"How do I move my blog to my own dotcom address?"
This is easily one of the most common questions I get asked in Second Life (after "hai r u ready 4 teh seks", "can i borrow 10L i'll pay u bk 2moro" and "Hi, can I blog your products?").According to some recent statistic or another [citation needed] that I can't locate, there are approximately 2,000 Second Life blogs currently in active or semi-active publication. As you'll notice, some of these URLs (or web addresses) look like this: yomommasphatblog.wordpress.com, or this: itbringstheboystotheyard.blogspot.com.
Others look like this: anotherorphanedmetaworldblog.com. These are called top-level domains and any internet noob can tell you that they appear to form the backbones of credible website addresses. If you don't know what a "noob" is, you need to start waaaay before this post.
A top-level dotcom blog address is something that many Second Life bloggers have aspired to move to at some mature stage of their blogs' lifespans. While my distinct brand of sloth prevents the capture of the full discipline of web hosting and domain names in a single post, nor does it permit the production of a viable step-by-step in detailing how to perform this task, it does allow me the aim to provide a very high-level and simplified explanation of the concepts involved.
That was a fucking long sentence, guys. I need a nap after writing it, brb.
A Run Down of "Why?"
As with anything that involves any investment of time (and potentially, money), moving to a dotcom should be prefaced with the simple but pivotal question, why do I want to move to a top-level domain?
Generally, the most sought-after ADVANTAGES of a dotcom include:
- Branding and marketing options
- Search engine optimisation (yes, I spell it with an 's' because I live in a Commonwealth nation getoverit)
- Varying levels of customisability and flexibility
The biggest DISADVANTAGES of a dotcom relate to:
- Cost of ownership and upkeep
- Management and maintenance
Yes, some of the more web-savvy of you will be schooling your monitor right now, saying things like "but Liq, what about self-hosted versus service-provider-hosted blogs?" and all that. You are right, depending on the solution you've chosen to run your blog, there will be differing levels of benefits and challenges listed above.
DOMAIN NAMES - A domain name registrar is a company that you 'buy' a domain name, like google.com or myfreeporn.net, from for the privilege of use. I say 'buy' in quotes because really you're just renting it on a usually-annual basis; when you stop paying your bill, you stop being allowed to own and use the domain name you've chosen. If you don't buy one, you can always use a provided one for free (such as xxx.wordpress.com or xxx.blogspot.com).
WEB HOSTING - Separately, you may wish to purchase hosting from a web host, which allows your very own virtual space in the corner of the world wide web for you to store (and serve) pages. This is essentially where websites and webpages are kept and published to the world. They will often package in database allocations that drive selfhosted Wordpress engines and other goodies that we don't care about right now.
Here are the three most common 'choice baskets' that people choose (URLs are examples only and costs are $USD average ranges as at Oct 2012):
There are three common solutions that people tend to gravitate toward. For lack of better naming, I've named them Provider Hosted, Domain Name Only and Self Hosted. Let's break it down into a summary so you have a basic idea what it means...
1. PROVIDER HOSTED
* What most people start out with
* Easy; requires almost no setup at all (sign up with Wordpress, Blogger or Tumblr and start blogging!)
* Free of charge
* No maintenance - a range of features and updates are managed by the provider service*
* You have to have a yourname.wordpress.com or yourname.blogger.com address
* Very limited features and customisation (usually reduced to free offerings for themes, widgets, etc.)
Total Estimated Cost: $0 USD
* Note: Wordpress.com hosted blogs do not support installing the powerful Google Analytics engine but have their own simplified traffic/statistics dashboard functionality. Blogger.com is owned by Google, so have it built-in.
2. DOMAIN NAME ONLY
* You buy a top-level domain name, like binderbitches.com and link it to your blog
* You pay annually, usually between $5 to $30 a year**
* Some setup related to mapping domain name records to point to your blog location is required
* You can link it to a Wordpress/Blogger hosted website or your own - you can choose
* You have the ability to leverage a top-level domain for branding and marketing
* With a bit of setup, you can also have your own email domain (e.g. mromney@binderbitches.com)
Total Estimated Cost: $20 USD per year
** Note: Traditional suffixes like .com, .net and .org are cheaper than newer ones like .tv or .me. You can also pay an additional premium for privacy protection (when people WHOIS backtrace the domain name, the registrar is listed as the contact, instead of your full name and address, which is required for registration).
