Here’s your first assignment: start your own blog! The easiest way to do that is to sign up for a blog at Blogger.com. Just click on the orange “create your blog now” arrow and fill in the blanks.

You’ll need to decide on a name for your blog (e.g., Cynthia’s blog, Kelly’s Jour61 Blog or The Media Maven) and what color/design you want. Feel free to have fun with it. For example, here’s a link to my personal blog, McCunications. You can see that I’ve added a number of Blogger “widgets” (found in the Blogger “dashboard” in the “template” tab), including a cool Flickr photo display badge (lower right column).

Carefully consider how “public” you want to be before you fill out your “profile.” You can choose not to show your real name or email address (probably a good idea) on your blog. You can choose an alias to serve as your “display name” (the name that goes on each “post” to show who wrote it). You can upload a photo or icon…or not. You can provide some personal info…or not (FYI, I mostly don’t).

Once you’ve got your blog set up, click on “posting” tab in the dashboard to write your first comment. You’ll see that it’s a lot like writing an email. You get a slot for a headline, a box to write in, and tools for editing and formatting what you write. Ycan write right in the form, or write what you want in Word and copy and paste it into the form.

Here’s what I’d like to do for your first blog post: introduce yourself. You don’t have to give your full name if you’d prefer to stay anonymous (remember, unless you check off the box saying that you want to keep your blog private, it’s open to the world) briefly say what you’d like to get out of this class…and maybe what aspect of the media you’re most interested in. Just two or three short paragraphs will do.

Oh, and make sure to email me the URL (web address) of your blog so I can visit it.

If you run into any problems, don’t panic. If you’re in section 4, we’ll go over it in Tuesday’s class. If you’re in Section 80 and would like some help getting started with a blog, feel free to attend next Tuesday’s on-ground class (12 noon in DBH 224), or come in during my office hours, or email me (see syllabus.)