Best solution for a website for a christening present?

March 1, 2005 10:12 AM

I have a friend whose baby is getting christened. As a little present I'd like to provide them with an easy-to-operate website through which they can store and display photos of the child as he progresses, and supply news (essentially a blogging factor). Though I'll be setting it up and am pretty good at tech-stuff, the operators of the website (the parents) aren't so it'll need to be as simple as possible for them to do things like upload photos and post news of the baby. PHP content management systems seem like the logical solution, and I've looked at a few ideas (like using Gallery for the photos, and embedding it in a site) but I was wondering what do you all recommend?
posted by uk_giffo to computers & internet (14 comments total)

I cannot be of any direct help, I'm afraid, but FWIW I think it's a really neat idea. Hopefully the parents will keep their end of the deal...
posted by AwkwardPause at 10:29 AM on March 1, 2005

I did something similar to this. I gave the couple Wordpress for their blog, and used Gallery (as an external link) for the photos. They are completely clueless about computers, and after a couple of minutes of training they got the hang of it.
posted by Doug at 10:31 AM on March 1, 2005

I have a number of gallery websites up and running, including one for each of my two kids. The nice thing about gallery is that you set up the pictures now, and worry about embedding it later.

Geeklog is secure, and works well with Gallery from what I understand. Although I run both Geeklog and Gallery, I've never had the need to tie them together, but all the hooks are there.

I've been using Gallery for years, and Geeklog for about a year. Let me know if you have any questions. I'd be happy to point you to some of the sites I have up.
posted by bh at 10:40 AM on March 1, 2005

Maybe something like this: www.virtualbabybook.com?

Seems to me like you're kind of savvy, so maybe you can set it up for the parents and then they'll have GUI to update stuff without having to know HTML or programming.

HTH!
posted by absquatulate at 10:41 AM on March 1, 2005

A Wordpress weblog takes about five minutes to set up. Photostack photo galleries are pretty attractive out of the box and also take about five minutes to set up.
posted by ubernostrum at 11:14 AM on March 1, 2005

The Trixie Update is the quintessential baby blog. I know that the author is working on a full fledged web application to replicate the functionality, it may be worthwhile to contact him and see how it's coming.
posted by cedar at 12:37 PM on March 1, 2005

IMHO, keep it simple. Blogger with BlogSpot hosting is so easy to use... and Flickr can post photos to Blogger blogs.

Flickr, of course, is a blast in itself, and on its own is a very cool way to share photos and commentary. But, if your friends will also be posting non-photo news you'll need a blog app.

See what BizStone does with Blogger & Flickr. Simple & classy.
posted by Tubes at 3:57 PM on March 1, 2005

Yeah, sounds like you want, well, a blog.

I'd recommend springing for someone that provides the service rather than providing the service yourself, because "sysadmin for friends" is sort of like "loans money to friends" in the wealth of negative outcomes. "Five minutes to set up" is great, but "needs upgrading four years from now" less so, and "damn, it crashed and the backup was no good and say, you have copies of all those pictures, right" much, much less so. It's hard to do managed hosting for one person because you can't take advantage of the economy of scale and when there is stuff you need to do but do not want to do Right Then it becomes a job.

LiveJournal does blog plus photo hosting for $25/year and lets you point your own domain name at your journal. TypePad is a bit bloggier than that but for the photo-hosting package you're looking at $90/year. Tubes' Blogger+Flickr suggestion seems workable too, although there are advantages to going with a single service.
posted by mendel at 6:03 PM on March 1, 2005

If all they need is the ability to post photos with comments, try Pixelpost. It's the easiest and most simple to use photolog software I've ever seen. But if your friends needed to post a blogish entry without posting a photo at the same time, then it won't work for them. Another downside is there's no ability to have multiple users.

Check it out and see what you think. It's certainly a heck of a lot easier than hacking a photolog module on to Wordpress, which is what I was trying to do before I found PP.
posted by the_W at 7:04 PM on March 1, 2005

I gave my dad WordPress and Flickr for Christmas. He hasn't posted once. If you do go that route, be sure to ease them into the usage of it, and explain it in very non-scary terms.

I think Tubes is probably right, that Blog*Spot and Flickr might be the way to go.
posted by Alt F4 at 7:14 PM on March 1, 2005

(I work for the company that makes TypePad.) I've found that most of the folks I get set up on TypePad actually keep blogging, whereas those I've put on geekier free apps (various) tend to abandon.

I'd probably set them up with TypePad, since it's got photo albums and blogs, or maybe on Friendster Blogs, which is based on TypePad too.
posted by anildash at 12:09 AM on March 2, 2005

Contact lebonze.com
They have exactly what you're looking for: an all-in-one blog+flickr thing for babies. (They called it a "babyblog").
Plus, they're really nice folks. :)
posted by ruelle at 2:50 AM on March 2, 2005

Are you sure they want a blog for their baby? Before you jump into the project, sound them out on the idea. They'll be really busy with the kid.
posted by Carol Anne at 5:53 AM on March 2, 2005

I installed Gallery on a new website for my nephew, and uploaded some lovely photos of him, but his Mum and Dad turned out to be paranoid about his pictures being up on the web, and I ended up having to take it down, even though I had tried to explain about registered users and passwords etc.

So - if you think they might freak out then put everything behind a password just in case, to reassure them.
posted by suleikacasilda at 3:44 PM on March 2, 2005