Attendees of End Bloglessness can do these three things to help us start quickly:

Buy your hosting package and domain name. Not sure who to use? Try Bluehost.com. Domain name is free with a 1 year purchase (we don’t get any money from you hosting with them). Download the plugins we’ll be installing at http://www.beerandblog.com/plugins.zip Download the theme we’re going to start you out with http://getk2.com/download/

Ok, looking forward to seeing you all soon!!

As part of our one year celebration, we want to offer the past year’s worth of wisdom that we’ve built up to help you launch your blog. We’re looking for all of those folks that have wanted their own hosted blog. End Bloglessness will be a 4 hour, 4 session workshop. We’ll be meeting at CubeSpace on Saturday, January 10th from 12:00-5:00pm.

Saturday, January 10th from 12:00-5:00pm Session Format Each session will be 1 hour: 15 minute presentation and 45 minutes of assisted help. During assisted help, attendees can raise their hands to get help from one of our assistants. Assistants are folks from the Portland tech scene that have done this process before who can help you with your questions. Agenda

Session 1 - Install your blog 12:00-1:00pm; Session 2 - Configure your blog 1:00-2:00pm; Session 3 - Stylize your blog 2:00-3:00pm; Session 4 - Connect with other bloggers on Twitter, by Kelly Guimont (@verso) 3:00-4:00pm; 4:00-5:00pm will be an open help time to ask help with anything you’d like.

What to expect We are focusing on launching WordPress blogs for this workshop. We’re also focusing on self-hosted blogs, so you’ll need a hosting plan and your access information with you at the workshop to get assisted help. Owning your own hosting account, and therefore your blog, is important and the reason we want to do this workshop is to expand access to blog ownership to more people. By the time you leave the workshop, you’ll have a blog that is ready to go and some direction on how to connect with other local bloggers. We are expecting people from all skill levels, including the technically challenged. Everyone will be treated with respect and will be encouraged. Help us get the word out! Most of the people we’re hoping to reach are either to far outside of our social circles or are offline completely. We could use your help in letting people know about this free workshop to get a blog up and running. We don’t care if your motivation to blog is personal, professional, or political; we’ll help you get one up and running.

Tweet the link to this page http://is.gd/ePLs Email this page to a friend RSVP on Upcoming and Calagator Tell someone in real life using your voice. Crazy, huh?

Why is this free? We’re hoping to make new friends and be good citizens. We don’t want to be an insular group, so we want to enable others to join. And, because we’re Portlanders inspired by other Portlanders to DIY and that Yes We Can.
Help out If you have experience with installing WordPress, we’d love to have you help answer people’s questions. Contact Michelle if you’re interested in helping!

In honor of the Release of WordPress 2.7 the organizers of WordcampPDX are hosting an upgrade/switchover party at CubeSpace this Friday! In case you haven’t heard about the new WordPress 2.7, I can assure you updates are plentiful. Personally, I’m diggin’ the ability to upload media to the Media Library without having to create a post and the drop-down menus on the left in the admin panel. The new interface is not only purdy, it’s functional, too. Not using WordPress? They’ll help you migrate. WordPress users who want assistance upgrading to the new hotness? They’ll hold your hand and tell you to remember to breathe. Keep in mind that Beer and Blog will start at 5:30pm, a little later that usual, to coincide with the start of the WordPress 2.7 release party. And while there’s bound to be a couple of us at our regular haunt at the Green Dragon waiting until it’s time to party at CubeSpace, the extra time will give you extra time to grab some brews. It’s BYOB, baby! Join your Beer and Blog friends and celebrate the bells-and-whistles of the new WordPress 2.7. RSVP on upcoming!

During my WordCamp presentation, I shared that the WordPress bookmarklet, called Press This, was the Jesus. I use it for two primary reasons:

To quickly create microposts, and To reblog from one blog to another.

I use password-protected WordPress installs to coordinate blogging activity with other people. I recently converted Press This for use in a theme so we can easily reblog anything shared in that back channel. The bookmarklet works by passing data through the URL. So, to add Press This to a theme, you simply a link to your theme formatted like the URLs spit out by the bookmarklet, but using WordPress template tags to populate the content. The receiving WordPress install will process the link created by both the bookmarklet and the reblog link exactly the same, which is to spawn your blog’s admin in a new window with the content prepopulated. Now, you have a chance to remove any sensitive content, add context, and any other edits you need to complete your reblog. See, I told you Press This was the Jesus

Wordpress Ecosystems View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: wordpress ecosystems)

Ok, I uploaded my slides to SlideShare and have embedded them in this post for reference. Bram Pitoyo did a thorough job of taking notes on my session, for which I am much obliged! Thanks, man! Nate DiNiro was kind enough to video record my talk, so I’ll be posting that soonly here as well. About WordCamp Portland I really enjoyed WordCamp Portland and was honored to be a part of it. The night before was a great time at Beer and Blog getting the festivities rolling. I’ll post an update on Beer and Blog shortly with some pics from that party. It was really nice to meet Lorelle and Jane, who both helped make the event special. Last night, I browsed around Flickr and Twitter enjoying some good photos and commentary. I also have a good number of business cards from people I met and more folks that have added me on various services. I’m looking forward to following up on all of these fresh opportunities over the next week. Acknowledgements Seriously, great work everyone. I’m still buzzing today. I had no idea the WordPress community had come to mean so much to me.

Aaron Hockley and crew for pulling it together!! Lorelle and Jane for making us more popular than Matt did Utah
Nate DiNiro for recording my talk CubeSpace was an excellent host as always The sponsors rule for making the event possible! I’m proud that my company, Voce, was a top sponsor! All the attendees! I look forward to talking more with the folks I met and to catch up online with those I didn’t.