By the way, you're not supposed to have the words "sl" or "secondlife" in your domain name as this is against Linden Lab Terms of Service regarding marketing and use of trademarks.
3. SELF HOSTED
* You buy both a top-level domain name and you purchase hosting space for your blog***
* This option requires the most setup and the most monetary investment
* You will need to install a Wordpress.org blog engine on your webhost (unlinked to Wordpress.com, the free provider-hosted version).
* You pay annually for domain name ownership, between $5-$30 (as in solution 2)
* You pay monthly for webhosting, usually between $3 to $20 per month****
* Maximum flexibility; more notes below...
Total Estimated Cost: $80 USD per year
*** Note: Of the three example providers, you can only self-host Wordpress-type blogs. Blogger and Tumblr do not offer selfhosting options. There are, however, other blog engines available you can selfhost but that's beyond the scope of this article, sorry.
**** Note: Different web hosts offer different packages for hosting. It's up to you to pick the best ones by comparing reviews based on service, affordability and quality. I have used HostMonster, BlueHost, InMotion and GoDaddy before with varying levels of ease and satisfaction. Often, the web host will also allow you to buy domain names from them (they either are a domain registrar themselves or resell domain names to customers).
More self-hosted notes:
I won't go into the details of setting up a Wordpress blog (there are stupidly-many help articles out there if you search) but there are some hosting requirements that you need - read them here.
With a selfhosting option, because you basically own and run the site and it's content, you have the flexibility to do things like modify the CSS of your Wordpress themes at a code level. Hell, you can edit the PHP pages and entire architecture of your Wordpress installation itself if you want (if you're not scared of breaking everything). Uploaded files will also go to your own webhost and the entire blog will be driven off a database on your rented webhost servers.
If you have existing blog content (posts, comments, etc.) to be transferred over, both Wordpress and Blogger offer cross-platform import/export functionality, though some things just can't be moved.
Because of the customisation options available to you in selfhosting, you may be required to purchase 'full versions' of blog themes that were previously free (albeit, limited versions) to use them on your new blog.
Google Analytics can be tied to a self-hosted Wordpress blog, unlike it's free counterpart.
I hope this was a very basic primer to moving your blog to a dotcom. I apologise if it's unclear or convoluted (or even self-contradictory) as it's currently late and I'm starting to just mash my keyboard while my attention span grows ever-shorter.
Thanks for reading (or tolerating).
If you do have further questions though, feel free to bug me on Plurk (@liquidhell) or IM me inworld (LiquidH3ll.Carter).
Liquid hails from an IT background, with rudimentary (laughable) experience in web-development, web design and web-based object-oriented technologies. He currently manages and maintains the technical side of several Second Life blogs so the authors can focus on blogging. In the past, he has also helped with moving blogs to dotcoms or new hosting.
* Moves/Transfers:
Simply DaniRiaxik - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
RockinChicas - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
JanainaDelvalle - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
Expression - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
VforVeenya - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
NotQuitePink - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
GrandIllusion - transfer from blogger to wordpress
* Service/Maintenance/Other Support:
Slidioglossia - new domain name
KyootSL - wordpress reinstall - site no longer active
LittleMissFashionCupcake - new domain name
KeepCalmAndKeepShopping - theme layout fix
Eenie-Meenie-Miney-Moh
There are several options available for the standard blogger wanting to move to a dotcom. This allows some flexibility in terms of expense and customisation. Basically, you need to know about two services: domain names and web hosting.DOMAIN NAMES - A domain name registrar is a company that you 'buy' a domain name, like google.com or myfreeporn.net, from for the privilege of use. I say 'buy' in quotes because really you're just renting it on a usually-annual basis; when you stop paying your bill, you stop being allowed to own and use the domain name you've chosen. If you don't buy one, you can always use a provided one for free (such as xxx.wordpress.com or xxx.blogspot.com).
WEB HOSTING - Separately, you may wish to purchase hosting from a web host, which allows your very own virtual space in the corner of the world wide web for you to store (and serve) pages. This is essentially where websites and webpages are kept and published to the world. They will often package in database allocations that drive selfhosted Wordpress engines and other goodies that we don't care about right now.
