MySpace How To

I am going to show you how to add a profile layout, (those cool looking graphics and pictures you see on web pages) at a social network site called MySpace. You can then take what you have learned and start to play around at blog sites or other social network sites. If you use your search engine you can find some good ones and most of the time they are free to join, giving you a free web page to say hello to the world.

Let's get started, type MySpace.com in your browser window, and click sign up on the front page. Fill in the short sign up form, click sign up. Be sure to write down your email address and password because that is your login information. You will come to a page where you must enter some text into a capcha box, fill in the charachters and enter. You will be prompted to upload a picture of yourself now. Be sure to have one saved on your computer in your "my pictures" file before you start this process so everyone will know who you are. Click browse, a window will open, look for the picture that you chose and double click it. The window will disappear and your picture code will then be in the box on the page. Click upload or if you want to, you can click the "skip this step" and do it later. Now, you will see an invite your friends page. The first box is where you can add email addresses of your friends, separate each email by a comma like this: w@es.com, sw@se.com. MySpace already typed out a nice welcome and invite for you, click invite or again, you have an option to skip this step if you like.

You should now see your home page and your picture, if you uploaded one. There will be a red box above your name that says "verify your email address. Click here. You will go to another page where there will be a button that has "request verification email", click that. You should have a screen that says verification email sent.

Go to your email account. The email will be from MySpace Admin called MySpace email verification. Open it and click on the link to complete the process. A new browser window will open up and you will be back at MySpace, email address verified, click return to home.

Just under your picture, you will find a red box that says "pick your MySpace name URL. Whatever name you pick here, will be your nickname in the MySpace community. Choose wisely, because this is what people will associate you with forever on MySpace. My name is Wavecritter, if you want to, see my page and make me your friend. I really enjoy helping people with fun and learning!

Read this next little bit on the site carefully. And choose accordingly. This name is going to stick and you cannot change it once you choose. This page also says a bit about your display name. We can change that if you want in a bit, so don't worry for now. Two little windows even come up to make sure you are happy with your name before it takes it as permanent.

The next screen is for you to enter your real name. I add mine here, so if someone who is looking for me, but does not know my nickname, can find me. Your real name never shows up anywhere on your profile, home page or anyplace easily accessible. Or, you can choose to skip this step as well. You are now at a page where your information like your username, real name, URL, and display name are. Be sure to take note of your URL. This is what you tell your friends to type into their address bar to view your profile when you have completed it. There is also a "grab this code to add your MySpace URL to your AIM profile. Whether or not you have an AIM profile, let's try to copy and paste this into your notepad or save it as a draft in your email. With your mouse, use the right click button while your cursor is over the code in the box, click your right click and choose select all. Then, while the highlight is still on the code in the box, right click it and choose copy. Now, go to your email, click compose message, or new mail to open like you are going to write a letter, right click on the page, choose paste and there you go! Save this email in your drafts so later you can go back and post this on one of your blog sites or other sites for an easy clickable link to your MySpace profile. Or, you can use your notepad to save this link.

You are now a master of cutting and pasting! And, you got a glimpse of an HTML code, saved it for later, and are on your way to an award winning page.

Returning to the page with your username, URL, display, and real name. Look at the upper part of the page. There is first an ad, then a horizontal line starting with a clickable MySpace, People, Web, Music, etc. Just below that is a Google search bar, and just below that is another horizontal line of clickables starting with "home". Let's keep that one in mind for now. This is the one to click on, if you ever get lost when you are exploring the site. You will be brought back to familiar territory, your picture. Click on that now. Take a few minutes to study the page and get real comfortable here. This is your home, no one but you sees it. This is where all the controls to create your wonder page will be found. Play around, get click friendly, just remember, you can always go back home. And too, don't forget to sign out before you leave. The sign out button is in the upper right hand corner.

My part two will be coming soon, so you can make your page special. But before I end this, I wanted to tell you how to change your display name and account settings. Next to your picture, there is a list of things on the right, starting with "edit profile", just below that is "account settings" click here. It will display your email address, preferred site location and time zone. You can change these by clicking the drop down menu and choosing the correct time zone and location. Then click save changes.

