Myspace.com has made a big splash on the internet because it gives thousands of people their own free sites where they can keep in touch with old friends, meet new ones, talk about themselves, and pretty much write the stories of their own lives.
Myspace has places for people who just want to meet new people and talk to others. It also has its own little communities where people with similar hobbies and interests can hang out and jam on forums. Some niche groups on myspace, for example, are about skateboarding, and a lot of passionate skateboarders from all over the world have joined myspace to meet people with similar interests.
If you're serious about skateboarding and want to connect with other skateboarders, try making your own entry on Myspace.com. It's easy to design your own space. There are dozens of reliable places online where you can download codes, layouts, graphics, and music to spice up your personal page. Some of these sites even help skateboarders find good layouts for their MySpace pages.
But any artist knows that just having the materials isn't enough. If you want people to notice what you're doing, you have to be creative and put your heart into it. Here are some tips I stole from friends who skateboard and also do things like make music and design graphics. These examples might help you and also get your creative juices flowing.
Graphic Ideas: A website without graphics is like a cake without frosting, cherries, and chocolate flakes. Not even interesting. Your opening page has to tell people who you are at a glance, whether it's a picture of you and your girl as the background, a splash of your favourite movie or anime character, or a picture of your favourite skateboard. One of my karate club friends used a picture of himself getting kicked so hard that he flew off the ground as his background to show how creative he was. It hurts, but it's funny to watch. Another one of my friends drew a charcoal sketch of himself and scanned it for his room. You can do a lot in this area if you can draw, paint, or make graphics on a computer.
People often say, "Music, Baby!" or "Life Has a Soundtrack." Aside from the songs you put in your car or CD player when you're skating, there are songs that just seem to play in the background when Wierd Things happen in your life... If you know what I'm talking about, this is one way to make the layout of your MySpace page more interesting.
In the Photo and Video Galleries, you can start to get funky. People can get a sense of who you are and what you do from the photo galleries you set up. Some of the things I've seen my friends do are: Winning shots of all his skateboarding stunts and competitions, a Bloopers gallery showing every crash and burn on a board, a Skateboard collection (all of them personally tricked up and spraypainted with awesome designs), and even a Tattoo Art gallery for one of our friends who skateboards, surfs, and owns a tattoo parlour down by the beach.
Blog your Stuff - Last but not least, this is the modern version of those cheesy leather-bound diaries we see old-fashioned gentlemen and ladies writing in. We write about things on blogs these days. Every day, write down your thoughts and experiences here. Your brain's caffeine level is probably the only real limit to what you can write. You can rant, rave, or brag about your latest accomplishments. You can also ask questions that your readers may be able to answer (or make a joke about). Some MySpace layouts also let you set up surveys for your friends to fill out when they visit your page. This way, you can ask strange questions that are best thought about while drunk.