Here are the three most common 'choice baskets' that people choose (URLs are examples only and costs are $USD average ranges as at Oct 2012):
What the Fuck, Dude? Break it down for me...
This is intended to be an extremely beginner-oriented explanation, so I will gloss over or oversimplify a few concepts. If you have questions beyond my rudimentary outline, feel free to bug me on Plurk (@liquidhell) or IM me inworld (LiquidH3ll.Carter).There are three common solutions that people tend to gravitate toward. For lack of better naming, I've named them Provider Hosted, Domain Name Only and Self Hosted. Let's break it down into a summary so you have a basic idea what it means...
1. PROVIDER HOSTED
* What most people start out with
* Easy; requires almost no setup at all (sign up with Wordpress, Blogger or Tumblr and start blogging!)
* Free of charge
* No maintenance - a range of features and updates are managed by the provider service*
* You have to have a yourname.wordpress.com or yourname.blogger.com address
* Very limited features and customisation (usually reduced to free offerings for themes, widgets, etc.)
Total Estimated Cost: $0 USD
* Note: Wordpress.com hosted blogs do not support installing the powerful Google Analytics engine but have their own simplified traffic/statistics dashboard functionality. Blogger.com is owned by Google, so have it built-in.
2. DOMAIN NAME ONLY
* You buy a top-level domain name, like binderbitches.com and link it to your blog
* You pay annually, usually between $5 to $30 a year**
* Some setup related to mapping domain name records to point to your blog location is required
* You can link it to a Wordpress/Blogger hosted website or your own - you can choose
* You have the ability to leverage a top-level domain for branding and marketing
* With a bit of setup, you can also have your own email domain (e.g. mromney@binderbitches.com)
Total Estimated Cost: $20 USD per year
** Note: Traditional suffixes like .com, .net and .org are cheaper than newer ones like .tv or .me. You can also pay an additional premium for privacy protection (when people WHOIS backtrace the domain name, the registrar is listed as the contact, instead of your full name and address, which is required for registration).
By the way, you're not supposed to have the words "sl" or "secondlife" in your domain name as this is against Linden Lab Terms of Service regarding marketing and use of trademarks.
3. SELF HOSTED
* You buy both a top-level domain name and you purchase hosting space for your blog***
* This option requires the most setup and the most monetary investment
* You will need to install a Wordpress.org blog engine on your webhost (unlinked to Wordpress.com, the free provider-hosted version).
* You pay annually for domain name ownership, between $5-$30 (as in solution 2)
* You pay monthly for webhosting, usually between $3 to $20 per month****
* Maximum flexibility; more notes below...
Total Estimated Cost: $80 USD per year
*** Note: Of the three example providers, you can only self-host Wordpress-type blogs. Blogger and Tumblr do not offer selfhosting options. There are, however, other blog engines available you can selfhost but that's beyond the scope of this article, sorry.
**** Note: Different web hosts offer different packages for hosting. It's up to you to pick the best ones by comparing reviews based on service, affordability and quality. I have used HostMonster, BlueHost, InMotion and GoDaddy before with varying levels of ease and satisfaction. Often, the web host will also allow you to buy domain names from them (they either are a domain registrar themselves or resell domain names to customers).
More self-hosted notes:
I won't go into the details of setting up a Wordpress blog (there are stupidly-many help articles out there if you search) but there are some hosting requirements that you need - read them here.
With a selfhosting option, because you basically own and run the site and it's content, you have the flexibility to do things like modify the CSS of your Wordpress themes at a code level. Hell, you can edit the PHP pages and entire architecture of your Wordpress installation itself if you want (if you're not scared of breaking everything). Uploaded files will also go to your own webhost and the entire blog will be driven off a database on your rented webhost servers.
If you have existing blog content (posts, comments, etc.) to be transferred over, both Wordpress and Blogger offer cross-platform import/export functionality, though some things just can't be moved.
Because of the customisation options available to you in selfhosting, you may be required to purchase 'full versions' of blog themes that were previously free (albeit, limited versions) to use them on your new blog.
Google Analytics can be tied to a self-hosted Wordpress blog, unlike it's free counterpart.
Long Story, Short...