Go back to your home page, and click edit profile. Later, get familiar with this page. Just look it over, read the headers, and study the layout, so that when you read my next article, you will be more certain of yourself as we move on. OK, at the top of the page, it will say Profile Edit, Interests and Personality. Then, a smaller type interests and personality and name. Click on name. You will see your user name, real name, and display name. This is where you can click to erase and rename yourself. I chose my Wavecritter here as well. I figured, it took so much thought to choose this username in the beginning, with all of the consideration, that would be a good one to use. After you choose, type it in the display name box and click save changes. To see what your visitors and friends will see when they come to your page, click the "view my profile" text in the upper right hand corner.

I think you did a great job! Now, you can click home, sign out, explore a bit, and even make a friend if you like. Stay tuned for my follow up to make your site sparkle! In the meantime, Google search me, Wavecritter! For more How To's, tidbits, and thoughts.

Stephanie Haile AKA Wavecritter Google Me

http://www.MySpace.com/Wavecritter

This is part two to my detailed step by step instruction for navigating a MySpace page. I am convinced that if you can learn to create your own MySpace page, you can create a blog or other social network site page. Part three is coming very soon.

Hello again future web site masters! Here we go with part two of How To Get Started At Myspace, on a Blog, Or Other Social network.

We left off with the display name change. OK, let's log back into MySpace and start again. You type in your email address and password that you used to get started and that will take you to your friend, the home page.

Did you get acquainted with this page and explore around awhile? If not, take some time and do that now. Pay particular attention to the "edit profile" link and the boxes on the page. After you click the "edit profile", a description of the boxes on that page follows.

The Headline space contains whatever you want to show just above your picture on your profile page. It will not be the same thing as on your home page. Remember, your home page is for your eyes only, but your profile is what your friends see. So feel free to type whatever you want here and change it as often as you wish to. Some, like myself, leave it the same all the time. I just type Wavecritter here so it is easy for all to know my username. Some, like to change it every week or so, depending on their mood. It is entirely up to you. When you start venturing out and making friends, you will see what others do. I recommend making one change in one box at a time. After you add the type for Headline, click save all changes. You will then see a red typed "profile updated" above the save all changes button.

Before we get into the other boxes, starting with the "About Me" section, I think we ought to cover the other type click areas along the horizontal line of the "interests and personality" link. The one next to the "interests and personality" is "Name", this one we covered last time, then, there is "Basic Info", let's click there now. Most of this is already filled out for you, but if you want, you can choose to type in your occupation, your ethnicity, your body type, height (if you fill this is be sure to unclick the little no answer box under height), and what you are here for, I click friends and networking. Then click "save changes". Again, you should see the red type "profile updated above gender.

On to "background and lifestyle", here you have options for marital status, sexual orientation, hometown, religion, whether you smoke or drink, if you have children, your education, and income. Feel free to leave any of these as "no answer". The only one that you will need to choose is the marital status, this is set to single as a default choice. Under "income" click "save changes" and once again you will see the red "profile updated". It's getting kind of easy now, isn't it? That is good, getting your comfort level higher, raising the bar.

Next is adding your schools, company you work for or wish to promote, and then "song and video on profile". Let's go over this one next, I am certain that you can handle the other two solo.

This link is fairly self explanatory as well, but I will walk you through a bit. First, decide if you want a song to play on your view profile page. If so, click on "find a band in MySpace music", (you can still see the home page link, you can always go back home and start over), the search artists box is where you will type in the artist or song title you are wanting to put on your site. After you type it in, click search. Don't stress over a song title or band name if you can't think of any because the next page you can just choose a type of music to search. Like Rock, Pop, Country, Hawaiian, or Jazz and many more. While you look around, remember that you can click on the blue type names of the bands and then go right back by clicking your back arrow button located by the address bar way up in your browser window. Also, there is a search criteria box on the right where you can change what music you are viewing. This is also a great way to make some celebrity friend while you choose your music. When you click on an artist name in blue type, you then go to their profile page. Find the "add friend" link under their picture or close by, click that, click confirm add, then it will say "an email has been sent to add this user. You then have the option to view the artist profile again, click the back button until you get back where you want, go home and start over, or go back and add a video.

