Great Bear Lake Web Studio (GBLWS) is a growing Website that offers free Websites for people (guinea pigs) wanting their own Website that they can manage and personalize themselves using the powerful content management system (CMS) Joomla! In exchange for the free Website I need feedback on the ease or difficulty of using Joomla and what will make it better. My goal is to use the feedback and to develop an easy Website for people to use and manage as well as develop an easy to follow instruction guide. For example, it needs to be easy for the user to change text and pictures as well as layout.

Guinea pigs can keep the sites they claim for free in exchange for feedback relating to the site's ease of use, design, and development.

Sites to choose will be announced on the Blog so be sure to follow that page. When you find something you like just send me an email and I'll give you access to the site. Joomla has thousands of extensions that can be added to your site. For example: an image slideshow/gallery, portfolio, ads and affiliates, shopping carts, calendars, maps, weather forecasts, chatroom, auction, forms, podcasts, video, games, twitter/facebook, and many other extensions. Your job is to play with the extensions you're interested in adding to your site, and my job is to help you set them up as easily as possible. I'm a college student and am learning Web design/development.....this is my passion!

My goals:

1. The best customer service
2. Design/develop perfect Websites for clients

What is Joomla? It's an award-winning content management system. It can be used to build Websites such as personal, family, school, church, community-based portals, non-profit, small business, government, eCommerce, online reservations, online magazines/newspapers, as well as corporate Websites. The Joomla about page has the following list as an example of sites that use Joomla.

Here are just a few examples of Websites that use Joomla:

• MTV Networks Quizilla (Social networking) - http://www.quizilla.com
• IHOP (Restaurant chain) - http://www.ihop.com
• Harvard University (Educational) - http://gsas.harvard.edu
• Citibank (Financial institution intranet) - Not publicly accessible
• The Green Maven (Eco-resources) - http://www.greenmaven.com
• Outdoor Photographer (Magazine) - http://www.outdoorphotographer.com
• PlayShakespeare.com (Cultural) - http://www.playshakespeare.com
• Senso Interiors (Furniture design) - http://www.sensointeriors.co.za

Ready to get started? Email me, Admin: Connie, and I'll get you setup as a guinea pig!