How do I Create a MySpace Blog?

Manage Your MySpace Blog, Address Book, and Music

Now to the part everyone loves: creating a blog on MySpace. For those of you unfamiliar with the meaning of the word, but familiar with the term “blog”, it is short for Weblog, with the “we” cut out. Basically this is a technical term for “chit chat” except this chit chat talks to a specific audience and can actually be useful. For example, in the blog we set up we want to speak to people, (students, 30-somethings, moms and dads, and retirees) who like to garden either personally, professionally, or on a volunteer basis. The blogger plans on discussing everything from her fear of bugs to tips and tricks she recently learned about gardening techniques.

Step One: Click <Home> on the top tool bar to access the main menu. Click <Manage Blog> which is the second to last link. This will take you to your Blog Control Center. (Woo hoo! As you can see from the menu options, you’re almost done building your basic site!)

Step Two: The Blog Control Center (shown below) is the brains behind the blog. The thin menu bar shown below may look skinny, but there is a lot going on here.

Step Three: Let’s get started by clicking the <Post New Blog> link under “My Controls.” Once you do this, an entry form will appear next to your blog menu bar. The first line asks for the day you would like to post your entry. By default this is set as the current date. This feature is offered with many blog posting software, so that you can add many entries at once, and assign each one a future date. This keeps readers interested, as you always have new information no matter what your offline schedule is like. Plus, once you write on short blog, you’ll notice you get into a groove and can usually create a handful at once. On the next line enter your title, and then choose a category from the drop-down menu. In the large box, or body, enter your blog post.

Step Four: As you would with a Word document or email, you can format the text by changing the font style, size, or color; aligning the text, and add images, background colors, or symbols. The following is a close-up of the blog entry format toolbar. Run your mouse over each icon to see what each feature is.

Step Five: If you decide to add a photo, you need to enter the URL for the image, or you can simply copy it from one of your existing websites and paste it into your post.

Step Six: When you are done entering the information, and answering any of the fun questions at the bottom of the page, hit the <Preview & Post> button. The next page will show you a preview of your blog. If you love it click <Post> if you hate it, click <Edit> or <Cancel.>
Once you add a blog post, you’ll notice that at the bottom of each post are links for readers to leave comments or kudos, and for you to edit or remove the post.

Customize the Blog

Step One: To change the background color of the main blog page, add a heading, or make any other changes to the default settings click on the <Customize Blog> menu link under My Controls on the Blog Control Center page. Don’t be intimidated by all of the customization options you see. We’ll break this page down by section and walk you through each one. Let’s start with the first section, General Page Settings. This let’s you change the background color, adjust the alignment and length, set the default font, and determine the number of posts per page. As you make changes you can click <Preview> or <View My Blog> to see how things are progressing. When you preview your site, a message appears asking if you wish to save changes. Click either <Yes> or <No>.

To change your background color, click the icon to the right of the option box. A pop up window showing a grid of color options will appear. Choose a color by clicking it with your mouse and then hitting the <OK> button. That particular color’s “number” will now appear in the background color box. This is also the color box that pops up when you click the icon to change the link colors.

Step Two: The next section of the customization page allows you to modify the page header. There are three main options: no header, custom header, or add your own header HTML. Creating a custom header is easy. Just add a title for the blog, choose a font, create a tagline (optional), and then select a color for the border and interior of your header. If you know HTML you can include your custom code in the HTML header box.

Step Three: The third section lets you customize the site module; these are the menu bars on the left with your picture, details, and information about the blog. Your options here will allow you to add colors and a background to the menu box, decide which side of the blog post you want it on, and pick and choose what information blog viewers can read (i.e. your age, city, status, and gender.) Be careful what information you reveal, remember, these are just blog posts—does your age or gender really affect the value of what you have to say?

Step Four: Wow, this is a long section, but hang in there—your blog is going to look great! The next set of options allows you to adjust blog post settings. Here you can change the background color of the post (not the blog), font, date format and background color, subject font, and the time format and position. After that scroll down to the next short section and designate the colors for the Comments area of your blog.

Step Five: The last step to customizing your blog is to change your background setting, or add a custom style sheet. Add a background image (URL) and music (URL) for your blog and then click <Preview>. Don’t forget to save your changes!
Tada! You’re done customizing the blog! Don’t forget to go back to the main Blog Control page and play around with the links. Your blog stats are also listed on the control page. When people visit your profile, in the upper-right hand corner they will see a list of your latest blog entries, with a link to read them or to subscribe to your blog.

Manage Address Book
The last option on the main menu is to manage the address book, and this one, I promise is easy. Click the last link in the men <Manage Address Book> and you’ll see an address book. Easily add new contacts by typing in their first and last names, email address, and username and then click <Add>. The name of all your contacts will then show on this main page. To change information for a user, or delete an entry, click <Edit> and change the appropriate information. From the Edit page you can also create contact lists (i.e. friends, family, online friends, work, etc.) by clicking the <List> link in the left-side menu bar on the Edit page. And that’s it folks, for your main menu options. It’s official—you have graduated from the basics of building a MySpace page!

Add Music to Your Profile
But wait, folks, there’s more! You’ve added photos, slideshows, video, a calendar, blog, and a contact list, but I bet you’re wondering where the music is? How can you add music to your space? Relax. Adding music to your site is done a little differently than adding photos or videos. The easiest way is to click the <Music> link in the upper toolbar.

This will take you to the main music page. One of the first features you’ll notice is the MySpace Music search engine. One way to find songs is to type in the keyword of a track or artist in the search engine and then click <Search>. You will then receive a list of relevant sites. Be prepared to do some serious sifting to find music to add to your profile on MySpace if you use the search box option. When you search for a band name or song, your results will be riddled with not only the artist’s site (if they have one at MySpace) but also fan pages. Some bands have many, many, many, many fans. A clue to finding the artist’s page (again, only if they have one) is to pick the site with the most views.

Your results will give you this stat.
A second way to find songs is to scroll down to the genre menu, on the left-side of main music page. Click on your genre of choice and you’ll see a chart of related bands listed by their status (unsigned, Indie, or major label.) We chose Electronica from the top genres menu on the main music page, and then scrolled down to find Paul Oakenfold in the major label column. This took us to his MySpace page. For those not familiar with Oakenfold he is famous for Starry Eyed Surprise which you may know from Coca-Cola commercials, as well as Ready, Steady, Go from the movie Collateral.

If you go to Oakenfold’s site you will see he has some songs online, with an <Add> button next to each one. If you click the button, a message asks if you want to add the song automatically to your profile. You can click <Add Song to Profile> or <Cancel>. Once you choose a song, click <Home> and then click <Profile>. A media player will now appear in the left-side menu bar. Click the play button and enjoy! When you’re done enjoying the song and want to delete it click <Home> on the top toolbar then click <Edit Profile> from the main menu. Go to Profile Songs and delete the song.