.

Many are against this idea as they feel that it is a violation of human rights and that some unscrupulous people might take advantage of this to advance their own selfish ends; but this can be minimized by promulgating basic ethical norms that every blogger should follow no matter what diverse culture he comes from.

The Ten Commandments from the Holy Bible would be a perfect example. The commandments are clear, precise and concise. There are various, existing religions but their beliefs adhere to the same basic tenets of the Ten Commandments (i.e. Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, etc.)

This Code of Conduct that every Blogger should follow must set clear boundaries between what is considered as decent and indecent language, of what is bad behavior and good behavior. It should set clear laws and sanctions on the violation of intellectual property rights. It should also be a venue for the prevention of bloggers from exploitation, harassment, spamming and identity theft.

These are genuine crimes that only a Universal code of conduct could address and monitor. Integrity and honesty then would prevail.

These aspects could be included in the Code of Conduct for bloggers, which would make it more significant:

1. No discrimination as to sex, race, or creed we all sentient, human beings.

2. Honesty and sincerity should be lauded, these have their just rewards.

3. The desire to help and support each other. A Magi once said: “Ensuring the welfare of others is ensuring your welfare as well.”

4. No criminal activities. Criminals should not be allowed entry into the blogging world. If someone is caught, they should be given necessary sanctions. Crime does not pay.

5. Love others as you love yourself

These all boil down to the Golden Rule; “Do unto others, what you want others do unto you.”

What about you? What do you observe as a blogging code of conduct?

Photo by cambodia4kidsorg

When I first started blogging, one of my intentions was to earn money online. I have read so many online articles advertising this notion. I was disappointed; however, when after three months, I still had no tangible income. All the ad review sites had rejected my blog application.

I decided then to forget about earning money online and concentrated instead on writing for my blogs.

Writing has always been a great love for me so I wrote several topics in my field of interests and had updated my blogs weekly.

I enlisted my blogs in search engines and in several ranking sites to maximize their exposure. I joined blogging communities and tried all possible means to make my blogs known. I wanted people to read what I wrote.

At first, I could not access my blogs from any search engine, but as days passed, slowly trickles of articles are being displayed in search engines. As my viewership increased my Google page rank appeared and that was the start of my earnings on line. Ad review sites started approving my blog applications.

Here are some strategies that you could use to earn money online:

1. Create a blog.

There are many sites that provide the creation of blogs for free. Create one and maintain it regularly by posting interesting articles.
Photo by Nikes

As mentioned above, add your blogs to all search engines like Google, yahoo, and msn. Enlist your blogs in various ranking sites like Blogtoplist,Alexa ranking,Blog Topsites, etc; this is to advertise your blogs.

Utilize all available gadgets in the internet to maximize your exposure to internet users. You can become a member of blogging communities like Entrecard,MyblogLog,Social Sparks, and many more.

Every three months or so, Google will be ranking your blog. If you had done well in the above-mentioned areas, you’ll be assigned a page rank. As your readership increases, your ranking increases too.

It is your content however, that would let your readers come back for more. Content is King, so be sure to write eye-catching titles and informative articles.

2. Apply your blog for sites which pay for reviews.

After you have gained your Google page rank, you can now apply for the pay per post or paid reviews features.

These sites namely: blogvertise,sponsored reviews,review me and many others would usually pay $ 10 to $ 50 for every review published in your blogs.

You could earn a good income from these sites. Be sure however that your ranking would not go down as Google will decrease your rank if you do not maintain the
proper ratio of paid to unpaid posts, which is usually 1:3.

If your blog loses its rank, advertisers for paid reviews would not select your blog to advertise on, for the simple reason that no one will get to read your reviews.

3. Write for writing sites.

This is one good source of making money online. You just have to be dedicated, disciplined and be hardworking in your quest as a writer.

Do not get discouraged if at first you don’t earn good money. You have to write a lot of articles before you could really earn from their daily views. But remember, these are investments which could last a lifetime.

Examples of these writing sites are Helium,Triond,Associated Content, and many more. Helium has a lot of venues for earning money, like the marketplace, rewardathons, the writing contests, citizen’s contests
and upfront payments for articles as long as you maintain one star. I have earned good money from Helium for the 4 months that I have joined this site.

These sites are all free. If a site asks you to pay for some fees, then don’t join; they should be the one paying you for your articles, and not you paying them.

While you’re writing for these sites, this will also improve your writing skills.

You learn as you write, and write as you learn; to top these all, you earn at the same time. What could be better than that?

4. Allow direct advertisers in your blogs.

There are several sites that you could apply your blog to. Adsense, Adjitize
are some of them. You have to do some research to determine which among them suits you the most.

