Publishing stories online - anyone else doing this?

[Nick B]

Thanks guys, I'll look into it

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Look for one with single click WordPress installation

Some of those are nasty. Wordpress's install instructions are clear and it's less than 10 minutes (most of that is the file upload time!).
You make a subfolder on your hosting and designate it for the domain (using Hosting control panel). Then you put the nameservers of hosting company into the DNS setting of your domain registrar and turn everything they do, "off".

Sadly no-one gets to buy a domain name. You rent right to use it and don't let it lapse or its expensive to get back as neer-do-wells will rent it or even registrars will "park" it with adverts.
You'll get SEO spam unless you registered Domain with "privacy service" for "Who Is". That costs me about €4 a year per domain. The SEO spam looks like renewal notices.

If the hosting comes with an annual "free" domain, then choose the same name as you have but .com .net .org or .biz or .co.uk etc instead of current ending and then you have a 2nd "free" site (in a separate subfolder on hosting) to test changes on.

Some hosting companies with bad reviews are among the best, the problem is people not reading the instructions, or the company being really popular. I've been with 5 companies since 1996. I'm currently using 1&1, a German company, though my hosting with them is in USA. They have a UK organisation too.

Decent hosting lets you create a large number of free subdomains, ie. www.fred.liberator.com www.stuff.liberator.com if main domain is liberator.com. Technically www.liberator.com is usually an automatic subdomain aliased to liberator.com but sometimes it isn't.

 

[gdoc]

Quellist, ignore the avoid one-click installer advice above. They are fine, and if you are not technical they guide you through without fumbling with FTP etc.

Another option is squarespace. It could be ideal for the first version of your site, although you'd need to give some thought to what you'd do if you chose to leave and had lots of content. I've not used them myself but there is zero setup and a low monthly fee.

Build a Website

 

[Ray McCarthy]

They are fine,

Actually loads are garbage. I've had to "rescue" people from one click installers. Some do not let you upgrade!
FTP with Filezilla is no harder than copy files to a USB storage device that has a password!

Squarespace is stunningly bad idea.

 

[gdoc]

Actually loads are garbage. I've had to "rescue" people from one click installers. Some do not let you upgrade!
FTP with Filezilla is no harder than copy files to a USB storage device that has a password!

Squarespace is stunningly bad idea.

Relax, Ray. It is fine for a version one, to get something online with the minimum of fuss. If I had a pound every time some tech head told a novice there's nothing to it, just fire up Baffling Product X and type in these simple commands, I wouldn't be on here

I've never used Squarespace, but if he has the money then a fully hosted everything-done-for-you affair might be fine to get started too. I'm sure he will find something that works for him.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

I've never used Squarespace,

Risky to recommend it then

 

[Richard Thomas]

Weird how this turned into a hosting debate. I've been a web developer since 1997. You don't need a masters in computer science or a ton of advice to start a blog. You can start a decent one at wordpress.com and just have it hosted there. It's not free but it's worth not having the headache of dealing with something else.

As far as the idea, I've thought a lot about this. I have a blog where I just write very short summaries of story ideas. I do it because it's fun. My traffic grows a tiny bit every few weeks. I figure if I'm writing something people enjoy reading then it'll be even better for me when I complete one of longer works.

 

[Old_Man_Steve2016]

I've been fussing around with Wattpad lately. It's a story hosting site that looks a little bit like Tumblr and Medium. Website and App based formats.
There is a comments section for each chapter of your story, and fans can give you paragraph specific advice.

You can't sell products there, but you can release bonus chapters and point people to your sale site (amazon, smashwords, etc).
A few writers have gotten book/movie deals from them. I'm trying to get in on the Tales From the Crypt reboot.

If you want some more tips, keep an eye on my SFF blog- whenever I encounter something a writer might want to know about, I'll post it there.

 

[allmywires]

Wattpad just makes me think of fanfiction!

The only stuff I've ever posted online is fanfiction. You have to be super careful of plagiarism - mine has certainly been reposted to other fanfiction sites, for example, but there's next to nothing you can do to control it. I think posting other original work online is a nice idea but how much volume do you see through that? It would be good to build a reader base for future publications, but be careful of posting stuff you later want to publish. People don't take too kindly to getting free content and then having it removed and put behind a paywall.

 

[Martin Gill]

I've pushed some short stories out on my wordpress page and link through to Facebook. I don't get a massive amount of traffic but I haven't done much with it for a while. But to be honest I'm writing because I enjoy it. I write and edit non fiction as a major part of my job so writing creatively is a nice distraction and actually helps hone my work skills. I'm under no illusions that I'll replace my professional salary any time soon through writing fantasy!