It seems like everybody has their own website these days. Everybody...except maybe you. Hi, I'm Mike Stroh, a writer on the Windows team at Microsoft, and today I'm going to show you how to create your own website on Windows Live Spaces, a Microsoft service designed for helping people stay in touch.
Think of your site—we call it a "Space"—as your own little corner of the Internet. It's a place to give a shout out to family or friends, share pictures of your kids, or your philosophy of life via a blog. It can be your electronic soapbox or your private diary. It's really up to you. So let's make one!
First, open a web browser and go to spaces.live.com. If you already have a Windows Live Hotmail or Windows Live Messenger account, you're all set: Just sign in. If not, click Get Started to create a Windows Live ID.
Creating a Space is like building a house. Windows Live frames out a few of the walls—it's up to you to do the rest. The building blocks you'll use are called modules. Every new Space has a Getting Started module, a Title module, a Profile module, and a Friends module.
The first thing I need to ask myself is: What do I want to do with my site? As a new dad, I want to blog about my kids and share their photos with friends and family around the world.
To save time, I'll start with a built-in template. Find them by clicking Customize and then Apply a template. Templates make it easier to quickly create a specific kind of space by combining different visual themes, layouts, and modules. You can still fine-tune everything later.
Okay. I like this basic three-column layout called Focus on friends.
This template has only two modules. So I'll add more. Spaces comes with nearly 40 built-in modules.
I'll grab this photo module for family snapshots.
A blog. An archive for my blog posts. A few list modules, so other dads can see the parenting books I'm reading. And this weather module—just to prove it doesn't always rain here in Seattle.
Okay, so it's a bit of a mess. Kind of like how your house looks after the movers leave. But it's easy to tidy up. Notice how I can just click a module and drag it somewhere else. I can also hide modules by clicking that little triangle in the corner. After I'm all done and click Save, this is what I get. Now my space is really starting to take shape.
Now its time to decide who can see my website. So I click Options and then Permissions.
I'll let anybody see it for now, but if it starts to get too personal, I might come back later and limit my audience.
Now click the Space settings tab to name your space.
The catchier and more descriptive the name, the more likely people will want to read it—or pick it from a list of search engine results. I'll name mine The Minivan Chronicles.
Now do the same thing for your Spaces web address. Unless you're a mathematician, you probably won't find your new Space's address very memorable. Click Personalize your web address. I'll type in my site name and then click Check Availability. Great. It's free.
Alright. So let's check out the finished website.
Today, I've only scratched the surface of what you can do on Spaces. My advice: Have fun building your website. And also check out our two other videos: One on uploading photos to Spaces and another on blogging on Spaces with Windows Live Writer.
