One of the basic principles of Paganlink (it'd be called a 'mission statement' these days) is to make Pagan and magickal ways accessible to anyone who is seeking them. The web is an excellent way of doing this, whether by letting people know what's going on in their local area, or by making training material available.

What do I put on my page?

An example of a local information page is the Paganism in Edinburgh site. This page includes listings of local pagan events (both regular and one-off), a selection of shops and a pub or two. The page could also do with a listing of local organisations - not all of them have regular meetings. There are also plans to include a section on sacred sites in the area - you can see the links commented out in the page source.

Alternatively, you might have lots of useful information about a particular path. Perhaps you've been teaching for years and would like to make some of that knowledge more widely available.

Where do I put it?

Most Internet Service Providers include a certain amount of web space in their standard package. There are also a number of free web-hosting services. Many of them insist on advertising banners. GeoCities is the best-known of these, but they've been known to claim copyright on your own material, plant web bugs on people looking at your site and then insist on advertising banners on top of this! The PJ Mallard Guide to Free Things on the Internet Free Web Space page is a UK-based resource which "provides information on the best services available to host your web site, whether it is a personal or business site. It also aims to include profiles of the hosting services that you should avoid". The Free Pages Page is a worldwide review of the available services. There are also some specifically Pagan (and Pagan-friendly) web-hosting services.

If you are a student or member of staff at a university, you might have some space on the institution's web server for personal pages. Some universities do not give personal web space to students, but may allow pages for clubs and societies.

How do I do it?

There are loads of books on HTML on the shelves of bookshops. This is surprising, because it isn't that difficult! I have composed a document which contains hints and tips for simple but effective web pages. It can also act as a very basic HTML tutorial. There's also a list of resources for HTML and web design.

Okay, I did it! Now what?

You'll want to check out Search Engine Watch which tells you how to submit your site to search engines and make sure people can find it.