When you do find a song that you would like to add that is on a player box, look next to the song on the right, there will be an "add" click. Click it, and a page with a box saying "Do you really want to add this song to your profile?" will show. Click yes, and it will say that the song has been added to your profile. You can now either go back to the artist's profile or go home.

Back at the home page click edit page again, and song and video on profile. This is all starting to come natural, isn't it? Now, the same process for a video, if you want to look for one. Although, when you get into the Myspace TV section, the home link is all the way at the top more toward the right side. It says MySpace Home. The link to add the video is directly under the playing video as you choose to view them, not in the long list of potential viewable videos. Then return to your home page.

Now, we will explore your account settings link just below the edit profile next to your picture. We already covered the time settings. The next link is your password. If you ever want to change your password, click here and fill in the boxes for current, new, verify (just retype your new password here) for passwords, then type in the letters from the safety box and click save changes. The privacy link is for your general privacy settings, here you can choose to show others your birthday, when you are online, profile viewable or not by everyone, photos, or you can choose to block a user here. The spam link is for more specific privacy settings. Read through the list and check or uncheck the "x boxes" and then save changes. Remember that whatever you do can be changed if you redo the step and click save changes. The notifications link is for e-mail and newsletter notifications. You choose whether or not you wish to receive these here, then click save changes. The mobile and calendar links work just the same way.

The miscellaneous tab has settings for your music to start automatically or not, your profile settings for HTML comments (the cool pictures that people like to post), and if you are going to be away from MySpace for a time to set a message for your friends.

Now, back to the home page and I will point out some important areas here. Just below your friends area will be a view birthdays. People love to get birthday wishes and this link will take you right to the friends having birthdays soon so you can click on their picture, view their profile, and add a comment to their profile page.

View your own profile at this time, the link to do that is directly under your picture, it will say view profile, pics, videos, blog, comments, friends, groups and get used to the layout. The message, add friend, view friends, add comment, subscribe to blog, and bulletins.

The difference between a message and a comment is that the message is private to your friend, and the comment goes directly on the profile page for everyone to see. Now, your blog listings do not get sent to anyone except people who subscribe to them. And the only way they can see them is to go to your profile page and click on your blog listings. The bulletin post section is for you to be able to post one comment for all of your friends at the same time, listed in their bulletin sections on their home page, not their profile page.

So, to view another persons profile, you click on their picture, and you will be taken to their profile page. From here you can add them as a friend or interact with them in other ways. The search and invite links will help you find friends, I am teaching you how to fluff your page, so I won't get into that. I am certain, once we are finished, you will be navigating like a pro.

The biggest and fluffiest part is yet to come. So, again, play around and get comfortable with the view of the boxes on your edit profile page, because part three will make your space shine.

Stephanie Haile aka Wavecritter Google Me

Here comes the fun part that we all have been waiting for! We all have our pages set, we can navigate around MySpace, now we put some "Wow" on our pages!

Let's log in to our MySpace pages and begin. Click on the "edit profile", which now has become second nature I believe. Have you gotten familiar with the about me, TV, music, etc. boxes on this page? Then let's get busy.

Open another browser window and search for MySpace layouts. Some spaces are easier to navigate than others, in my opinion. For this instruction, I will get you through a pimp your profile site. I chose this because men do not appreciate having an ad for the girly space on their pages. If you are a women, then I would encourage you to see the awesome layouts on other girly sites as well. You see, wherever you go to choose a page layout, that site will include a small ad for there site in the layout HTML code. They have an ad to direct someone else who likes your page to the site you found your cool layout on.

After opening another browser window, type in the address to a pimp your profile site. You do not have to log in or register here if you don't choose to, you are just browsing the layouts. About a third of the way down the page is a layout tab, and under it includes layouts for MySpace, Blogs, and other Social Network Sites. Click on the text MySpace Layouts, if you click on the MySpace box it will take you to the MySpace site and then just click your back arrow up by the address bar in your browser window.

