As you might have noticed throughout the year, I’m making an
effort to actually teach you things on Funny Strange every once in awhile,
rather than just spending every single day being the wise-cracking smart ass in
the back of the classroom of life.
With that in mind, here is a little tutorial on free websites. I am writing this here so I can memorialize
it, and so I can point people toward it in the future when they ask me this
question. It’s a win win win!
This is question I get asked quite a bit, actually—people
want to make a website for free, and they want me to tell them the best way to
go about this. Let me qualify my
answer by saying that I am the biggest advocate for saving money and/ or
getting things for free, but I think a website is not where you want to be
saving your money. In my mind, free
websites are a “get what you pay for” situation, and that is because when you
agree to put your website on someone else’s free platform, you are essentially
giving them the right to tell you what to do and to do what they want with your
content. If you are a writer, an artist,
you own a small business, etc, it is really important that you start out by
controlling your web presence, and you really are not in control of a website
built on a free platform. I feel like, if you have an idea, at least give it the respect of a domain and some hosting.
Before I go on about this, though, let me give you some places where
you can make a free website, in case you are determined to make a free website
and are going to ignore my advice anyway. I accept this. It's your life.
Wordpress.com. This is the “free hosting” version of
Wordpress, where you can essentially go and make a whole website for yourself
right now. The domain will look like
this: myfreewebsite.wordpress.com. The difference between this version of
Wordpress and Wordpress.org, which is what you would use to build a website on
your own domain (like mywebsite.com) is that Wordpress.com (and all the
websites built on it) belong to Wordpress, whereas a site where you own the
domain and the hosting and are using Wordpress.org (the software) to build it
belong to you.
Confusing?
Totally. Let’s just boil it down
to say this: anything that ends in
“wordpress.com” does not really belong to you.
Blogger. This is the free blogging platform provided
by Google, and you can go over there right now and start up a website/ blog for
free. In that case, the domain will look
like this: mywebsite.blogspot.com. Blogger is user-friendly and intuitive, so
even beginning beginners can get in there and start blogging right away.
Tumblr: This is a popular platform that is used
mostly for blogging, and (even more specifically), for more visually-oriented
blogging (so, photos, animated gifs, drawings, stuff like that).
Weebly: This is a free platform that will let you
make a website that looks more like an actual website. Yes, they are probably going to make you keep the "Created Using Weebly" link on your site, and you're not going to be able to complain about this, because you got a website for free.
Blogster: This is a free platform that I hear is mostly used by older people who want to start blogs. Interesting!
To pile on more confusing explanations, you actually CAN buy
your own domain and use these “free services” as the host, though this is also
something I don’t want you to do, because if you’re already paying for the
domain, why would you want Wordpress.com/ Blogger/ Tumblr telling you what you
can/ cannot build? That seems crazy to
me.
OK, now that I’ve told you how to make a free website, I
will tell you why I think this is a terrible, horrible idea and why I think you
should just bite the bullet, get a domain and some hosting, and set up a
website that you have control over, rather than putting time and energy into a
free website that could go away at any time.
Here are the reasons to NEVER EVER EVER build a website
(your intellectual property) on someone else’s free platform.
When you build a website on someone else’s free
platform, you are putting them in control of your business. This is probably the most important and best
reason I can give for not doing this.
Last year, I met a writer who had been blogging for SEVEN YEARS on a
Blogger blog. She didn’t have any of
her writing backed up or saved in another location, which essentially meant she
was trusting Google with seven years’ worth of work. One day, she posted a photo that Google
didn’t like, so they DELETED HER ENTIRE BLOG without warning her. Deleted.
Gone. If you’ve ever tried to argue
with Google, you’ll know how far she got doing that. In a complete separate (but equally
disturbing) example, an author built her entire blog/ writing career on a
Blogger blog, then someone got mad at her and reported her blog to Google for
objectionable content. Because she was
on the free Blogger platform, Google put this warning screen up: OUCH.
Again, she did nothing wrong, but her traffic went down by
75%. Since she doesn’t pay for the
service, she has no recourse.
2. “Free” means free to you. That
company is still making money. If you intend to monetize your website in any
way (like with Adsense or affiliate offers), you should know that the company
where you got your website is going to have a say in this decision. Run an ad they don’t like, they can shut you
down. Also, if you do figure out how
to run ads on the site, that free platform is going to take part of the profit,
so that’s awesome.
3. “Free” means you can’t do everything you want to
do. This is especially true in the
“Wordpress.com vs. Wordpress.org” argument.
With Wordpress.com, you simply do not have access to all of the cool
plugins and developments that come from the Wordpress.org environment, so you
are limited to whatever the .com guys want to give you. This means that eventually you are going to
outgrow your site, and then you’re going to have to start over with your own
domain/ hosting.
4. “Free” means that company could go away at any
time, taking your website with it. If
you’re about to say “Google will never get rid of Blogger!” think again. Google will do whatever makes them money,
whenever they want to do it.
5. "Free" means good luck with your tech support. Oh, did your website crash? Well, you got it for free, so no one is going to rush to help you.
Right about now you’re all:
“Repeat yourself much, Culwell?”
I know! But, you’d be surprised
how many times per week I have this argument, especially with authors. Here
is the bottom line on this (for me, at least):
if you are putting something out in the world, it at least deserves the
courtesy of a paid domain and some hosting.
Is your idea not worth $100/ year?
WHY DO YOU THINK THAT? The only
possible use I can think of for a truly free website is something temporary,
like directions to your family reunion.
Tomorrow, I will tell you the steps to setting up your
website so that you own it. I will try
to make it as close to “free” as possible.