Beware of scam sites, however. I have not yet reached payout with adsense but I have read several testimonies of users being paid by them.

5. Join Pay per click (PPC) and Pay to click (PTC) sites.

This is where most scam sites are found. Before you join, surf in the internet about personal experiences with these sites. If there are many complaints about the site, then don’t join. One red light for you to disregard the site is when they ask for payment upon registration and anytime during the membership. I don’t recommend any of these sites, as I did not receive yet any payouts from them. I stopped using them two months ago.

6. Join paid forums

These are forums on line in which you post questions/discussions that other forum members could reply to. You are then paid on the quality and quantity of your responses, the discussions that you post, and from the pictures that you have uploaded.

Active participation is needed. An example of this site is MyLot forum. I recommend this site as I have proven already that it really pays its members. I have been paid thrice from this site within the 4 months that I had joined them.

For other legitimate forum sites, surf in the Internet for users’ testimonies. Research well, as there are sites which pay late, and there are several scam sites.

There are still several strategies to earn money online. Open your ears and eyes to all these legitimate opportunities. Be wary of scam sites, though. Be persistent and dedicated in any money-making sites that you have decided to join and you’ll be earning good money in no time at all.

Almost everyone you know talk about their wonderful blogs and how they enjoy blogging. Some of them even claim to have earned a sizable income from blogging. You are interested and you would like to visit their blogs, and eventually, create a blog of your own. You do not know; however, where to start because you are not a computer savvy.

Well, fret not! Here is a step by step outline of how you should go about making your first blogging experience a truly memorable one.

What is a blog?

A blog is a web site which features articles, videos, pictures, journals and many possible means of communication. They could be categorized according to niches or interests. There are blogs for writing and the arts, health and education, IT and computer technology, Travel and photo blogs, money-making blogs and many more.

Blogs gained popularity in 1999 when the first web hosting tools were discovered. From then on, the number of bloggers increased steadily with majority writing their personal journals.
Eventually, blogging areas broadened and more and more topics were included.

Today, there are blogs on all topics under the sun and it still continues to grow in leaps and bounds around the world.

How can you create your own blog? Below are simple steps to follow.

Chronological steps in creating a blog.

1. Determine the purpose of your blog.

Before you create your blog, be certain of what you would like the content to be. What would be the name of your blog? The name of your blog should be in congruence with your content. What is the purpose of your blog? Who are your intended readers? All of these should be taken into account.

2. Choose a domain name.

The domain name should be in congruence with the purpose, the theme and the content of your blog. Choose a name that is catchy and that could easily be remembered by a casual reader.

3. Selecting your web host carefully.

After you have carefully chosen the name of your blog, you have to select now your web host. A web host is a site that owns a server which is accessible in the World Wide Web (www) for internet users. This host will allow your blog to be available in the internet.

There are two most common hostings and these are the free hosting and the paid hosting.

If your blog is for business purposes or other significant enterprise then you should opt for paid hosting. If you just want to experience blogging, then free hosting would be sufficient.

The two most popular free hosting sites are wordpress.com and blogger.com. If you blog for fun, there would be no problems with these two sites. They both have user-friendly features.

For paid hosting, there are hundreds or more, available in the net. Some of them are HostGator, Blue Host, Go Daddy, etc. You have to select the one that best fits your purpose of blogging.

You must consider whether they would provide technical support or not. This is very important if you are a newbie to blogging.

4. Select appropriate theme/template design

Your template design should match your purpose. A formal looking template would be appropriate for a money making blog instead of the flowery, colorful ones.

There are several to choose from:

Two column or three column or more, templates are available. Do not clutter your blog with two many useless columns.

5. Post interesting and related contents to your blog.

After the steps 1 to 4 are done, you are now ready to post your first article. Your article’s title should be carefully selected. More specific titles are preferred than short, general titles.

6. Insert pictures, images or videos to enhance your post.

An all text article would look drab without any picture or image. Be sure to double check your spelling and grammar before posting.
There are spell-checkers and grammar checkers in your blog templates.

7. Be sure to save your article after posting.

Label and assign tags so that web crawlers would be able to pick them up. These crawlers are responsible in updating your blog every now and then.

8. Maximize your blog exposure.

You can do this by enlisting it in ranking sites like Technorati, Blogtopsites, Alexa ranking, Blogtoplist and many others. You could also “Add your URL to Google Search” and “Add your site to Yahoo.”

You could also join blogging communities like Entrecard.com, MyBlogLog, Twitter, Mixx, etc. to increase your ranking and readership.

9. Update your blog regularly.

This may be done three times a week or daily. It all depends upon your goals. A consistently updated blog would be visited more often by crawlers of search engines, thus increasing the exposure of your blogs.