Since you are an old pro at the copy and paste procedure, (remember, we did that in part one), I will only brush over it briefly. You find your layout, (this might take a while because there are so many great ones), look first through the category listing, choose your category by clicking the highlighted text, pick one to preview. Always preview before you select to see the code. It might look great small, but when you see it in a large view, there may not be an add friends button, or no place for people to message you, or worse yet, no area to get comments on your profile page! Check for these things during your preview. When you have selected one by navigating through the numbered pages on the pre-made layouts don't get tempted by the tweak your layout just now. After you have completed your page, you can then go use your talents to explore HTML tweaks for another site's page. Click the details and code highlighted text.

Under the profile selected, you will see a text bow with your profiles HTML code in it. I showed you how to copy and paste using your mouse and the right click method. There is another way as well, to right click on the code and select all. While it is still highlighted, on your keyboard press the Ctrl button and the c button at the same time. Or you can just right click your mouse after it is highlighted and click copy. Never close your profile code page until you have pasted, saved changes, and then viewed your own profile to see if it takes. You just did a lot of work to choose the one you wanted, it will be that long again to find it the second time.

Go back to your MySpace edit profile, and in the About Me section, if you wish to tell the world a bit about yourself, type that in now. At the end of your text, click the enter button about 3 or 4 times to leave a space between your text and the code you are going to paste here. Make sure the cursor is down the 3 or 4 spaces and then either right click and paste or on your keyboard press Ctrl then v, holding the buttons down together for a second. You will then see the code you copied on your about me section! Click preview profile. This will not quite look the same as your view profile, but you will see if it is coming together at this point. If it is, click save all changes, then type the letters from the "capthcha" box into the bar and click save changes. This process will direct you back to your edit profile page, with red text saying "profile updated". If it does not say this, start the steps over until it does.

In the upper right hand corner, click view profile to see what you have created so far!

You can now go back to your edit profile, and type some extras about your books, movies, music, and TV if you wish. Remember to always preview profile and save all changes. I will cover the more detailed MySpace fluff in my next article, "How To Spice Up Your MySpace Page!" I will also cover posting comments on your friends profiles. I gave you my page name that I have had for a while, but I made a page with you for this article and subsequent articles. If you want to be friends with my writer page, I am also Surfcritter. Look me up, I am always willing to help!

Stephanie Haile AKA Wavecritter AKA Surfcritter Google Me

Have You been enjoying your site at MySpace but want a bit more happening on your page? Let's get started with some music, my personal favorite. You can go to your edit profile page and delete your original song choice if you want to get a player. There are several sites to visit to get a music player that will hold more than the one song. I will introduce you to a project playlist song list creator.

Let's get started with some music, my personal favorite. You can go to your edit profile page and delete your original song choice if you want to get a player. There are several sites to visit to get a music player that will hold more than the one song. I will introduce you to a project playlist song list creator. I think the players are sleek and the song choices are varied and numerous. Open a separate browser window (the tab up under the address bar) and search for song lists, players, or play lists, choose a playlist builder or song project site.

Welcome to the playlist creator site. Click on the my account tab, then 'click here' to create a free account. Follow the fields on the page, click create new account. Step 2 is a short free offer section that you can fill out or click no thanks, continue to my account. Now, we log in and let's make a playlist. You can come back to this page another time and upload a photo, and set up your profile page. It will be great practice, so save this page as a favorite.

Choose click here to search for music and type in the bar an artist name, song title, a combination of both, or even just a word to get a variety of ideas for song choices.

Once you find a song to add to your playlist, check to make sure it plays nicely by clicking the green arrow. If you are happy with the sound, click the plus sign. If you forget to check the song, you can always play it here. This will take you to 'click here to create a playlist' and success, you have added your first song! Click continue if you would like more songs. Just keep with the steps, type an artist or song, view, listen, add, continue.

When you have added all the songs that you want, click go to my playlists instead of continue. Click on the name of your playlist. Here you have the option to arrange your songs, delete them, or add to your list. Make sure to save changes when you move the song order around before you go to delete or add a song or you will have to rearrange your list again. There are options below your playlist for sharing your playlist. Choose generate code to copy and paste your playlist into your MySpace edit profile section under any empty box you have, or choose post to MySpace. Follow the instructions listed there. You can post any of your playlists to many other sites, by choosing the post to MySpace option.

