About Us and FAQ

What's this site all about? This site is a directory and an aggregator of blog content from blogs all over Central Oregon. We have blogs from Bend, Redmond, Prineville, Sisters, Terrebonne, Sunriver, La Pine, Crooked River Ranch and Madras listed in the directory.

Why "Bend Blogs" if you're listing stuff from all over? 1) Because Bend is the biggest city in the area. 2) Because it has a catchy ring to it. 3) Because the bulk majority of the blogs here are from Bend. 4) Because the domain was available. 5) ???

What is a weblog/blog? Short Version: A weblog is typically a frequently updated site with entries listed in reverse-chronological order. Long version: here.

How do I start a Web log? There are a zillion services out there that will provide hosting and software to create a Web log. You can see a few comparison charts of the various services here, here, here, here, here, and here. Or pay these folks and if they're not too slammed, they should be able to help you out and at least get something basic up and going for you.

How do I make my blog not suck? I thought about writing a long diatribe about how things should be done, but this article sums is up so much better.

How do I get my site listed on BendBlogs.com? It's pretty simple: fill out our submit form, and wait for us to list it.

How long until I get listed? About 48-72 hours, but sometimes as long as a week (this site is done as a hobby, after all, and Real Life™ takes priority). Unless you send us a bucketload of cash or keys to a new car, then you'll be listed in about 15 minutes.

How do I change details of my listing? Head back over to our submit form and under "Type Of Submission" select "Change to Existing Listing," fill it out, submit.

How did you find my site? Are you stalking me? We wish we had that kind of time on my hands. In reality, we just run a few simple queries in Google to come up with the sites that get listed here. This is by all means not a comprehensive directory, as we not only didn't include blogs that hadn't been updated in a long time, but also haven't really combed through all the pages I have bookmarked in quite a while.

I want off!!! Get my site off here before my parents find it! If you didn't want your parents to find out about how you got really drunk with all your friends or about all the crazy crap you did down at Mardi Gras or anything like that, maybe putting them on the Web in the first place isn't such a good idea. Just the same, just use our submit form and under "Type Of Submission" select "Remove My Listing," fill it out, submit.

How do I change the little icon next to my posts? Those little icons are called FavIcons. If you're using one of the many free blog hosting services, you often can't customize your FavIcon, as you're unable to upload files to your server. But if you are able to store the file somewhere with a static URL, go over to our submit form and under "Type Of Submission" select "Change to Existing Listing," fill it out with your URL for your site and your URL to your FavIcon, hit submit, wash, rinse, repeat.

How often are the articles updated? Our spider goes out on the Web on the top of the hour to download new content from the sites listed here. Sometimes, depending on how fast your site is and the responsiveness of your syndication feed, your site will be missed on one update, but will get hit and download the next update. Just be patient, and it will appear within a couple hours of you posting it, and e-mailing us a hundred times won't speed up the process.

Are you making money on this? Don't we all wish we were paid for doing what we love? However, if you're interested in donating to the cause, doing it via Jake's blog is probably the best bet, or e-mail us using the form below.

What other fun things should I know? The general public is allowed to tag indvidual entries. Just browse down to an individual entry on the site by clicking on the "#" next the entry title and have at it.

What is this site powered by? This site wouldn't even be remotely possible without Gregarius. It's a stupidly powerful chunk of software.

Who created this mess? Long-time central Oregon resident (since 1978) Jake Ortman has been reading other Central Oregon blogs since he started his own, even making several great friends through them. He kept a list of links on his site with the few sites he knew about, but as he was discovering more and more local blogs he was having a hard time keeping track of all of them. And he also knew that a lot of other locals wanted to be able to keep track of local blogs as well, so this site was born as not only something for him to use, but as a community service to folks in Bend, Redmond, Sisters, Prineville, LaPine, Terrebone, and even Sunriver who want to keep up on local blogs, journals, weblogs and the blogging community.

Is there a LinkedIn group for BendBlogs.com? There sure is! Click here for details.

Are you for hire? For the right price, aren't we all? Jake Ortman's the guy responsible for this site, and you can read all about him and view his resume here.

Can I e-mail you? Sure, just use the form below:

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