You should also be familiar with the general features of a blog to be able to interact with bloggers properly. These features are:

General features of blogs:

1. Comment section

This makes blog unique because of this interactive feature. Readers could comment on posts they find interesting. The comment section maybe moderated or not. If you want to screen the comments, then you should choose “enable comment moderation”. The comments then would only be posted after your approval. This would prevent “spam” (unwanted comments) from being published.

2. Customize/edit features

You could customize/edit your posts/articles anytime you want to. You could download pictures, upload videos and create external links to other website or blogs.

3. Archives of old articles

Old articles are arranged chronologically according to the date they were written. Labels and tags are also included to further categorize the posts.

4. Feeds

These are machine generated updates of the content of your blog; they maybe RSS (Rich Site Summary) or Atom feeds.

They can be subscribed too and are easily available through emails or Google readers.

5. Blog roll

These are links from other blogs or sites. You can add or delete the links anytime you want to, by entering the customized mode of your template.

6. External links

You could link your article to any source in the internet just by clicking at the link icon.

Blogging would be more meaningful if you could interact with other bloggers.

How could you interact with blogs/bloggers?

You could interact with blogs through the following:

1.
Commenting on articles you find interesting.

Your comment should leave your email address or your back link where the owner of the blog would be able to reply to your comment. Comment only on articles that are of real interest to you; that way your comments would be well thought of and of real value to the discussion.

2. Promote the blog or an article in the blog.

You can Digg, stumble, mixx or Yahoo Buzz the article to promote it. You could also post the URL at MyFace, Yahoo answers, MyLot forum and several forums.

3. Find blogs in your area of interests

The best way to search for blogs is through Google or Yahoo search. You could also visit blogging communities like Entrecard.com to browse their different blog categories.

At Entrecard there are various niches, like arts and culture, mixed bag, personal diary, education, books, blogging, cartoons, and several others. In lifestyle the top three blogs are:

Oriental Lodge

Everyday Living

Freaky Frugalite

In writing:

Blogs to Note

West of Mars

Darnuth Keep

You could also search blogs in several blog ranking sites like Technorati, Blogtopsites, Alexa ranking, Blogtoplist, etc.

The blogs are usually categorized into different niches or areas of interests, so it would be easy searching and browsing through these sites.

If you want to follow a certain blog or writer, you can subscribe to his RSS (Rich Site Summary) or Atom feed.

This machine-generated summary, will update you through your mailbox of new articles written in the blogs that you have selected.

4. Creating your own blog would maximize your interaction with other blogs/bloggers.

Your blog URL (blog internet address) would show up every time you comment or interact with a blog. This would allow you also to follow your favorite blogger.

These are the basics of blogging. As you “blog” along, you’ll be learning more about how to tweak your HTML and many more.

Blogging is a dynamic and challenging activity. You write, learn and interact simultaneously. Be a blogger and be part of this exciting blogosphere!

Since I started blogging , I have always wished for a free blog hosting , my own URL , a blogging community which could critique my blogs, and one place where I can download large amounts of pictures, videos, and files without living the site. I have planned to categorize all my articles into poetry, short stories, quotations, lyrics and novels.

I also had plans of using wordpress with one of my blogs to see if I could be more comfortable with it. All of these seem now to be fulfilled with this amazing free blog that is available over the net. It has all the features I have mentioned above, and many more innovative features.

In the future, I would like also to buy a domain name. What better way to continue blogging than to have your own name? I am sure this would enhance my blogging experience.

The Inspirational Book is progressing slowly. I need more 12 articles to make it 20 articles all in all. I am hoping by July, I would be having my 2o articles, so that the target date of August 31, 2009, would be met.

In the meantime, I would have to contend with this great blogging opportunity available in the Internet, because blogging would always be special to me.

I discovered blogging accidentally when I was researching in the internet about a dissertation I was working on entitled: Web Based Instructional Materials.

Since English is my second language, I had a hard time doing this. I did not even know what blogging was all about; more so with related terms like HTML, XML, widgets, URLs. It was a new world for me (I wrote about this in a previous post).

Through trial and error I learned about blogging, and I would like to think I had graduated from the rudiments of blogging as presently I am looking into web hosting, owning my own domain, and having my own domain name.

Web Hosting is defined as creating your own domain name and allowing a second party to host your site or blog. You have to let someone host your site because you do not have the access to the internet unless you have a server and the technical gizmos of owning a “space” .

Photo by Tim Dorr

Web hosting can come in a variety of styles. We have the free web hosting which is apparently what I am using now. We have also the multiple domain hosting, in which you can employ one web host or several web hosts for your sites, and many more.

You should know the basics of web hosting and know exactly what you want your site to achieve, so you could select an appropriate web host and hosting style.