When you start adding more than one item code in each box of the edit profile section, take care. Always be sure to leave spaces between the codes. And with a code for a graphic, player, video, any code that will take up a limited space, not your profile code and not a contact table code, but any code that is going to create an image in a set area, you will type at the very end a small HTML code to create a space break. This is done with no spaces, touching the very last character of your source code. I am going to type this with spaces because it will not show up on an HTML compatible screen as the type, but it will actually create a space and it no longer shows up. OK, type < Br > all together with no spaces touching the last of the code like a tail. Preview your profile to check and view if there is enough room between the shown items. If not, go back and add one more set of < Br >. Then, save and view your profile. This will help you add two or three separate codes and items in each one of the edit boxes but keep your page uniform looking, not all bunched together. Also, some items if run together will not function. If you come across a malfunction, try to put the new item near something else. If two items are animated or interactive, they may not sit well together. Spacing these items in separate boxes is the best plan to prevent any future problems. If you ever forget which code goes where, go view your profile, and see where they are and count the number of items per the section, if it is the second item, delete the second code, again, this is a great reason why you left spaces between the codes.

Now that you have a good sized music selection, let's visit sparkle tags. There are over 4000 images and 83 different categories of images on this site. Again, feel free to use your search engine for MySpace images, but this is a great site to get going with. I will walk you through posting a Thanks For The Add comment to post on your new friends comments area on their profile. First, choose one of the categories for Thanks graphics. You might get an ad showing but you have the option to skip it. Scroll down and find the one that you would like to use, on this site just moving your cursor over the code will highlight it, and right click and copy. This is becoming quite comfortable now, isn't it? Go to your MySpace page, click on the friends picture to go to their profile page, scroll down to the add comment link, click it, place your saved code in the add comment box by either Ctrl v or by right clicking and pasting. If you want to add text as well to your comment, type it either before or after your code, being sure to leave spaces between the text and code. Click post comment. You will then view the comment you wish to post to be sure it is the one you wanted, and click to post again. Some pages you will need to complete the "capcha" box. View your friends profile and see what you have posted, now some friends will wish to approve the comment before it gets posted, with these friends you will need to wait until later to view your own comment, but be excited for yourself that you now can post to all of your friends comment boxes with graphics instead of just typing text. Also, a heads up, some friends have their comments set to only accept text. Not much fun, but some comments can slow a pages loading time.

On to polls, clocks, and generally nifty graphics. There are a few very good sites to find these items. For all of the clocks and generators of all kinds search myspace generators. They are listed under generators because they are animated but they are put on your site exactly the same way as a graphic. No worries for you!

Bulletins and Blogs are two very different types of postings. A bulletin is a posting that you will send to your entire friend list. A blog stays right on your page and each friend has the option to either come to visit your profile and read it or subscribe to your blog postings and get notified as you post a new one. Read others bulletins and blogs to see what others do here.

I saved the very best thing to add to your page (next to music, of course) for last. The almighty Guestbook! This is the most fun for you because every time you view your own profile, you can see the pictures and comments your friends put on your now signed guestbook. Go to slide.com, sign up for a free membership, and click on make a guestbook. You can also create a slide show here to post on your site! Slide has brilliantly generic and basic instruction from this point, I do not even need to say it here. Follow the instruction from Slide and from our steps of copy and paste before and you have got yourself an awesome way for friends to leave a bit of themselves on your page forever! Comments get bumped down by newer ones as time rolls on.

Well, I am proud of your page without even seeing it yet! Awesome job, look me up or Google me, make me a long time friend and let me know if I can help out with your pages. You are well on your way to mastering HTML, even though you think you have just learned one small code, you have been seeing them. Getting comfortable with the look of an HTML code is half the battle. My next article will cover basic HTML codes. Stay tuned for "Basic HTML Codes With Tips and Tricks".

Stephanie Haile aka Wavecritter Google Me

Wavecritter on MySpace!