As you can see, there are a lot of options surrounding a decision to move to a dotcom. I've presented just the most basic common choices, but the opportunities are very wide-ranging and dependent on your personal needs and budgets.I hope this was a very basic primer to moving your blog to a dotcom. I apologise if it's unclear or convoluted (or even self-contradictory) as it's currently late and I'm starting to just mash my keyboard while my attention span grows ever-shorter.
Thanks for reading (or tolerating).
If you do have further questions though, feel free to bug me on Plurk (@liquidhell) or IM me inworld (LiquidH3ll.Carter).
Liquid hails from an IT background, with rudimentary (laughable) experience in web-development, web design and web-based object-oriented technologies. He currently manages and maintains the technical side of several Second Life blogs so the authors can focus on blogging. In the past, he has also helped with moving blogs to dotcoms or new hosting.
* Moves/Transfers:
Simply DaniRiaxik - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
RockinChicas - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
JanainaDelvalle - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
Expression - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
VforVeenya - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
NotQuitePink - full selfhosted setup (wordpress)
GrandIllusion - transfer from blogger to wordpress
* Service/Maintenance/Other Support:
Slidioglossia - new domain name
KyootSL - wordpress reinstall - site no longer active
LittleMissFashionCupcake - new domain name
KeepCalmAndKeepShopping - theme layout fix
I had some questions that were asked over the last 12 hours, so I thought I'd answer them here in comments section as concisely as I could:
ReplyDeleteQ: Will you help me modify my theme?
A: Sorry, theme development is pretty much a fulltime job for some web developers, and I don't have the resources or the practice to be any greater help than the very trivial.
Q: I don't want to use my domain anymore, can I get a refund if I still have time left?
A: If you buy milk and decide to throw it out, do you ask for a refund for the milk you didn't drink?
Q: How come there's free hosting that can host my Wordpress blog?
A: Sometimes webhosts offer free webhosting but they limit things like processor power and database storage (or have ads). Depending on widgits and add-ons, some Wordpress installs can be pretty CPU-intensive and require hefty resources which just aren't available to free hosting plans.
Q: What do you mean by 'management' and 'maintenance' for selfhosted blogs?
A: Wordpress regularly release updates to their blogging engine. This is like any software platform; you will be responsible for updating it yourself (usually like 3 clicks of a button). These fixes will patch security breaches and bugs, so it's important that you not only apply these updates, but ensure your chosen blog theme are updated too, in case of theme-specific exploits.
Q: Can I move from one web host to another?
A: I don't know, can you?
Q: Can you explain more about 'privacy' with domain names?
A: When you register/buy a domain name, you have to give your full name, address, contact information (like if you bought online software). When people do a WHOIS search ('reverse domain search') on your domain, your details come up. You can pay extra to hide this information and replace the listing with that of your registrar's generic details. I highly recommend this for Second Life blogs where there are some elements of RL confidentiality required.
Q: Is having a dotcom more credible and fancy?
A: This really is a question that has a tailored answer for each individual blogger. What does it mean *to you* to have a toplevel domain? Is it worth the price you pay? Are you going to take advantage of the marketing/branding potential? Are you going to lose your existing subscribers and web hits? Is it successful as it is? Will it improve your search ratings? Can you afford it? I can't answer this for everyone because we all have different priorities.
I will continue to answer questions in comments section as they are asked (until I get bored).
Q: Someone said that mapping an existing Wordpress.com blog to a custom domain name you own costs money, is this true?
ReplyDeleteA: Yes, I didn't cover this much, but Wordpress.com charges a $13 USD per domain per blog fee to map a domain you already own to a blog they're hosting. You can find options in the Dashboard, but here is the reference link: http://en.support.wordpress.com/domains/map-existing-domain/ Note: The $13 is *not* the price of a new domain, simply the administrative fee WP charge you to map your own domain to a blog they're hosting for you.
Q: What is love?
A: Baby don't hurt me.
Q: I want to map a service-provider hosted blog to a custom domain name - how do I do it?
ReplyDeleteA: There are a few steps to take to do this - you generally have to map CNAME and ANAME domain records. If you don't know what this means, Google it. Otherwise, here are the respective CNAME (and optional ANAME) config documentation for the 3 most common blogs:
Wordpress.com - http://en.support.wordpress.com/domains/map-existing-domain/
Blogger.com - http://support.google.com/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=58317
Tumblr.com - http://www.tumblr.com/docs/en/custom_domains