You should also have to make sure that your web host is a reliable host, and could help you in the technical aspect of your site, an example is interworx which could provide you with this and many more.

There are those web host sites that would lend you a helping hand when you need it, and there are those which leave you on your own. You have to be aware of all their terms and conditions before you decide to sign in.

Web hosting has paved the way for small bloggers to be able to have their sites accessed by people using the internet. Without it, blogging would not have been possible and I would not be here with you sharing all these. Happy web hosting!

If someone told me less than four months ago that I would be a blogger, I would laugh it off.
You see, at that time, I didn’t even know what a blog was all about.

But let me tell you this significant story from the start.

I work with the academe. I try my best to meet up with the ideals of the university where I am engaged in. It is a daunting and formidable task, because it requires one not only to have a mastery of the subject matter but also to be innovative enough to be able to incorporate the updates in science and technology – into one’s didactic methodology.

It was for this reason that I wanted to conduct an experimental study on how I could effectively use solely – the world wide web resources in my particular subject.

One computer expert in the University advised me to open a main “site” of my own.

“How will I do that?” (I only know the basic rudiments of the computer) I could not help but ask him.

“Just surf in the internet, and you’ll learn how.” was the curt reply.

…So there I was, hunkered down on the computer, going over pages and pages of related literature.

Then I chanced upon this:

” Blogger create your blog now — Free!”

I was curious what it was all about, so I clicked on it and followed the prompts.
I got excited when I learned that by making use of this “blog”, I would be able to write about anything under the sun and be “published” in the internet. Incidentally, I forgot to mention earlier that I love writing. In fact, I would have ended up being a journalist if my parents didn’t insist otherwise.

“There is no money in writing, ” they said. Topic closed.

I didn’t have the option but to be an obedient child.

Going back to the story – so that day, I created my very first blog.

I wrote my first post – it was entitled: “ The Value of Honesty”.
It was composed of only one paragraph. I was just curious of how it would work.

As soon as I saw the outcome, I was hooked. I started “blogging”, and within the week, I created 5 blogs (imagine that!) – each with a topic of its own.

And yes, I was able to create 2 blogs for my subject.

After several days however, I realized that my blogs did not appear in any search engine.

I had presumed that they would, because they have been created for the internet. Sadly though, people came to me asking what the URLs were as they could not find them.

So I conducted another search and found this; “Add Your URL to Google”. I got some pointers from google and painstakingly copied the meta tags, etc, to my blogs.

Would you believe me if I say that I had 15 tries before I was able to properly paste the verification code to my blogs’ HTML?

I was ready to give up then!

This computer language was all Greek to me and I didn’t know the “body tag” even if it was there in front of me.

But because of my desire to write, I persisted and learned painstakingly and slowly.

All my sites now had the verification codes in their HTML. BRAVO!

I had also started enlisting my blogs in Bloglists and other blog ranking sites.

To my dismay though, I still got little traffic.

I had a snippet of success – my blogs’ names now appear with google search but not with any other search engine.

I wanted to be read just like any blogger. I wrote because I loved to.
But wouldn’t it be wonderful to share these thoughts, ideas and facts with people around the globe – regardless of race, color or creed? I wanted to share with others my culture in this corner of the world, and learn from them too.

I had dreamed about this to happen one day.

Miracle of miracles, IT DID eventually!

And this is how it happened.

I was going over an interesting site which I had chanced upon the search engine when I noticed this small rectangular logo - ENTRECARD!
I clicked on it and it led me to another site. I discovered that the card was like an endless link to several blogs.

“Get one” the card said, so I registered and got one – more out of curiosity.

And that was the day, my real blogging days began.

I met writers who were excellent in their own genre of writing. The icing on the cake was that- my traffic and rank increased in leaps and bounds.

I could now type “The Clamor of Kalinga” in any search engine and it appears in one of the top searches, or even on top of all the search results.

I have discovered a new and exciting world.

There were varieties of blogs dealing with any topic that I could think of. Blogs that were simply amazing and incredibly informative.

I realized the fact, that to be able to maximize the benefits of entrecard. I will have to consider that entrecard is a community of people – of bloggers, and that in a community – respect for one another, understanding and cooperation – should be observed.

Presently, I try to reach the maximum drops per day, but I don’t make it as my sole target. I usually stop and comment on articles I find worth reading and there are several noteworthy and information laden posts. It is much more rewarding to learn something new and interact with people all around the globe.

I took my chances with ENTRECARD and I had succeeded beyond my wildest dreams.

I laud ENTRECARD for continuously trying to improve their services. I am sure the blogging community recognizes your efforts.

Without you, blogging would never be a dynamic experience.

TO ENTRECARD , THANK YOU AND MORE POWER!