If you would like to become a contributor to En Banc, please call editor Eric Howard at LACBA at 213.896.6456. Be ready to provide your name and an email address to which the invitation will be sent. A short biographical statement is also needed. Once you receive the invitation via email, please follow the instructions below.
Thank you for agreeing to become a contributor to En Banc, the Los Angeles County Bar Blog. The next step is to sign up on the blog's online list. To do this, we will send (or we may have already sent) an invitation by e-mail. To those who have signed up for discussion boards or similar online forums, the signup procedure should be easy to follow. But if you have trouble with any of this, feel free to call Eric Howard at the Association at 213.896.6456 for help.
This invitation will come from TypePad, the company that hosts the blog. The invitation headline should say something like this: The Los Angeles County Bar Association has invited you to join the Los Angeles County Bar Blog.
When you open the e-mail, it should have wording like this:
Dear [Your Name]:
You have been invited by Los Angeles County Bar Association to be an author of The Los Angeles County Bar Blog.Personal message from Los Angeles County Bar Association:
I'd like to invite you to contribute to my weblog, The Los Angeles County Bar Blog. Just follow the instructions in this email message, and you'll be able to quickly sign up for the service and post within minutes.
Accept or decline this invitation.
The line that begins "Accept or decline..." should be hyperlinked. Click on the link.
A browser window should appear that will offer you choices. One choice, in red, will be to decline the invitation. The other choice or choices, in green, will be to accept the invitation.
Chances are you do not already have a TypePad account. (You would likely know if you do.) If you do not, the "Accept" choice will offer you two options. One is a simple login with your name and password, which you can use if you already have a TypePad account.
The other option for accepting the invitation is to create a TypePad account before you can begin. This option should have wording like this: "Don't have a Typepad Account? Register for Free." Click on that. You will be directed to a page that will ask you for some information: your e-mail address, password, confirm password, first name, last name, and birth date. Fill out this online form.
Here is what the form looks like:
You will also need to click on the empty square to confirm that you agree to the terms of service, and you will probably elect to click on the square that is already checked that signs you up for monthly e-mail alerts. That is, change the square that isn't checked to checked, and the one that is checked to unchecked. (Yes, that's silly. But they want to know if you are a human who is paying a attention or just a machine trying to make spam.)
Here's what the choices look like:
You should change the choices to this:
Then click on Create Your Account. If the form has been filled out properly (that is, the e-mail address appears valid, the twice-entered password matches, and so on), you may next see a dialog box warning you that you are about to be redirected to a nonsecure page and asking if you want to continue. Click Yes.
The next page will thank you for registering and tell you that an e-mail has been sent to the address you provided to confirm your registration. Click on Accept the Invitation. You may also check your e-mail to see that you received the confirmation, and use the link provided in the e-mail to access your new account. If you save that e-mail, you can use the link to access the page later. You can also bookmark (or save as a favorite) the page in your browser.
Either way, you will be directed back to a TypePad page that tells you that you have been added to the weblog and that you can begin a new post by clicking the "Begin a new post" link. This Begin a new post link appears in a rectangular box. Go ahead and try it, and bookmark the page so you can go straight to it later.
At this point, the registration is complete, and you are ready to create blog posts. If you have trouble with any of this, feel free to call Eric Howard at the Association at 213.896.6456 for help in getting started or send us an email: [email protected]
Now you are ready to create an entry, and that is the subject of the next part of this instruction sheet.